My dad died this morning. I was working overnight at Walmart, and I received the phone call from my Uncle Jack around 3AM, during the "lunch time". The hospital had just called him, then he called me right away. I took the phone out in the hallway by the break room, and once I heard the news, I started crying. There were people by the time clock, and when they saw me starting to cry, they all asked if I was OK, if they could help, etc. I kept nodding my head, crying, and talking to my uncle at the same time. I walked down the hall a bit, to a corner, and continued talking to him. Since I was facing into the corner, I didn't see anyone walking towards me; Christine, my immediate boss (Assistant Manager) came up behind me, patting me on the back. I turned around and she was crying, too, and she gave me a huge hug. She stayed right with me for the minute or two it took to finish my phone call with Uncle Jack, and she made sure I was ok. I then explained to her what my uncle had told me, then she said I could go home if I wanted. I didn't want to leave because I deal with things much better when I keep busy. If I came home, I'd have a lot to think about and no one to talk to unless my mother happened to be up, so I stayed there around a lot of people. Since we are closed during the night, everyone in there was an employee and they all know me. It's such a great "little" family at that store. I totally love working for Walmart, especially this particular store.

After about a half hour of being back on the floor (we are doing "mod re-sets", rearranging old merchandise and getting ready for the new merchandise coming in. I only work overnights when they need me, otherwise I'm on the salesfloor during the day.), anyway, after a bit, my "former" boss (Jesse) came over and gave me a hug, too. He is such a doll. He's young (very early 20's), but he has the Leadership Qualities that are so important to being an excellent leader. I'm very protective and motherly towards him, which he finds so funny. He went to overnights permanently about two months ago, but he was my original boss when I was hired over a year ago, and up until they shook everything up by switching all the boss's hours around. One of my coworkers even gave me a hug. Brenda Lee, another wonderful boss, came in this morning for the day shift, and when I told her about it, she even hugged me!!

I called Uncle Jack once I got home, and North Carolina will have to embalm the body so they can send it on the airplane back to Indiana. The funeral will be held whenever I want it, so I changed my flight from North Carolina to Indiana. I was able to change the destination, but not the days. Otherwise, I would be paying tons of money. It will be kind of nice to go back to Indiana.

It's so strange not to have my dad be-bopping somewhere on this earth. We didn't talk incredibly often, but even when we weren't in touch, I knew where he was. And that's a nice feeling to know that as soon as he gets internet accesss, he'd drop me an email, or a letter, or even a phone call. Or, I'd write to him, and know that once he got back, he'd get it. There was always the thread of a connection, even if it was sometimes just a quick call or a one sentence email. Half of my DNA is gone. That' s a strange feeling.