Or, How to work around death
With fall comes the glimmer of the beginning of the end. The start is where we launch our hopes out of the fog. The end, where a moment pulls at our toes, slowly turns our head with a warning, a warming of parts forgotten to launch our hearts through the crevices.
Maybe the soundtrack of Our Endless Numbered Days has made it easier for me to accept the leafless bodies that slowly appear from the sidelines. These past days have been filled with family faces, struggling to pull some strength out of their definition of a family tragedy.
I was looking at the shadows on the ceiling of my bedroom the other night and wondered what my father could see at that same moment. But I was actually thinking about my grandfather, I just slipped in the thought of him being my father figure for a split second. But what can he see from his hospital bed? Don’t ask me how old he is. My grandfather is ageless. All I know is that he is younger than my grandmother and that this does not exclude him from the constant ticking.
When I got the news, I was at home, not dressed, not warm, by my mother, trying to deliver a message that still had her stunned. Not blinking, I stared at the shiny floor as I heard some technical words and a shaking voice sink into my skin.
Later, I found myself beside him, holding his hand that was held back by a fuzzy wrist belt. What do I say? Can he hear me? What do I say? What do I say to make it better? I whistle. A faint, vague blur of my breath trying to find it’s way to our memory of his renowned half-whistling while he worked. It sounds like the fall wind through the naked branches. Yes, that is how he whistled. It drove my late uncle Ron crazy when they worked on some garage project together.
In and out of consciousness. Our thoughts bounce back and forth as people who are unaware of the shadows look at us and use this talk that passes by like white and yellow lines. I have to build that database. Is my grandfather still alive? Intensive care is a fancy term for expensive monitoring machines. I can’t build the database without her list. I have to work on the website. My grandfather likes pancakes. When he was able to talk, he told my grandmother, after he woke from a long sleep, that he made pancakes, “the good kind, the kind we like”. Apparently, his mother, before she passed away, also made pancakes.
P.S.: Isn’t Times New Roman the worst font?
With fall comes the glimmer of the beginning of the end. The start is where we launch our hopes out of the fog. The end, where a moment pulls at our toes, slowly turns our head with a warning, a warming of parts forgotten to launch our hearts through the crevices.
Maybe the soundtrack of Our Endless Numbered Days has made it easier for me to accept the leafless bodies that slowly appear from the sidelines. These past days have been filled with family faces, struggling to pull some strength out of their definition of a family tragedy.
I was looking at the shadows on the ceiling of my bedroom the other night and wondered what my father could see at that same moment. But I was actually thinking about my grandfather, I just slipped in the thought of him being my father figure for a split second. But what can he see from his hospital bed? Don’t ask me how old he is. My grandfather is ageless. All I know is that he is younger than my grandmother and that this does not exclude him from the constant ticking.
When I got the news, I was at home, not dressed, not warm, by my mother, trying to deliver a message that still had her stunned. Not blinking, I stared at the shiny floor as I heard some technical words and a shaking voice sink into my skin.
Later, I found myself beside him, holding his hand that was held back by a fuzzy wrist belt. What do I say? Can he hear me? What do I say? What do I say to make it better? I whistle. A faint, vague blur of my breath trying to find it’s way to our memory of his renowned half-whistling while he worked. It sounds like the fall wind through the naked branches. Yes, that is how he whistled. It drove my late uncle Ron crazy when they worked on some garage project together.
In and out of consciousness. Our thoughts bounce back and forth as people who are unaware of the shadows look at us and use this talk that passes by like white and yellow lines. I have to build that database. Is my grandfather still alive? Intensive care is a fancy term for expensive monitoring machines. I can’t build the database without her list. I have to work on the website. My grandfather likes pancakes. When he was able to talk, he told my grandmother, after he woke from a long sleep, that he made pancakes, “the good kind, the kind we like”. Apparently, his mother, before she passed away, also made pancakes.
P.S.: Isn’t Times New Roman the worst font?
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