A Grand Man

This particular Sunday morning I decided to take one last walk around the lake before my father would be free of his earthly body.  It's best to come out around 5am to lessen the chance you'll see another live creature.   It's not so bad running into a squirrel or two I suppose.  Or to have an ever skittish coyote meet your gaze and make a quick decision to freeze then dart back to the bushes with purpose. I always feel guilt for disturbing them. It's their lake. The serenity of this massive body of water is always being confronted by the urban environment. The heavy gaze of downtowns massive buildings, the angst of the commuter, and the dirty and dense smog coming down wind from the other decaying city on this massive water mass that goes on and on.  On that morning the clouds hung low, dull, and grey. Some would say oppressive but I would say comforting.  A means to spend the day in bed but remain outside.  As I sought comfort outdoors I knew today I had to leave my peace on this lake shore and go confront a singular and sharp pain.  On this quiet day I knew I had to go to my fathers apartment for the last time.  Two years ago he was given a finite amount of days to finish his journey on earth.  Fast forward to two weeks ago he had three to four months. And every day the hospice nurse shortened that time dramatically.  Your father has a month.  Your father has a few weeks.  A few days.  Any day.  Any hour.  Any minute.

In the prior weeks I hadn't spent much time alone which I was not accustomed to.  Just like my father I am a solitary man.  Being in the same room with my brother for this much time had become unfamiliar.  Why is it only tragedy brings people together like this?  The three of us were never very good at living together.  My father was a solitary man.  My brother wanted a life outside of our home and typically only slept there and ate the occasional meal.  And I was stuck. Nowhere to go.  The comfort of a mother nowhere to be found.  All of us in the same house.  Three men living very different lives together.

I went home and checked in with my girlfriend.  I'd asked her to stay at my place and hold down the fort while I was at my fathers apartment.  She'd deposited the check for $20,000 that my father had given me like I asked.  Normally a person would feel some sort of joy at receiving unexpected money like this.  But I felt none even with just a few hundred dollars in my bank account and lingering concerns over some needed dental care.    While deeply grateful at the prospect of ease that having extra money brings, that $20,000 was mine by proxy of the death of the only parent I ever truly knew. He worked so hard in life to give us everything he could. And now what was left was partially mine.

I took a long shower, packed a bag of clean clothes and my fathers little black leather bound notebook that he'd asked me to read. It smelled like him. Diesel fuel, the sweetness of tobacco, and his very outdated and masculine musky cologne. I kissed my dog on the head and held my partner for a while.  We both had been reading his journal as he requested.  He was a truck driver and had a lot of downtime.  The last few years on his job he started writing out his favorite memories and stories about growing up with his two sons. He talked about the wildlife he saw while working. The crew he worked with and their outrageous stories. Memories of being a young man trying to grow up but struggling. But in that journal there was no mention of my mother as she'd left when I was 3, my brother 8.  They were friendly to one another when they did intersect but she may as well have been a vaporous ghoul haunting our home for all intents and purposes.  Of the three of us my father knew her best, and I knew her the least.  As a three year old you're not exactly aware of the minutiae of your day to day life. But you know when something hurts. And one day she was gone. 1000's of miles away. And a hole was dug in my brother and I's heart. And we didn't know why. As an adult I started learning family secrets.  Many of which involved my mother and her exit from the household.  Not much room for grace or forgiveness in those stories as they were told to me.  But today I can thankfully say I have no ill will towards her. We all do the best we can with the tools we have. In regards to my father, in every conversation where she came up, he never spoke cruelly of her.  I always respected him for that and like he mentioned in his journal, you don't speak ill of people.  I wish I was more like him in that regard.

The time came to leave my little basement apartment and for a brief moment the little life I'd made for myself in this tiny space. My gut told me today was the day and I needed a little comfort. Instead of driving I called a taxi. In my life like my fathers I was always in the driver's seat.  And one of the best treats I could have was to feel the smooth and cold leather only the passenger can feel. Even if for a short while I was able to breathe and think without worry about what every one else was doing. The way a father does for their child, the taxi driver took my fragile body in his care and made my life easier. Don't forget to buckle up. On that drive out across town meandering east to west I knew I had about 45 minutes of peace left before I would be confronted with the grim truth of my fathers impending death.  So I grabbed my pen and I wrote what would be the last entry in my his journal.  

Hey Pops,

I know with this possibly being your last day on earth  it will be hard for me to properly convey how I've seen you my whole life.  You are grand.  You are a gentleman.  You are kind.  You are generous to a fault.  And at times you caused the kind of fear a person only knows when thunder crashes so loud you felt the earth is tearing open and about to swallow you whole. But I understand now.  You are so strong.  I didn't know much about your father but I got the idea.  I understand now why grandma took all his photos down after he died. And I'm sorry you had to go through that.  You being the oldest was a large burden to carry.  But I know it's what made you so strong.  In every way.  How many times did I watch you take a nut off a bolt with no wrench or pliers?  Your hands chiseled of stone, your knuckles sharp and jagged like rocks jutting out of the mountains, your large presence, that barrel chest,  and your antiquated and impeccable manners that everyone loves you for.  We knew who you could be behind closed doors.  A violent storm waiting to erupt under the crushing weight of all you had to carry from being a single parent.  A single earner.  A single teacher.  And such a tender and kind man forced to be so strong. I'll never know how hard that was on you.  Through the anger and the tears you remained gentle and kind and sweet.  We saw the unease in you.  The pressure.  And never in a million years do I fault you for your humanity.  You couldn't be more of a grizzly bear if you tried.  It's common for male bears to eat their young.  So I want to be the first to thank you for not doing that when I deserved it.  I still have a lot to do in this life.  But you've done enough.  You loved us wholly.  You protected us from every wrong and evil in your power. You always do the right thing. You don't cut corners.   You always did the best you could with what you had.  Even when it was scary and you were angry, I never questioned that you loved us.  And you taught us anything you possibly could.  I'll never forget the sadness in your eyes when you saw me shaving for the first time and said I wish you'd waited. I wanted to teach you.  And I said, you still can. I'm sure I'm doing it all wrong.  And I was. You taught me to shave with the grain. That was who you were.  A teacher with a big heart.  A man with too much on his plate but handled it with grace and a sense of duty the likes the world will never see again. And when you read this I ask you to know how loved you are and how missed you will be.  But we're going to be ok.  You did your job.  It's time to rest.

With all my love,

Bird

The cab pulled up to my fathers place.  I grabbed my bag with the little black leather notebook on top.  I could see inside and saw my brother and fathers head turn when I got out of the car. And I walked into my fathers apartment for the last time on a cloudy and calm Sunday.