My father passed away a year ago today. Juan Adolfo Singer, born in 1935 in Uruguay. Raised by a single mother, a Romanian immigrant who had a small farm. Started working at 13. Was elected to congress at 31. He loved politics and he loved his country. He was highly intelligent and an incredible decision maker- logical, practical and unwavering. This clarity and logic didn’t always apply to his personal life. He made mistakes, some of them bad. He was maddeningly frugal but he allowed himself some small luxuries, such as a bottle of Veuve or a new leather wristband for his decades-old Omega watch. Here he is, with his watch and his champagne. He loved this apartment by the beach, where we’d spend the summer. I hated the furniture, but I felt at home there. I got to spend quality time with him there, and now that place is gone, and he too is gone. A parent dies and with them goes an entire swath of your life. It is a tectonic shift. And yet amid all the pain, the love remains intact, it even grows. I’m not idealizing him now that he’s no longer here, but he loved me deeply and I could feel that in my bones. And that is one of the greatest gifts he left behind. Gracias, papá.