Daddy

4-16-12


I don’t like seeing my dad look old.

In a quick visit yesterday, the boys and I headed over to say hello to my folks and see how their trip to Jamaica went. I could tell something was wrong even as I walked in the house. I saw my dad at the top of the stairs and he looked frail. My dad never looks frail.

His face was thinner, and aside from what was a nice glowing tan, he looked like he could crumple. I also heard my mother on the phone in the background, and it all seemed wrong. Red flags everywhere. My dad’s voice was hushed, I assumed at first due to my mom being on the phone, but in reality, he seemed to have a sore throat.

I could hear the conversation my mom was having and I perked up to Torrance Memorial and appointments being made. I wondered if someone was sick and at the hospital, which might have explained my dad’s weakened appearance. But this was not the case. The appointment being made was for him.

On Friday, while still at the resort, my dad got sick. He couldn’t keep anything down and spent the remaining day of their vacation in the room. He lost 10 pounds in 2 days. He and my mom had to fly back Saturday, which was 12 hours of pure hell having to travel in that condition. His sleep has been ok, but the pounding this illness is taking on his body was exhausting.

Looking into his face scared the shit out of me. Aside from the creepy resemblance to his mother he took on, I could see a weakness I thankfully don’t have to see much on him. He aged 25 years and even his normal laugh was gone. I hated it, and yet I tried desperately to not freak out to spare both my mother and children from my fears.

My mom took him to the urgent care per the doc’s advice and thankfully it sounds like it was just a bad virus of sorts. They hydrated him via IV and prescribed him some anti-nausea meds, which will hopefully help in getting some food into his body. It will most likely lay him out for a good week. This of course sucks for the simple fact that my dad doesn’t like to be cooped up for any length of time.

It was a disturbing image for me to have, and one I won’t soon forget. I know he is ok, but it is a sad reminder that one day he will be gone.

Stupid mortality.

The rest of the weekend was less traumatic. Sure, 5 hours of my life were bored away while sitting in the AYSO Treasurer meeting that turned out to be a poorly performed live show of the exact same webinar I already took. The only things that kept it entertaining were the suggestive text messaging Ken and I exchanged while he was in a different class. It was quite the thrill since not only did I have to be discreet for the sake of the instructors, but my nosey neighbor who insisted on talking to me much of the class seemed to want to sneak a peak at each message I received on my phone. I considered making it more visible if only to shock her since I was pretty sure the graphic language would have made her blush, but I didn’t want to blush myself.

We ducked out of the Tri-Section meeting right after lunch. There was no way my ass was sitting in another boring class that I don’t need. I am not sure I understand completely how these meetings are considered a lot of fun. Perhaps if I could have taken a class that was on coaching or maybe been with Ken it would have been better.

The boys spent Saturday morning with Aaron. It was amazing to me how well it went. Aaron showed up to the house on time at 6 am. Shockingly, too, Dax held it together despite the fact that I saw the tears in his eyes. Aaron said they were incredibly well behaved. They hung out and played Wii in the morning. Then they went down to the beach where Aaron had his NA meeting. The boys were able to play with the kid of another member of the group. Then Aaron and the boys along with their new friend and her mother went and saw The Lorax. Yay!

Saturday night we went out to dinner with Matt. He wanted to take us out, so it was a nice dinner at Denny’s. The boys were good and Matt was pretty pleasant. It was really more monumental that he answered a text message from me earlier in the day. Hee hee!

I have things to do this morning so I suppose I should get to it.