Side effects of death, for the survivor, are as follows: anger, guilt, confusion, impatience, irritability, insomnia, flu symptoms, cold sores, tunnel vision, intolerance, overwhelming compassion, grief, love, concern, silent prayer, rejoicing in song, longing for peace—I could go on. Oh, and add exhaustion. I am exhausted.
I paced in the moonlight on the back porch last night for two hours. I admired the stars, there was a light breeze, and it was cool for a night in the desert in July. I was grateful for the stars and the coolness. My eyes were slamming shut, but when I lay down, my mind switched into hyperdrive. So I walked, back and forth, trying not to trip in the darkness.
I prayed out of gratitude, I pleaded with my God to just grant me the ability to sleep. I admitted I couldn’t control my mind, I asked for forgiveness for the ugly thoughts, I hummed snippets of songs. I surrendered to not sleeping, I quit fighting. I put my head back on the pillow for the third time and I did sleep for a couple of hours. I awoke exhausted and not ready for the day’s tasks.
I drove to the airport and picked up my brother. His first words: “You look thin.” My ego immediately snapped out the thought: “Yeah and all your hard work to tone up for the past few months has been flushed by just a little over a week of not working out.”
I smiled weakly. “Yeah, I was all toned up. Haven’t had much time lately. It’ll come back once I get back to the gym.”
I tried my best not to terrorize my brother on the trip to the hospice facility. I don’t know if I was successful. I have rapidly become accustomed to discussing the “dying process” like any clinician—sterile and matter-of-factly. The one thing I did emphasize to him was to have no expectations. I told my brother of Dad’s improvement the day prior. “Who knows what he’ll be like,” I said.
That was meager preparation for what we saw when we got to Dad’s room. There he sat in a chair, fresh shirt, showered, clean-shaven, bright-eyed, a clean lunch plate on the table. “He ate the whole meal” was my first thought, and my second thought was “Jesus probably didn’t look this good at the Resurrection.” Or maybe Jesus did, and that would explain my reaction to my father. My mouth dropped open. I exclaimed, “look who I brought, Dad!” followed immediately by, “WOW! You look GREAT!”
I didn’t stay that long, my job being to transport brother and leave him with Dad. Mom would be by to pick up brother and take him to her house. Brother and Dad were chatting away when I drove off.
And, as is customary, my alter ego engaged as I shut the car door and put the key in the ignition.
“You and your mother made a BIG mistake.”
“How could we have misread Dad’s condition all these days prior?”
“He’s going to get out of there, and live for who knows how long … where will he live? Will he go home? Will he walk again? Mom can’t take care of him if he fails again … he’s done this before, he’s been really bad and then he just gets up and gets going and then he goes home and falls down again.”
“I thought he was tired of fighting. He said he didn’t want to do this anymore. He said he was ready. He said he understood he didn’t have long.”
“I wonder if Mom has seen him yet … sure she has. Why didn’t she call me to warn me?” And on and on and on.
I got home and fell asleep for an hour. The phone rang, the woman introduced herself as the social worker from the hospice center. “Can I talk to you for a bit, and ask you some questions about your father?”
