Dad

Note: I am sitting at my desk, mid-summer, gazing out on a hazy, warm day in July. I soaked my feet in the sea this morning and watched my dog, Gus, swim out to fetch sticks in the company of a resident harbor seal on Eagle Harbor. I have held the following essay captive for over a year and a half. My father, Bob McCormic, passed away on December 23, 2022. I wrote the following essay a few days before he died, and with his death stopped writing. I miss writing and I miss him, and so much life has happened since I wrote this. Time passes quickly, and I want to put this story out there as it is a moment on my journey that I don’t want to lose.

Mid-summer somehow feels like the right time to let this essay breathe, and sail out of my sight, to make room for new stories. And, this is dad’s season– he lived for summer. He is everywhere now–on the diamonds bouncing off the waves, the morning caw of the crows, settled into my morning coffee heating and spinning in the microwave as I gaze out at the songbirds fluttering about my bird feeder. I see him on passing sailboats, say hello to him when I take a dip in the bay, see his twinkling blue eyes and warm smile in the face of his sister, Karen, and meet his gaze from his photo hung at my moms, promising to keep taking care of her until she moves on beyond my reach. Last week my sister captained a small Beneteau cruiser, and took my husband and me on a three-night trip to the Sucia and San Juan Islands. I felt like a little kid again, and except for our wrinkles and middle-aged body aches, could have sworn that we had time travelled back to our magical boat trips with Dad. My husband teared up telling me he couldn’t remember the last time he saw me so happy. We assigned everyone a role–my big sis was the captain, my husband the bartender/cook and I proudly embraced the title of ship’s naturalist. I spent hours scanning the sea for seals, river otters and herons, squealed at the sight of sea stars, kelp beds and schools of fish–and relished my short sea swim at Sucia.

Thank you to my big, sister Sarah, and dear husband, Josh, for a magical adventure at sea. Dad is surely beaming.

December 20th, 2022

I sit watching large snowflakes gather upon the branches outside. All is white. Dad is dying beside me. I count his quiet breaths, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, then nothing. He begins again.

I wonder where he is now, when his breathing will cease, as his body lets go bit by bit. We have held vigil beside him for four days. We, the daughters, grandchildren, sister, wife, sons-in-law, are exhausted, bent, and weary from this stark wait. Endless outside of time time. Nurses and caregivers and housekeepers roll in and out of this big building, some with their hearts “ on their sleeve”, others blind to the labor of death, the work being done here. All but one have been kind, a couple tremendous, two terrible. All have offered what they know, with the training they received. Or didn’t. The best ones know when to be quiet, how and when to talk to dad, ask us questions quietly, about dad the father, friend, son, brother, husband, worker, sailor, builder—who he is, what he loved.

Two nights ago, at the end of a breathtakingly beautiful and gut wrenching day of grieving grandchildren and waves of words and waves of tears, everyone left but me. Another night alone with dad. I was anxious, fearful that dad would have another bad night, pulling at blankets and straining to stand.

“It’s like labor, but much more so,” the hospice nurse of this morning told us. All of our salt-stained eyes gazing at dad, our verbal permissions for him to leave when he is ready, our thanks, our messages of forgiveness for his transgressions, our gifts of stories, reminisces, our river of words of love—have worn him out. Dad has heard them all and now he needs quiet space to leave. We hold him here with our touch, our words, the nurse tells us.

We thought we could walk him all the way there, holding his hands and whispering love, but now we understand we perhaps hold him captive now with no break from visitors and words, even our touch may hold him back.

Outside, the wind blows the snow clouds about, small brown branches quiver under uneven clumps of white.

Inside mom snores, wrapped under dad’s blue fleece while the brown recliner serves as the final cradle for our tiny larger than life dad.

We began playing Bing Crosby, White Christmas for dad on my phone, it began after a bad episode yesterday, dad’s fists tight, tight brow, gargling cough. Our eldest sat with him, rocked with grief and sadness, pain for his Grampa hitting him like ice.

“How about we try some Bing, Dad?” I asked.

The music began, and like a switch had been flipped, dad went soft and still. All tension left his body, and his eyes closed and he began to softly snore.