So, at age 46 I became an orphan. I lost my mother (technically lost is the right word here as shes actually I believe still alive but its long and complicated needless to say it involved her lying about ever having had kids on divorce papers, and being a complete tart and never speaking to her only child ever again) and then in Aug 2018 my Dad died, kinda unexpectedly. He had been sort of ill with “asthma” which I told him many times “You dont get asthma age 65 after smoking for like 50+ years, you get C.O.P.D” but no no its asthma they gave him asthma meds, and… they werent helping (another big clue it aint asthma then) anyway, July last year he finally conceded to go for the xray they had been asking for since April and.. found a “mass” in his lungs.. well a few weeks later very very out the blue the hospital called me to say they were worried cos my Dad was confused, and I phoned him and he was his usual jolly self, he had been slightly slurring for a week or so, but, pretty with it.. By Sunday, well, he didnt ring me like he usually did, which was odd, so, I rang him a bit later and.. got a lecture for phoning so late.. see, he knew it was 11.45, but he thought 11.45pm.. even though the sun was doing that thing where if you put your hand out the window it would probably blister.. he accused me even of moving the sun to confuse him.. I found it quite upsetting.. anyway, he was due in the next morning for a bag of stuff to help fix it, and.. I woke, went to work, tried to ring him to wish him luck, no answer, but it was around the time he may have been doing dog things or the man collecting him could have come early.. It played on my mind which is weird, and I asked my boss if I could go to see him.. its a 2 hour drive, boss didnt blink and said yes.. So, on leaving the town I live near I phoned because a nice lady was dog sitting and she answered and almost cried.. “hes in hospital” well I should hope so that was the point.. “no no, he fell in the night, he got taken to A&E” .. oh crap.. ok, well I’ll be there in 2 hours.. zoom zoom zoom.. well he was still in A&E, no no you dont need to come in miss.. (wish I had now) but he was just confused and had a bit of a swollen arm.. Anyway, they finally decided a doc wanted to talk with me and said I should come in.. so I went.. at this time its nearly 6pm, he’d been there 14 hours, and all they had done was take obs. Not given him his bag of fix it, not done a thing but made him sit in one of those gowns which covers nothing and taken obs.. they whined to me his obs werent stable.. Being true to our family, I pointed out they could take mine right now and mine wouldnt be either… the woman took the hint.. Anyway, doc finally was free.. She took me aside, and basically told me he had a 10cm mass, and a 5cm mass in his left lung along with numerous nodules around both… if he stopped breathing or whatever no matter how much I pleaded they wouldnt be able to resuscitate him, I asked what they planned to do, the answer was nothing.. I asked if they had told him that, and they said “We said we werent going to operate yes” and I shook my head.. see, my Dad all his life had a phrase “Kimber’s campaign for more positive speech” .. “You dont borrow a pen, you USE it..” see in saying “no operation” that left open many other options, chemo, radiation.. but no, what they actually meant was, that was it..that there was nothing they were doing to be able to do to fix him and hadnt actually told him that.. While holding down my job, and doing as few hours as I could so the business got what it needed, and driving 2 hours (minimum) each way, I drove back and forth, and on the Thursday morning.. i got a call.. “He hasnt woken up” .. one of my dogs who has cancer of everything had needed a vet appointment or Id have taken them down days before, so that all got scrapped I threw everything in the car, dumped them at Dads house, and flew to the hospital sadly to watch him die..
So, why did I tell you this??
I dedicate all this to my Dad, I wish he could have seen it, I never remember him saying he was proud of me, not when I got my grade 8 flute, nor my black belt in karate, but I loved him, I still love him, and I still miss him..