Remembering

Need More Air

This week, I received a box with some folders in it, and some old pictures as well. Among the contents was a small gathering of papers from 1989, papers written on by my father in the hospital on the respirator during the many months in and out of intensive care before he passed. It was a very difficult time. Not being able to speak made it all the harder. Fear and Pain, Exhaustion and Grief formed the skeletal structure of our time. That form was draped in cloaks of Grace and Love, adorned with brooches of humor. On occasion, we would pluck a moment of serious soul touches. But, those were few. Oncoming of death will do that to a person sometimes.

He was a skeet shooter by profession, and so one day I brought in a suction cup gun set and targets which we placed along the ICU unit wall. He shot well. Despite the morphine. The nurses? Not pleased. We did it anyway. It was one of the best days he had, I think. Well, that day and the one where I sneaked in something like 6 Reese's Cups for him. What the hell. He was dying.

I never got to say goodbye in person.

That happens sometimes.

These words, and the few pages of others I have been reading and re-reading all week have brought me back.

Brought me back to my Daddy.