“It is a curious thing, the death of a loved one. We all know that our time in this world is limited, and that eventually all of us will end up underneath some sheet, never to wake up. And yet it is always a surprise when it happens to someone we know. It is like walking up the stairs to your bedroom in the dark, and thinking there is one more stair than there is. Your foot falls down, through the air, and there is a sickly moment of dark surprise as you try and readjust the way you thought of things.”
― Lemony Snicket, Horseradish
It was on this day in 1994 that my father died. The phone call from my brother came in the middle of the night. I remember screaming, gasping and then sobbing, sitting on the edge of our bed in Memphis, Tennessee. I did not have to say a word of explanation to my husband Tom. He knew.
My father’s death was not a surprise. He had a glioblastoma brain tumor. He had had surgery a few weeks earlier but as with most tumors of that type, the prognosis was not good. Not good at all. He and my mother decided they would not pursue any additional treatment course after the surgery. No radiation. No chemotherapy. They felt the time it would gain them together was not worth the possible emotional and physical cost of the treatment. My mother took my father home. Home to the house that had been their home for 40 years. Hospice was called.
My father did not live but about six weeks after his surgery. But he was home and he was with my mother and other caregivers who were kind and gentle. I had been home for his surgery, for the week he was in the hospital and a week following. There was pressure for me to return to Memphis to work. None of us knew how long my father would live. I went back to work but the lump in my throat was always there, the wondering of when I needed to go back never left. I didn’t make it back before he died.
Now here it is, 29 years after that phone call in the night and as impossible as it seems, I still miss him. I still feel his presence in so many ways. Yet I know he is gone. It is, as Lemony Snicker says, a sickly moment.
In truth I could not even imagine him dying. That seemed impossible. My father had always been there. Even when he had been stationed in Korea during that war (yes, a war, hardly a “conflict”) he sent letters and messages and recordings and there was never a doubt in my mind of his love or how very alive he was in my own life. He helped to start an orphanage while he was in Korea; he knew what it was like to be an orphan. His heart had a special spot for all children.
It is only on the anniversary of his death these days that my heart breaks all over again. Most of the time when I think of my father I think of the happy times—his love of sports, his jokes (he could have been the inventor of Dad Jokes), his love for my mom, for all his children and grandchildren. He would have been over the moon to know his great-grandchildren.
Sometimes I think of the terrible childhood he endured, the poverty and heartache that he had no choice but to live through. Joining the Army was his salvation. But even then it was not easy. He was at Pearl Harbor when it was bombed. He fought in World War II.
He was a survivor and that makes me want to be a survivor, even though my life has been so very easy compared to what he had to face. Yet he felt he was one of the luckiest people in the world—he married the love of his life, survived wars, had a real family, owned a home, owned two cars, swam at the YMCA almost every day, never met a stranger, could enjoy a Hershey’s chocolate bar anytime he wanted. I never really ever heard him complain.
Why do I share this with you? Because we have all experienced what it is to lose someone we love, someone we thought could never possibly die. But, as we know, death happens. The reality of death is that it will happen to each of us.
Ernest Hemingway, in The Sun Also Rises, wrote: “Don't you ever get the feeling that all your life is going by and you're not taking advantage of it? Do you realize you've lived nearly half the time you have to live already?”
I am at the point that I have lived way over half my time. It feels strange to write that, but I know it is true. I am 73 years old. I won’t make it to 146. How important it is to live with intention and delight.
As one of my favorite poets Mary Oliver wrote:
When it's over, I don't want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.
I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened,
or full of argument.
I don't want to end up simply having visited this world.
My dad was never a visitor to this world. He was not perfect but he lived fully and found a way to enjoy and delight in whatever came.
I hope I might try to do likewise with however many years I may have left. None of us know.
.
That was good. Thank you.
Sylvie
"Grief never ends, but it changes. . . . It is the price of love." Blessed are those who mourn and remember - you: your beloved father for 29 years, me: my father for 44 years, and my husband Bob fo 16 months. Also among the saint candidates are the survivors who have no rest from their labors after their loved one dies. Post mortem paperwork in the age of technology compounds our grief. Have mercy on the widows / widowers among us and those who have lost parents, siblings, children and other loved ones. And LIVE FULLY WITH GRATITUDE FOR EACH DAY.