After my recent post about my mom, I thought it only fair that I say a few things about my dad too.
But what to say about him? His example of patience and endurance, the
relationship I had with him, the lessons he taught me...there are so many
things that my dad was to me. One of the things I miss most was our nightly
routine. For several years after my mission, my sister and I would help put my
dad to bed every night. The three of us had it down pat and every night at
nine, we knew where we would be and what we would be doing. One of my favorite
things to do was to tell dad stories or jokes that would make him laugh.
Getting him to laugh was a small success every time. It was because of my nightly
comedy routine for dad that my mom thought I should try out to be a stand-up comedian.
But seriously; my dad is one of the few people who got my jokes, so the comedy
route just wouldn't work out.
I didn't know my dad when
he was a young dad. He was 49 when I was born in 1986, but what was neat, is
that when my sisters and I were writing his life sketch, we were able to read
through the life history he had written over the past several years. It think
that my favorite part about that was realizing that he had been someone just
like me at one time. He had outrageous dreams, like playing as catcher for the
New York Yankees, and he had fears too, life providing for his wife and family
after he had been diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis.
All these things about my
dad are important things for you to know, but last Saturday, September 12th was
their 58th wedding anniversary and so I thought I'd tell you a little love story.
I don't know all the
details, I know they met on a blind date in October of 1956. I know that dad
called mom for a second date, but it wasn't until later that she found out that
he had been too terrified to call her and he had asked his friend to call,
pretend he was Bob and ask mom out for that second date. They dated that whole
winter (Mom said her grade in math that year when from an A, to a B, to a C and
a D) And then on Mom's 18th birthday and graduation day, the two were engaged
and set the wedding for that fall.
The years that followed
brought more schooling, kids, job hunting, moving to another country, a MS
diagnosis, grand kids and a million other life experiences they shared together.
Dad's health was one thing that he dealt with for many years. In 1999, dad suffered a
heart attack and had triple bi-pass surgery, with his MS, any infection could
send him to the hospital. Medications were a delicate balance at times, because
with one thing off, it could be another trip to the hospital. In 2010, my dad
wasn't doing well and we ended up taking him to the hospital in the middle of
the night. My one sister, Karen, and I were with dad in the emergency room that
night when the Docter, serious and blunt, but also kind and gentle told us and my dad that
due to an infection, his heart was out of rhythm and was slowing down. Which
meant there was the risk of it slowing down and then stopping, or that blood
clots would form and cause a stroke, both cases would likely be fatal and not
to far distant given the current condition of his heart. Dad had a decision to
make. He could continue living as he was and let his heart alone with a small amount of time left, or he could
go to a specialist and have a pacemaker put in, greatly reducing the
risks he currently dealt with.
We let dad make that decision,
and he was quiet for a long moment before he looked back up at the doctor and
told him that he wanted to have the pacemaker put in. That pacemaker gave him
four more years with mom and the family and so I consider it worth it. But
there was a greater cost I will come back to, something I didn't consider until
four years later.
Those four years were not
easy, the included many more hospital trips and a stroke in 2013. My dad did
not complain though. He never regretted, or at least he never expressed regret, at his decision
for that pacemaker because he was with my mom and with our family.
When my mom got her
terminal diagnosis with brain cancer in March of last year, we took dad to the
hospital to see her that day. In that room, he looked at her in her hospital
bed and said, shaking his head, "This isn't how it's supposed to be. I'm
supposed to go first."
Mom in her typical
fashion looked at him and said, "well, maybe you still will."
Despite the how hard and tiring
the daily trips to the hospital and care center were for my dad, he wanted to
visit mom every day. He wanted to be there for her, to hold her hand when it
was hard for him to talk, and to make sure she wasn't alone and that us kids
were doing our part to take care of her.
In those few weeks, he
had his own doctors and hospital visits as his his was finally winning the war
it had waged on him for so many decades. When we took him to the hospital
for the second time, dad never work up and he passed away on April 12th, 2014.
It was then, that I
realized the significance of the decision he had made four years earlier to get
the pacemaker. We don't get to decide when we are going to leave this world,
but I believe that my dad was given a lot of say in that matter. His life with
MS was not easy, it was not comfortable, and it was very limiting. When I think
back on all the times dad could have left us; when he had his heart attack several years
earlier, when he needed the pacemaker, when he had his stroke, and many other
times when infection or MS raged through his body. He chose to do what he
needed to do to say here because he wanted to be there for his wife.
He had reached the point
though, where he could no long be there for her in a way that he wanted to and
so he left so that he could be there on the other side to comfort her at night
when she needed comfort. To be there to greet her when she left this world just
63 days later. When I wrote about mom, I wrote about her love of people and her gift of happiness. My dad, he loved my mom.
Every
love story is different, I recognize that clearly, but I also recognize that my dad loved my mom, and so even when it's hard that they aren't here, I'm grateful that they are together for 58 years now and an eternity to come.
