We each got to remember him our own way

One family, three children, and three very different ways of keeping their father close.

When my husband died, one of the things I hadn't really thought about was what would happen to his ashes.

We have three children, all adults now, and at first I think we were approaching it like there was one decision we needed to make as a family.

What are we going to do with Dad?

Except the more we talked about it, the more obvious it became that there wasn't one answer.

They had each had their own relationship with him.

They missed different things about him. They had different memories. And they each had a completely different idea of what they wanted to keep close.

So we decided to divide his ashes through Family Share™ and let each of them choose for themselves.

And I think that ended up being one of the nicest decisions we made.

Our daughter chose a memorial diamond that she had set into a necklace.

She wanted something she could wear. Something small and private that could be with her every day. Unless she tells you what the diamond is, you would never know.

But she knows.

Our oldest son went in a completely different direction.

He and his dad were car people.

There were so many conversations about cars in our house that the rest of us stopped listening years ago. They went to shows together, worked on cars together and could spend an unreasonable amount of time debating some tiny detail the rest of us couldn't care less about.

So he chose a Memorial Riser™ with an Amalgam model car.

When I saw it, I actually laughed a little because it was so them.

It wasn't what I would have chosen.

But that was exactly the point.

Our youngest chose an embellished painting.

He's always been more sentimental about the home and the things he surrounds himself with. He found a piece of art he loved and had some of his dad's ashes incorporated into the paint when the artist embellished it.

Now it hangs in his home.

Three children.

The same dad.

Three completely different ways of remembering him.

I think that's what I appreciate most about what we did.

Nobody had to compromise and choose the thing that worked well enough for everyone. Nobody had to agree on what Dad's memorial should look like.

They could ask themselves something much more personal:

What would make me feel close to him?

For one, it was something she could wear.

For another, it was something connected to a passion they shared.

For the third, it was something beautiful he could live with in his home.

And somehow, seeing all three feels more like my husband than choosing one thing ever could have.

Because he wasn't exactly the same person to each of us.

He was Dad to all three of them.

But each of them had their own Dad.

Their own jokes. Their own traditions. Their own conversations and memories that belonged just to them.

Now they each have a little piece of him, too.

And they got to decide what that piece would become.