Reflecting on My Father’s Passing and Our Last Conversation
This past week marks one-year since my father’s passing. I think about him often and I miss and love him. This seemed like an apt time to share a previously published story* about my father three months before he passed; twelve months after my humbled heart surrendered to God.
My heart is filled with the peace of God, open and alive. Giving and receiving love seems natural, second nature and even ordinary. Empathy, thoughtfulness and generosity are limitless gifts. I no longer consider them a fault but a force.
Echoes of a long past Smiths song reverberating within my consciousness, “It’s so easy to laugh, it’s so easy to hate. It takes strength to be gentle and kind” I have that strength with God’s love and it’s easier. It’s not always easy, but easier.
With a humbled heart, my phone conversations with my parents became more frequent. Speaking with them once every few days, as opposed to every few weeks. There was a newfound joy in our conversations, as they witnessed their son’s magnificent metamorphosis.
Unfortunately, my father’s dementia was causing his health to continue its downward decline. While cognizant at times, there were other times when his lucidity was lacking. This is why I will always remember the last genuine conversation I had with my father, before his horrific health happening. A conversation that never would have happened before my heart surrendered itself to God. Instead of a lifelong regret of sorrow, I will always carry a lifelong memory of joy.
It was Thursday late afternoon, summer firmly in control of the meteorological calendar. I was on the phone with my parents, each of us sharing the events in our life since we last spoke. I shared with them my conversation with our neighbor, a middle-aged man with two young children. Everyone seeming younger to me; adults and children.
I asked him about his new RV trailer and if he and his family had the opportunity to use it. He told me that they were planning a trip, and his young boys were looking forward to it. We chatted a little longer before going our respective ways.
Once again introspective in light of my spiritual reawakening. I shared with my parents my neighborly conversation; reminiscing when they took us to the west coast. Grade schoolers visiting their mothers parents and maternal relatives.
A pop-up RV hitched to our Volare station wagon. A vehicle I will always associate with the only real suffering I experienced as a child. Seats that felt like cold blocks of ice in winter and a hot griddle in the summer. Still traumatized by the sight of dark green vinyl.
This annual summer trip would use all my father’s earned vacation time. As an adult understanding how precious that time was for him. Telling my father how much I admire him and what a great role model he has been, knowing that I’ve been blessed with many great role models in my life. My Dad at the top of the list along with my mother of course.
We chuckled and laughed, reminiscing about a past that made me smile, a tangible testament that honors both my mother and father. A placard of parental priorities well lived. It was good.
Telling my father how much “I loved him” and telling my mother how much “I loved her”. My father responding, “I love you very much son”, my mother responding, “I love you very much son”. It was a love fest; a conversation unlike any other I had previously with them, and it would be our last conversation together.
A little over twenty-four hours later, my father had a violent seizure, breaking both his arms. In speaking with my family early Saturday morning, the consequences of this calamity become clear. My mother believing she would lose her lifelong partner of sixty-one years. Yes, sixty-one years.
My father would survive this trauma, but in reality, he didn’t really survive. His dementia became far worse and the man I knew as my father didn’t exist anymore. An apparition of the man who appears as my father. Occasionally, seeing a glimmer of his past self, but the husband, the father, and the friend we knew had passed.
Dementia is a slow painful death for the patient and the family. My mother’s ongoing grief evident with each passing day. Her partner who she relied on was no longer there. Worse, not only is her partner physically ill, but mentally ill.
His behavior and personality erratic and out of character for the man we knew. Confusing not only the patient but those who love the patient. This terrible disease fleecing my Dad of all the amazing attributes and generous gifts that made him distinctive. His amazing attributes and generous gifts now living in us and forever living in God.
My heart grieves for my father, but with each passing day he becomes less and less aware of this wrecked reality. Maybe it’s a curse, maybe it’s a blessing, I don’t know anymore because it really doesn’t matter. What I do know is that God is with him, and God will lead him home just as God will lead all of us home if we allow Him.
Like everyone in my family, I truly miss my Dad. Particularly when I see or do things only he would be interested in hearing about. Like the different types of birds, I now pay attention too. Including the aluminum avians descending into Vegas full of people with a million stories. Planes carrying families, fathers and friends; people like you and me and us.
I miss no longer talking with my Dad about our past shared experiences, the things in this life that united us and the memories we created together. Our pinewood derby cars from Cub Scouts, teaching me how to ride a bike and his love of Big Band music. Always “in the mood” to listen to Glen Miller.
Our father and son camping trips and how he always cried whenever he talked about my first night at home with him and my Mom. Their first child, their first son, finally falling asleep while being held in my father’s arms. My eyes tearful, my heart swelling with gratitude as I write this story. I miss him very, very much but we will meet again on that beautiful shore in the sweet by and by; that I am certain.
I think of my father when I look at the moon through our backyard telescope, another experience he would have enjoyed. While my father taught me to keep my feet on the ground and to face whatever is in front of me, he also taught me to look up and not miss the wonders of this world. Wonders not only in front of me, but all around and above me.
*This story has been edited.