Working through life

My father died on March 8th.  He had bone cancer, and he died.

Through it, I wrote.  I did have a couple of weeks where nothing would come.  Where what was happening to him so overwhelmed me that I couldn’t do anything but crawl back to my house after another day at the hospital watching the drugs and the “cures” make him sicker and sicker.  I’d eat something, then go to bed, so emotionally exhausted I could barely speak.  Then I’d go back the next day, and do it all over again.

Somewhere in there, though, I started to suck it up.  Maybe it was because Dad seemed to hear me when I talked about my story.  I had to give the man the end, now didn’t I?  It was one thing I could do.  So I did.

Dad almost always knew how to work through the crap life threw at him.  True, a couple of things pole axed him, and a few times I was afraid he wouldn’t be able to get up again. But he did. He always did. Right until the end.

So what did I have to bitch about?  Not a thing. I still had my strength, and my brain, and my hands.  With those, I could do anything.

So, as my father lay dying, I kept writing.  And I finished the thing.  He would have kicked me in the ass if I hadn’t.