dad, dark humor, & no kings

On this day 15 years ago, I got the phone call that my dad had died. I hadn’t known grief could tear you open like that and leave you bleeding for years. The weirdest side effect has been an occasionally macabre sense of humor.

At the World Fantasy Convention in 2012, I ended up in a conversation with Bill Willingham while Holly Black and Harry Goldblatt and some others were glued to their phones, monitoring announcements from the awards ceremony, which led to him making some comment about texting, which made me realize something that struck me as utterly hilarious:

“My dad told me I’d get texting over his dead body. Then he died. So I did.”

This might have been a little too dark for Bill, but it still makes me laugh.

Dad’s name was Dick King. (I know!) So I’ve been snickering since I realized the official anniversary of his death this year is also NO KINGS DAY. That macabre sense of humor has reappeared, and I didn’t know how much I needed that breath of levity in the seriousness of today and our increasingly fascist administration. And to be clear: I am hoping to share the smile, not detract from the seriousness of the day and current events.

Maybe this sort of humor gives the impression I wasn’t close with my dad, but that’s only because you never got to see our brand of theatre at work. We were sometimes nicknamed The Daddy and Missy Show for a reason.

He might be 15 years dead, but that’s not going to stop me from razzing him. I think he’d appreciate it.