I could not be at your birthdays, so I imagined them.

I could not teach you to drive, so I taught you in my head, every year, a little older.

I could not walk you down any aisle, so I walked a thousand imaginary ones.

They took my life, Nadine, but they could not take what I did with the inside of my own mind, and what I did with it was be your father.

Every single day.

That is how I survived.