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When your father is in the second half of his 9th decade you can’t help but occasionally muse about what the world will be like when he is no longer in it. Still my brother-in-law’s email about Dad’s escalating back pain, possibly from a fractured vertabra, was unsettling. We have since learned that there is no fracture, but a urinary tract infection. So antibiotics, pain meds and eventual physical therapy seem to be the order of the day. Yet prior to that, the initial email phrase “In someone this old, a fracture could be the beginning of the end” was certainly cause for reflection. One might ordinarily end that sentence with “concern” rather than “reflection,” but the choice is intentional. “Cause for concern” brings a lot of conceptual baggage that does not necessarily apply in this instance.I do not know if one can inherit an inclination to laughter, but it seems a common trait in the Schrag family. I recall it particularly in my Uncle Paul who passed away a couple of years ago at 99, and in my Uncle Delbert who is still chuckling along through his 80s. It is not frivolity; it is more being in tune with all that is humorous; an ability to laugh often and to give your full attention to that laughter. I remember that inclination being more prevalent in my father as a younger man, when Mom was still alive. It was more tempered than in Paul and Delbert, perhaps by the professorial need to be “right”, but it was there nonetheless. I choose to believe I have inherited that inclination to laughter.
I have seen only the briefest of flashes of that inclination in my father these last few years. Perhaps losing both a son and a wife leeched some of the laughter from his eyes. And, recently, he has made no secret of the fact that he finds the process of growing old most distasteful. His memories of himself as a younger man remain quite clear; he dislikes his own comparisons to the current edition.
My belief system, Chord Theory, or Universal Resonance as I currently conceive of it, releases us, at life’s end, as sentient entities free to explore the joyous intricacies of the universe. Should I be “concerned” that my father might be approaching that new experience? He has lived a long and rich and complex life, and he is most displeased with the reality of his current “everyday.” He seems to live more from force of habit, than from any joyful anticipation of what the day might bring. So, on closer reflection, my major “cause for concern” is a selfish one – I will miss him. He has been a loving consistency in my life, for all my life. And yet even that selfish notion of “missing him” is more complicated than it seems at first blush. I will miss the idea of having a father. I will miss the concept of my father as a mentor. I really have had no other. But in truth, he has not played that role for more than a decade. Like he himself, I will miss the man he was but is no longer. His eventual, yet certain departure will transform the fabric of my existence. I know I will find ways to honor that departure, but I’d rather put it off still longer. And yes, in light of his own ennui, that is selfish - and I will own that selfishness.
Still, while I will do what I can to aid Margaret and William in their always excellent, and deeply appreciated, on-site care, I need to begin to make my peace with the idea of a “world without Dad.” I find it comforting to begin that process with my firm belief that when he does leave us, Dad will once again be free to fully explore his hereditary inclination to laughter.
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