Goodbyes were never easy. Goodbyes are even worse when you don’t know when or in what circumstances you will see the person again. Where is the prayer in that?
It was lovely to see Dad but I won’t pretend he wasn’t much diminished from the last time I saw him only a month ago. Mom said, “You’ll probably be able to tell how he is better than us because we see him everyday.” At least she does, twice a day.
“He’s not tracking that well,” is the way she puts it. He comes up with unexpected things to say. Timothy and I arrived, coming straight from the airport. “We just flew in,” I said.
“From Puerto Rico?” he said.
“No, New York,” I said.
“Close enough,” he responded. There is that wry dry humor, the wit that makes Dad Dad even if he’s not tracking. I sang for the crew before lunch on Sunday and at dinner he had no recollection of me singing, until I reminded him. But he was delighted with dinner and with the nice nurse who served him. “She’s the cute one,” he confided.
Sitting with him while he ate reminded me of sitting with the boys when they were infants and we fed them spoon by messy spoon. “That’s sweet,” he says with delight of the lemon cake. He ate it even before the soup and cauliflower and ground-up meat. Wouldn’t you?
He’s not unhappy. He’s not harboring regrets. How much worse it would be if he were miserable. There’s an answered prayer for you. But I still wondered if we’d been doing all the right things—all doubts were gone when I said goodbye.
“I love you, Dad,” I said, kissing his forehead, just above the lotion some kind caregiver had put there.
“Tell your wife,” he said, “that I am loved.”
