Merry Christmas, Dad!

During the last two months of my father's life he was pretty much in misery. Imagine being 93 years old, have a serious heart condition to begin with, have been crippled for 60 years of your life due to an auto accident, and then one night your "good" leg really starts to hurt below the knee. I took him to the emergency room around 1 a.m. that night. The emergency doctor just examined him and said that Dad needed to get into see a vascular specialist ASAP.

So, we set it up for the following day.The doctor immediately put Dad in the hospital and said that he would need to do some exploratory procedures that Friday to see what the problem was. After they were finished and while Dad was coming out of it, the surgeon came in and gave us the news. Dad's "good" leg was dead below the knee. "Dry" gangrene had already started set in. Dad would be faced with a decision. He could have the leg removed from above the knee to make sure they got it all or he could choose to not have surgery and die within a week. Die horribly, I might add.

Dad opted for the surgery. He was genuinely hopeful that he would be able to recover, use a prosthetic leg and have a few more years left. Frankly, I was very doubtful. Remember, his heart was already severely damaged. He only had about 25% use of it. He was 93 and had very little strength left to him and his "bad" leg (which had been broken twice and nearly had to be amputated previously) was very weak. How on Earth was he going to have the physical strength to go through rehabilitation etc?

As it turns out, he wasn't going to be able to do that. He had the surgery and never left full-time nursing care for the remaining two months of his life. He was fairly well miserable. He had his moments of levity because he had always been such a fun loving jokester, but he was miserable and we could tell.

About three weeks after the surgery we moved him to a hospice facility. The first of two. This place was a madhouse. The people there were just horrible. They had been recommended by the hospital, but I don't believe the hospital had any idea what kind of people were running the place. It was during his 3 weeks at that facility that Dad had his first close encounter with the afterlife. At one point, we believed he was literally on his death bed. When he did come out of it I was sitting in a chair in his room with him and he asked me who all the other people in the room were. So far as I could see, it was just Dad and me. So, I asked him, what people? He looked at me like I was nuts.

"Well, that man standing next to you and that lady standing at the end of the bed and all those "little" people sitting all around." he said.

I figured he must be hallucinating so I asked the hospice nurse if Dad was on anything that might cause that. No.

This would not be the last time that Dad saw people that none of us could see. He was not on any drug that would have caused it. I can't explain it. I just know it was what it was.

We moved Dad to a much better facility, but it was further away. It meant having to drive 120 miles round trip to see him. I and my sister shared this along with taking our mother to see Dad. For about week after moving to the new place Dad seem to rally a bit. But then he started to have more problems. We had given him a "Jitterbug" phone. He started calling me 3 or 4 times during the middle of the night and I could tell that he was disoriented. He thought he was calling Mom.

Two days before Dad passed away I took Mom to see him and he was more chipper than he had been since the ordeal had begun. I would like to say I was encouraged, but I knew that there have been many cases of a person having a rally just before they pass. On the day that Dad passed away I took Mom to see him again. He was virtually non-responsive. His head was back and his mouth hung open. His eyes were glazed. He did respond when Mom held his hand and she said she was surprised at the strength in his grip. Had he lived two more weeks they would have been married 68 years.

The hospice nurse came by and I spoke to her outside the room and mentioned to her my thoughts. She said that what I had mentioned was indeed a real possibility and that she thought he was nearing the end. She said that he might be holding on because he didn't want to abandon Mom.

So, as everyone else was preparing to leave that afternoon around 2 p.m. I went to his bedside. I took his hand in one hand and put my other hand on his forehead. I gently stroked his hair and then I bent down and kissed him on the cheek. I spoke softly to him and told him that "I got this." I told him that it was OK for him to go. That Jesus was waiting for him and that he shouldn't worry at all. That me and my sister would take care of Mom. He turned slightly and for just a moment his eyes cleared up. He looked right at me and though he couldn't speak I knew he understood what I had said. There was love and gratitude in his eyes.

I drove Mom home and then went back to my house. I received a call from the hospice nurse about 3 hours after we had left. Dad had passed away.

I miss him. I miss his laughter, his corny jokes, his good-hearted demeanor. I miss the love of my father, but I know that one day I will see him again. I don't know how all that works for sure. I just know that God will make it right. I trust in God and I trust in His Son Jesus. It's not a weakness or anything of that sort. It's a belief based on faith and on things impossible to explain to anyone who isn't a Christian.

As for those "little people"? Perhaps they were angels. Dad loved Jesus so much and had been such a faithful and good servant since accepting Jesus as his Savior at the age of 12. He lead music in church, sang in the choir, and lead a life pointing the way to Jesus. So why not send a few angels down to comfort him? As for the man and woman who were invisible to me? Who knows. They could have been loved ones that Dad just didn't recognize. Loved ones who had preceded him in passing.

This Christmas will be the first since Dad's passing. No, it won't be the same. But I take comfort in knowing that my father is in heaven now enjoying everlasting life in a body that does not hurt or receive pain. He knows no sorrow. He knows no tears other than perhaps tears of joy. I'll join him one day and I hope Jesus won't mind if Dad and I crack those old corny jokes with each other for a thousand years or so.

Merry Christmas, Dad!

                                        When

                                                                           By James R. Stout

A man so old set in his rocking chair with his head bowed low in prayer.

I stopped to say hello and ask if I could help as I admired his silver hair.

“Excuse me sir, but can I be of any help? Can I ease your worries or pain?”

He looked up at me with a weak smile on his face and then rested his head on his cane.

“Young man, may I tell you a story? A story that I know so well?”

At first I was amused to be call young again, given I’m 60 years old myself,

But then as his story unfolded I understood how to him I did seem young at that.

I leaned closer to listen to this gentle man as I removed my well-worn hat.

“I was born in the year 1911” he began. “The third of seven children that my mother bore.

My father died when I was only one year old and my mother before I turned four.

I spent my childhood in an orphanage on the outskirts of Bossier City,

In those days we were outcasts it seems and we garnered very small pity.”

He stopped for a moment and seemed to reflect on those long ago days of which he spoke.

I could see in his eyes what appeared to be the haze of fires long ago turned to smoke.

He wiped at an invisible tear that must have fallen from his cataract eyes,

Then continued his story as his rocking chair creaked in time to his melancholy sighs.

“I first met the Lord when I was only eight. I gave my heart to Him that day.

I prayed the prayer of a child and I prayed that He would take me away.

I heard Him say in a silent voice, “Someday, someday, but not today.

Someday I will take you home and home is where you will stay.”

“When I was twenty-one I met the love of my life. She was a beauty both inside and out.

We soon had a son who I prayed would grow to be a man so strong and stout.

A daughter came later and she challenged her mother for the fairest in the land.

We were so blessed to have these two gifts from God, from His own tender hand.”

“We bore the times known as the Great Depression and World War Two.

A family together and, a nation like a family, in faith it seems we grew.

But in every life there are valleys and hills and roads with turns to be made.

Sometimes we swelter in the burning sun while other times we rest in the shade.”

“When I was forty-one we received the news that we so feared with dread.

Our son was serving his country far away and we learned that he was now dead.

An enemy bullet had pierced his heart and our hearts too I’m afraid.

I prayed that God would comfort us all as we dwelt on memories made.”

“One day I prayed to God that I didn’t know how much I could take.”

He whispered in my ear so soft and soothed my poor heart’s ache.”

“One day I will ask you when you are ready to come home and then,

you will only need to say when.”

“When I was fifty six my wife took sick and she slowly passed away.

My heart was broken and it was a dark time for me with no sunny ray

to comfort me or carry me through that valley so low.

But God lifted me and carried me until once again I could go.”

The old man stopped for a minute and leaned back to rest his bones.

While a myriad of birds sang their songs together with a harmony of sweet life tones.

It was then I noticed how frail the old man had become.

Yet I marveled at his inner strength and wondered where it came from.

“When I was 81 years old my sweet daughter died when a drunk driver stopped too late.

And with her she took my two grand-children to Heaven and for a while I slipped into hate.

But I realized that they were all in paradise with my sweet wife at their side,

and the hate washed away like a fierce midnight tide.”

The sun had started to set as the sky turned orange and then pink.

The old man stopped for a while to ponder and to think.

His eyes glazed over and he drew short and ragged breaths.

He seemed to be at peace though despite his loved ones deaths.

“I am the last of us now, my family, my friends all passed.

But it is the future that I look to even though I cherish the past.”

He lowered his head, I thought to rest, but a prayer he whispered thin,

“Dear Lord, dear sweet Lord, when . . .”