Most recent visit to South America

So I've just come back from visiting my parents in South America. And it wasn't necessarily a "good" trip. I'd gotten a call from my mother about a week before I left that my father was in the ICU at one of the hospitals around where they live. It seems he was admitted with a severe cough and trouble breathing and all the attendant issues with that (pale skin, lack of movement, tiredness, etc). In succeeding conversations with my mother and the docs, it turned out that he had a pretty bad case of pneumonia, and had to be treated with an aggressive antibiotic treatment. He had to be on a respirator, and have a feeding tube put in, along with a whole bunch of other things as well. He may have aspirated something in to his lungs as a result of dementia most likely. Dementia can often cause the disintegration of the neural and electrical pathways that tell the body what to do. So even the autonomic functions, such as the ability to swallow and other automatic activity- things we do without thinking - start to fall apart. And this may have been a result of some physical diminishment. Even if he got something in his lungs again, he doesn't have the strength to cough and get it out. The doc's say it's pretty likely he may very well get out sometime soon - he's doing a lot better... in the short term... but in the long term, the picture may not be as rosie.

Well, I'm not sure what to do, or even what to think of this. So I've just learned to settle with what is. So- I've decided to write about this... so I wrote a Haiku poem about the diminishment of his cognitive ability (I'm very attracted to the simplicity and sort of austerity of the discipline), and then something after the last day I saw him- the day before I left.

Falling unattached

disassembled memories

bridges slowly burn

Last visit with my father - May 11th 2011

It's hard to hug - too many wires and tubes, too many monitors that angrily beep when crimped - monitoring vitals; heart rate, O2 saturation, respiration rate, tubes delivering nutrition and medications, the trache tube.

Possibly some more lucid moments today. I hope I get through his fog more today. It's time to go- I pause - time to say goodbye. I'm leaving tomorrow! He's lying there - looks like my father. A snap-shot in time! My father - father's and sons. A long moment- and archetypal moment. All the years, all the memories - crowding their way in. All seeming to want to be present to say Good-bye. Today was a good day - but does he know I'm here?

What do you say to someone you may never see again? What do you say to your father?

I've already asked my grandfather- his father- whom he adored, whom he loved dearly and had a very, very good father-son relationship with - to watch over him when it's time, to help him have clarity of mind so he can pass solidly and strongly into the next world. Lord, may his dementia die as well when it's time, so he can see the next world with clear eyes and a clear perception. I've already anointed him, praying for his healing.

"I'll see you on the other side", I say - seemed like the right thing. This is a moment - frozen - bracketed - holding off the regular current, as other moments pass by - other moments of life with him - father-son stuff; the struggles, the joys, the "regular" moments - start popping up one after the other.

He still breathes. He's been slowly dying for years now. But it's more real now. "I love you!" He doesn't respond. He's still looking away. Doesn't matter though. As I walk away - to the end of the bed,a few steps past - I look back - wave - "Bye, Pa." Still nothing - yet.

I walk away, taking my memories with me. Before I reach the entrance to the hospital, a path I've walked every day for two weeks, I have to stop and write this! I know exactly where to sit - but not exactly what to write. But I remember.