We talk...sometimes

How much has life changed...you have gone from strong to helpless to hopeful to nearly helpless to stable...somewhere between hopeful and helpless.

You were doing better, moved from the walker to a cane, things looked really good, your mental clarity returned, and then out of the blue - you were "lost" again.

It always feels like we are running in the dark...this time, it feels like I am not only trying to find our way out, but I am trying to find you also!

Your ability to communicate, to comprehend, to walk, to follow directions...just went away.

Overnight.

One of the doctors told us recently, this may be your new normal.

I had a hard time accepting that...since when were we ever "normal"?

It is late in the year.  October...Halloween will be here soon, then Thanksgiving, and Christmas.  Lots of changes this past year.  Jobs, homes, deaths, births, and here we are - we haven't changed much.

Sometimes I feel like we are living the old 70s song "Cat in the Cradle".  You were gone so much when I was growing up, that it became a way of life to exist without you.  Now, I realize I needed you, and you still need me - so I have to break the pattern, and do that which is not "natural" and talk with you, visit with you, spend time with you.

I remember my grandmother, your mother, or "Grandma" as we called her.  There was no person I have ever met that I felt loved us more. Grandma wasn't wealthy, and we all knew what a horrible cook she was!  The only thing Grandma made that tasted good was fried chicken. There was something special about Grandma - I think it was the fact she loved us. There were no doubts about it.  When we spent years overseas, and did not see Grandma for a long time - we knew she never changed.

Even today, one of my favorite meals is cold fried chicken, Grandma always made chicken for us when we left her house and we kept in in the ice chest until we stopped for lunch.  Cold fried chicken means somebody really loves you!

Sometimes you remind me of Grandma in her final days.  She was weaker, feeble, but who she was never changed.

You are weaker, sometimes struggle with your words, but who you are on the inside seems intact, he just can't get out.

We talk...sometimes, but not enough.

You went to a new Neurologist yesterday.  He said you have too many problems to point at just one as the primary cause.  You are at a new "plateau", unfortunately, I do not think you have the momentum to go uphill any more.  This last episode seemed to really take a lot from you.

You don't talk about driving anymore.

You don't talk about what you are going to do when you get better anymore.

You are a little more quiet than before.

Sometimes I get busy, and I forget to call, then when I do - I see the struggle is harder than the last time we talked.

I am sorry Dad, I know this is hard for you.  To be 73 and nearly helpless. For a man that survived combat, a military career, another career, worked full time while attending college full time, how can this be?  You should be able to just get up, and march on!  That is what you always did...that is what you taught us to do...in the rain, the snow, through heartache...

I remember you saying, "Be a MAN"...when we wanted to give up as teenagers.  When it was hard to play football, and work, and go to school, I remember you telling us, ordering us to suck it up and be a man - that life is not easy and if we give up now, we will never make it when it counts!

Maybe there was a little bit of the Army in those words, but they are true.  If you can't make it when it is "easy", what are you going to do when it is hard?

We owe you a lot...I wonder if you realize we are okay now, and you were a part of that.  Along with our mother, our grandparents, our in laws, our teachers, our friends, we became who we are today.

We are okay.

We talk...sometimes...

We need to talk more...

Keep who we are alive.