Every year around Easter I get a little melancholy. It's not too surprising because Springtime reminds me of my dad lossing his battle with cancer (on Good Friday, April 13th, 20 years ago).
It is a strange time for me to think about, honestly. It was sad to be sure, but there is anger and triumph mixed in there too, and a sense of calm.
If you will permit me I am going to indulge in a little bit of dwelling on a rather significant day in my life.
I was barely 18 years old, still finishing up high school. We lived in a very new house that had too many bedrooms for the 3 of us (my sister had moved to my mom's before dad was diagnosed) and absolutely zero character or warmth, my dad was well into the cancer by the time we moved in so did not get to even begin to make it a home. That morning I woke up at my normal time to do my Friday chores. I gathered laundry, unloaded the dishwasher and got ready to take the trash out (all as quietly as I could because my father's hospital bed was in the familyroom right next to the kitchen). I was used to being quiet, there was no-one to talk to and I really didn't want to take any rest away from my dad ever. I could hear my step-mother talking on the phone in the den, and because the house was so quiet I couldn't help but over-hear even though she was in hushed tones.
She was telling her friend that my dad had slipped into a coma in the night and that she didn't think it was going to be long. She asked the friend to call the reverend over as soon as possible and she would call the doctor. I was numb to hearing that... I didn't know what to do, so I continued with my chores. I took the trash out and as I came back in my stepmother told me that the kitchen needed a sweep and the livingroom should be vacuumed too. Then she carried on without giving me any hint that there was anything wrong or different. I was angry, but silent and obedient.
The friend came over right away and then the reverend arrived in his Good-Friday best by about 9:00. He came over promptly because he was due to give a big sermon at 11:00 to his congregation. It was at this point that my stepmother chose to tell me what was going on... I assume that she waited for witnesses to this touching moment of "motherly" love. I was consumed by anger at the show she was putting on, but hearing the words coming from her mouth still filled me with a tremendous sense of self-pity and loss... I cried, of course, and I accepted the hugs from the friend, the reverend and my stepmother.
The next thing I remember with clarity is when we all circled around the head of dad's bed and started singing songs about Jesus. I looked at my dad through my leaking eyes, but I stopped crying as I looked at him. This mortal husk was a thin and nearly empty envelope. He was barely even there, hanging on by the weakest of threads, I could almost see him tugging at that thread to get free of the emancipated, dried out skeleton that his traitor flesh had become. That was no longer my dad, that was death, with a faint wraith of his being hovering only because it had to so long as the heart beat. The vital, 47 year old man did not occupy it anymore. Cancer had changed him to something closer to a mummy, wispy frail patches of hair, bedsores and paper-like skin covering all-too sharp bones that protruded from every angle. His face was not even his with ghoulish sharp cheekbones, buck teeth exposed by his shrunken lips, sunken eye sockets and clouded blue eyes.
He had not been the man I could recognize as my dad for a while. Over the last few weeks, occasionally he would have emerged from his pain or drugged state for a minute or 2 and make sense, but quickly he slipped again to ranting hallucinations, painful moans or that deep unnatural sleep that was his existence those last few weeks. As terrible as that sounds, those few moments of lucidity (when I was lucky enough to be there) were so valuable to me. He knew he couldn't lick the cancer, and he apologized for leaving before we girls finished school - he really trusted that his wife would take care of us when he was gone, he loved her so much.
Looking at him while we sang, the worst of my self-pity went away -- just evaporated -- and I realized that his eminent death was not a reason to be sad. Right then it was the kindest thing that could happen for him, and death itself was the miracle. A release to the next stage for him and for the survivors that love him. I sang, I watched, and I saw the very last breath my dad took. I watched his chest rise for the last time and relax. I was still, and he was still, and I looked up and away... he wasn't there any more and that was a good thing.
There was more crying from the others, I became invisible at that point and things started to rush around now that it was done. The doctor (in his day-off clothes) came to verify the death while I went out to sit in the Spring sunshine on the front porch. The reverend rushed away to meet his Good Friday obligations, and the doctor called the coroner who I watched pull up to our house in a pick-up truck, for a moment I was HORRIFIED, thinking this man in the golfing outfit was going to take my dad away in that truck! The panic left quickly as I realized he had other duties to take care of. (I wasn't there when they took my dad's remains away, but my dad always said after he was dead, it didn't matter what happened to the body.)
I called a friend and he came right over with a wonderful gift of the latest album from my favourite artist. It was perfect, me on the front step getting hugs from this dear friend... he understood me so much better than my boyfriend (but that's another story).
A little while later I remembered that I had a dress fitting for my grad dress. My stepmother told me to not be rude, that I should go. So I did. The seamstress was the lady-friend of one of my dad's contract labourers. As I was getting pinned and measured I told D that dad had passed. She grabbed my hand and pulled me down from the chair. The next thing she did was just about the best thing that could have been done... she said "We need chocolate cake!" and sat me down in her tiny sun-filled kitchen with a giant slice of chocolate cake and told me dead people jokes. I laughed and shared with her the good things that were coming next (still sober to the fact that my dad would miss everything from here on). My graduation, moving down-island for college, my own place to live, etc, etc.... she kept me focused on the possibilities instead of dwelling on my loss. Brilliant. Just Brilliant.
Then her boyfriend (my dad's employee) came in, and I let him know what had happened to his boss (and long-time friend) He did the other thing that people do confronted with powerful loss, he grabbed me and embraced me so hard that it hurt while he cried and cried and cried. That labourer had a tragic set of stories that went with his middle-aged life. He knew death and hadn't been able to drive since being in an accident while a teen that killed his younger brother and left him messed up for a long time. These are things I already knew about him. I also knew that he drank and picked fights with his woman, but always lost badly to her much larger size. They were an odd couple, highlighted for me by their own reactions to this loss of my dad.
The day went on, and ended, and the next day came, and the next.
Shortly after that a big fight happened at home (another long story) and my stepmother had an excuse to kick me out. The days kept coming and going. Soon I graduated highchool in that dress, and a pair of too small shoes that I bought from the goodwill. My stepmother surprised me by coming up after the ceremony and handing me a card. It was a graduation card signed by my dad months before.... I cried of course.
(But she did not want to reconcile and I didn't either. )
Now it has been very nearly twenty years and I still feel loss that my dad didn't get to see the milestones that came along as a grown-up.....
I need a tissue.
is now a gangly teen!
.JPG)
