I remember that day. I remember the days before it. I remember the doctors and how their eyes told the real truth. I remember the nurse who came in and took him off the ventilator. I remember her peppy, high-pitched voice and feeling like it was inappropriate for the situation. I remember the young, thin, kind Indian doctor who took care of dad… and mom… and me and Megan. Who looked so sad and sorrowful giving each round of new, bad news.
I remember the horrible, painful, debilitating year before. I remember begging God for mercy. No one, I thought, should have to suffer like this. How could someone so dependent on an equal balance of food from his diabetes be struck with a cancer that affected every single thing he ate or, in his case, couldn't eat? How can any human being be expected to go without FOOD for an entire year? To consume all calories through a tube. To not even be able to swallow water. How? How can anyone be expected to handle that? To suffer like that every single day? And even worse, to live through that.
I remember Dad's last breath and asking if that was it. Was that really it? Final? Forever? No way, I remember thinking.
Turns out I was kind of right. It wasn't the end. Because I feel my dad… and see my dad… and think of my dad…all of the time. Yes, he is absolutely gone. But he's not far away. I spent 35 years watching my father, listening to his words, watching his mannerisms and studying his body language. That's not something I could forget in just 2 years. I can still hear his voice in my head and in any given situation, I can almost recite verbatim what he'd tell me.
A friend of mine posted on Facebook the phrase "Feet don't fail me now" before she ran a half-marathon this past weekend. I immediately thought of my dad-- he used to say that! Feet don't fail me now…
And he would often sing the song, "Drop kick me Jesus through the goal posts of life. End over end, neither to the left or the right. Straight through the heart of them, righteous up right. Drop kick me Jesus, through the goal posts of life" and then dad would laugh. And we'd ask him to sing it again.
So how is it exactly that life has passed without him here when so much of it reminds me of him? I know that people come and go. That time passes and life changes. But I will never get over losing my dad. And I suppose the good thing is that I don't want to even if I could. So today, like every day of my life really, I think of my dad. I would give just about anything to sit at the kitchen table with him and hold his hand and kiss his cheeks and take it all in… just one more time.
