All Grown Up Overnight

I started this blog entry a few days after Dad's funeral. For whatever reason I didn't finish it then. But, reading it again now, it's probably as complete at it needs to be.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It's funny how certain things in this life call a person out to grow up and take responsibility. Around my folks and my brother and sister, I've always felt like I was still a kid - even after I've married and have a family. The past couple of years have forced me out of that kind of thinking - especially the events of the week.

When we first talked to Mom and Dad about moving from Malakoff, TX to Conroe, I was thinking about caring for my parents and ensuring that they were not alone for as long as we possibly could. My biggest fear used to be getting a phone call from someone who would tell me that one of my parents had suddenly died. Having them in an apartment off our patio would be a very good thing, for us and them, because we would all be in close proximity. No more long trips back and forth to their house. We'd all be in one place - together. It didn't take long before the new wore off and I realized that our roles had changed. I was becoming more of a caretaker and my parents needed to be cared for. This became so obvious to us toward the end of 2011 when both Mom and Dad both broke a hip and had to endure extensive rehabilitation to just be able to walk. I wasn't quite prepared for that, but somehow we survived. It had been bearable because we were all together.

Since they've been here, we've had to take away the car keys from my mother. Talk about awkward! For crying out loud - I remember when I was threatened with losing my privileges to drive, for coming home late - one too many times. We realized that taking away driving privileges from them meant that we had to pick up the responsibility to take Mom and Dad wherever they needed to go. I obviously didn't think about that, either, but it was what we needed to do.

The past several days have been about accepting responsibility and growing up for me. Family members have died in our family before. Someone else took care of the details. This time, it was my responsibility. That responsibility came with a lot of things. For starters, I've been coming to grips with my own mortality and that of my family - especially Mom and Dad.

I've never been with someone as they died. I've lost friends who died prematurely, but I wasn't there when it happened. I've lost family members who were close to me, but again, I wasn't there. Now, I've watched plenty of movies where this character or that character died. I've heard the debate about how TV violence makes a person insensitive to real violence and I've often wondered, if what they say is true, if I would know the difference. There was no question for me last Tuesday evening. At the moment of truth, I knew what was happening and was terrified.

I'm proud that I can say I was there when Haynes passed from this life to the next. But, I was scared and out of my mind during those moments. At first I didn't know what to do. I was trying to drive to the hospital and hitting Haynes in the chest with my fist, hoping that I could do something to help him. Then, I realized that I was completely helpless. Jessie was trying to keep him from falling forward in the seat while I zigged and zagged toward the Emergency Room. It seemed like an eternity before we arrived at our destination. I drove up to the ER entrance like a madman. Jumped out and ran around the car to get Dad out. I know now that when I pulled him out of the car, he was already a lifeless shell. With the help of kind bystander, we got Dad out of the car and into his wheelchair and rushed him inside. The ER techs went right to work and did the best they could, but it was too late.

I never really stopped to think about what happened when someone died at a hospital, much less anywhere else before Tuesday night. As far as I knew, someone else had taken care of that. But, this wasn't someone or somewhere else. This is where we were. Some 16 years before, Dad told me, before undergoing a routine medical procedure, that if something happened to him that I needed to take care of my mother. That's what a man did. But, now there was a dilemma. Dad had a custom that he would not view the body of the deceased. I never really talked to him about it, but I figured that he wanted to remember that friend or relative as they were when they were alive and not dead. I started observing this custom myself after Dad's brother, Herbert, passed away in 1990. He was my hero as a boy. He was a giant to me and had a personality that was larger than life. Dad wanted to remember him as he had known him growing up. I wanted to remember him as I had as a young man. With a very few exceptions, I have kept this custom since. So how do I reconcile that and fulfill my responsibilities to both my mother and dad? I realized I couldn't and sucked it up. It took a few minutes to adjust to what was happening, but eventually it wasn't as hard to do as I thought. I like to think that God gave me the strength to be there with my mother and my Dad's remains.

My dad's body was in a curtain-partitioned room in the ER, lying on a gurney. I want to think now that I became a man in that moment. But, I know I didn't do it alone. Mom and Dad's pastor, Lloyd Maddoux, was there with us. Soon, my friends, Raymond and Bobby McDonald and Frank Jackson were there,  along with me and my mom. They stayed to the bitter end, when the mortician arrived to pick up Dad's body to take to a local funeral home for the night.

The mortician gave us a final few moments to spend with Dad's body before he would be taken away. Frank asked to pray with Mom and I. After a short, sweet prayer, he started singing the little chorus "surely the presence of the Lord is in this place" with us. It seemed that in that moment all the fear, anxiety, sorrow and concern we'd felt for Dad just melted away. God met us there and had been with us the entire time. We had been where we needed to be, as uncomfortable a place as it had been and it was now a sanctuary, as holy as any church that had ever been built.

More importantly, when my mother and I drove away from the hospital in the wee hours of the next morning, I was no longer a boy in my own mind. I had grown into being a man.