A little over a year ago I went to the Journalcon in San Francisco—a special request! How could I say no? I flew up with baby Simon. We spent the night at the St. Francis hotel, off Union Square, and in the morning we wandered over to Journalcon. Right after my session I had to dash off, missing what everyone said was a great luncheon, because I was having brunch with my parents at Sears’ Fine Foods. My mom had seen Simon when he was a month or so old, but my dad hadn’t met him yet.
During the brunch my father seemed strangely distracted. He kept checking his watch. At the end of brunch he said he wanted to go home to watch the Giants in the playoffs. We’d spent about an hour together. I knew how much he enjoyed baseball, so I kissed him goodbye and then set off to catch BART to Oakland Airport.
A month later my sister called me to tell me our dad had collapsed and was in the hospital. He seemed weirdly disoriented, saying very strange things. And he was checking his watch all the time. “That didn’t just start,” I told them.
Then a little while after that she called to tell me he’d had a stroke.
I flew back up to San Francisco, Simon in my arms, and I went to visit Dad in the hospital. He seemed to have no idea who my sister and I were. It was heartbreaking to see him looking so different than he had just a month earlier.
A month after that, at Christmastime, Darin and I drove up for the holidays as usual. My sister and I went to visit my father at the hospital, and I was astounded at how much better he seemed. He definitely seemed to recognize the two of us. He wasn’t trying to communicate, but he listened as we talked to him.
He came home a month or two after that. Much earlier than we thought he would, but there was nothing further for him in the hospital. He attended physical therapy. He slowly started doing things, like going for walks. He couldn’t use his right hand very well, but he was working on it.
I brought the kids up to San Francisco about every two weeks to visit Grandmom and Grandpop. My parents definitely seemed to enjoy seeing them, and the kids enjoyed the wonder that is their grandparents’ strange and unusual house.
Last month—it all runs together at this point—my Dad tried to talk to me. We didn’t get very far in the conversation, because he couldn’t aspirate very well. He’d had a laryngectomy about 12 or 15 years ago and used a prosthesis to talk afterward. After the stroke he couldn’t use the prosthesis any more, because it requires manual dexterity he didn’t have and patience to relearn the process, which he also didn’t have.
But he was trying to talk to me. Which was a big difference.
At Christmas last week my parents arrived with bags and bags of gifts. The ones from my father were wrapped clumsily—which meant he’d done it. And the tags were written in a jerky handwriting—which meant he’d done it. It’s impossible to imagine getting excited over gift tags, until you’ve done it, I guess. I told him how happy I was to see him writing. I said I’d be back up to San Francisco with the kids after New Year’s.
Yesterday my sister called me and told me he was in the hospital again, this time with pneumonia. Evidently in the morning things were very bad and “the doctor was ready to call in the priest,” but in the afternoon he’d rallied. Still sick, but doing much better. He was pretty out of it, though. I wondered if I should go up to visit him even though he was out of it.
This morning at 4am my mom called to let me know he’d passed away. This morning has been spent working out mortuary arrangements.
I keep telling Darin there’s something wrong with me because I just feel numb. He talked to his Dad (who recently lost his own father) and Steve said, Don’t worry, that feeling won’t last.
I’ve never had a close relative die before. Considering before Darin my family was pretty much just my parents and my sister, I guess that’s not too surprising. Despite the troubbles my father has had over the year (throat cancer, the laryngectomy, the stroke) this has still come as a surprise. An unwelcome completely expected surprise, if that makes any sense.
Anyhow. In case anyone out there knew Thomas Joseph Patterson, of Philadelphia, New York, and San Francisco, he passed away today.
I’ll probably not be posting for a little while until I sort things out.