Using my governmentally bestowed half-day float, I am entirely off today, the last day of 2008. I have used it rather profligately so far, sleeping until 10:30, although that by itself is not unusual, I suppose. I always go to bed late, have trouble sleeping, and even on a work day, thanks to the perk of being a manager, I don't come in early. But 10:30 on a day off is also not unusual. I only got up because my three cats were using my bed, and thus me, as a trampoline, alerting to their rampant hunger.
A few days ago I ground beans of an especially dark and aromatic roast from Whole Foods, and was looking forward to my first cup. While it dripped, a good friend called Ms. Nes 55, and we talked of the year's challenges, during which she has managed an amazing calm, in part, using Scarlett O'Hara's philosophy of "Tomorrow is Another Day!"
The coffee was good, but not a revelation, which may be more the result of the pot in which it was made, than the beans. I allowed my big white cat, Bleu to roam around in the hallways of my apartment building (really, with only four units, like a private home) and watched HGTV, for the first real extended period, about "virgin" buyers.
Tonight, my friends and I will go out to a nearby restaurant and welcome the New Year, but a quiet day has generated thoughts of the past year.
In fact, there are only two things that stand out about the year, the rest whirring away in a blur. The first, of course, is my father's last illness and death in April. Though he was 90, his end wasn't expected. And, from my perspective, it wasn't either his heart nor his bladder, the two areas of his life's health problems that did him in. It was the lack of empathy of his two doctors. It was also the failure to keep him in the hospital after a "procedure" of removing infected kidney stents. As to those stents I frankly, to this day, wonder whether they were truly necessary. From the moment they were placed, my father declined. Although I have decided that a malpractice suit is not the direction I want to go, despite my legal background, I cannot think of these doctors without anger, every time an errant bill or explanation of benefits, still, arrives in Dad's mailbox. I have planned to write each of them a letter about how I perceived their miserable ministrations. I keep hoping that the angry emotion behind what I might write will minimize. It hasn't so far.
As long as it was 2008, the possibility of Dad's coming back or that the whole affair did not happen persisted. With 2009's arrival, the finality, I think, will hit me. Nonetheless, with his last published story in "Senior Moments" in May 2008, with a Christmas card arrived from an army buddy of his who did not know of his death, with another "hello" from a friend of ours who also did not know of Dad's demise, with fresh memories of his last well celebrated birthday,(in which lovely Sophia joined us after some nearly 30 years after their last in person contact), it has seemed Dad remained alive for nine months. The gestation period for letting go, I guess.
Before my father died as he lay so small and agitated in the hospital bed in the throes of a sepsis, requiring sedation, and breathing tube, people rallied around: my pastor, Monsignor Murphy, Sr. Pilar, the hospital chaplain, the Eucharistic Ministers who visit the sick, my uncle Steve, Dad's brother, and my friend, our friend, Susan, who was there when the end came. While I may have little affection for the doctors who were my father's caregivers in the last 7 months of his life, I have great affection for the young doctors and nurses who surrounded him in ICU. One doctor, in particular, offered reasonable hope on that first night of Dad's days there so that I could sleep. I was given wisdom and calm from my former pastor, Monsignor Parnassus, who advised me when I did not know what was good and proper for Dad's physical and spiritual welfare. And from a fellow parishioner, Veronica, who said, "Pray that God does the most loving thing", which He did. As well, in the final inevitable farewell after Dad died, I found out how many friends I had. My cousin, Carol, flew immediately across country simply to "be there" as I did what I had to do. My uncle Steve went with me to see my father, now dressed in his debonair best in the casket, for the last time, my having decided that a wake would not have been Dad's preference, I think. Len of "Len Speaks" and Mr. Anonymous of the Barbara Judith Apartments, each took time from their jobs to visit mortuary and cemetery with me as I made arrangements. Len did one of the readings. Veronica did the intentions I had written for the occasion. Dad's cousin Helen, drove all the way from Riverside to be in the family pew. My long time friend Carol, who also knew dad well, flew in from Chicago. Susan was there in the family row as well with all of these. My friends and colleagues from work attended the funeral. As did two of Dad's writing class members, Ric and Edith, and his next door neighbor Jack. I was touched at how many parishioners were there to say good bye, Peter, who also served as one of the pall bearers, (with Len and Andrew, who knew dad from our undergraduate days and darling Chris, a "new" friend at some 15 plus years), Ted, Jim, Trudy and Walter, Sal, Erin and others I should remember, but in my haze do not. Una hosted at her home, and provided the food for, the reception after the funeral. Delores sang my father to heaven. And again, were the two Monsignors, who concelebrated Dad's funeral Mass at the parish in which he had been received into the Catholic Church five years before, and in which he had been a dedicated usher. The homily, given by Monsignor Parnassus, was not only that of a religious shephard, but were the words of a man who had particular insight into my father, the "reluctant Catholic" and who clearly felt the loss.
The other event was a sudden trip to Hawaii, with my cousin Carol, in August, to try to sort out the condition of an elderly aunt. Unmarried, childless, without family there, financially and medically compromised, we tried to get her help, but she is living a bit in a fantasy that everything is fine, when it is not, and remains, not terribly cooperative with our efforts. On the good side, this was the second visit of my cousin Westward within months and the two of us did manage to have fun in Hawaii, even with a small family crisis. Benefit of benefits beyond that is that both events closed the nine year gap between us (I am the elder) from our childhood and made us friends. She sent me an ornate plate which I have on my wall, "Cousins by chance, friends by choice".
And so it was losses paradoxically brought gains. And reminder of how short is life, and how much it is to be savored.
This year, I particularly understand the "We'll drink a cup of kindness yet, for auld lang syne." For times gone by.
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