I am scooping oatmeal into a little bowl in the Delta Sky lounge and crying a few tears into the heap of brown sugar dolloped on top. My father loved oatmeal, the more brown sugar the better. I am here today because of him.

My flight leaves in a couple of hours for the AWP conference in LA, the Association of Writers and Writing Programs held each year in different literary cities across the US. In 2011, fourteen years ago, I boarded another plane for Seattle to take a six-week writing course with The Writer’s Workshop not because I could write but because I wanted to try. I was a mom of three fabulous young adults who had moved on; it was my turn.

Duck to water so they say: my first essay, The Bitter and The Sweet, was about helping my father through cancer while the echoes of my mother’s illness and death were still fresh in my bones. Sitting vigil next to my dad’s bed in what were to be his final days I heard a ‘ping’ on my computer informing me that this piece had been accepted for publication. I told him, not sure he could hear me. He opened his eyes and said “that is so great, I knew you could.” He did? We had never talked about it. But there it was, at the ninth hour, his appreciation, validation and nod towards my new career. I was fifty-two-years old.

Today, eight pieces published, hours and years of workshops, mentors, writing groups, butt-in-the-chair marathons, hundreds of submissions I am headed to what feels irreverently like the Disney Land of writing: hundreds of panels to choose from, readings, a book fair of your dreams, me and over 9,000 people will attend in-person and virtually for four days.

I dig into my breakfast which is swimming in cream and sprinkled with another of his other favorite cereals — Raisin Bran — and toast him. I miss him and appreciate him with each little success.

It matters what you say to people anytime, anywhere, whether you truly understand what they are doing or why they are doing it or whether you agree or not. Encouragement and faith from others means the world. Believe me.

Here’s to you, Grandad.