I started drafting this a few weeks ago after learning my dad would be going into hospice. It was intended to be a reflection on how one spends time and about why, despite my lack of talent or inability, I keep on writing. The original opening was very flowery, and I honestly thought it flowed:
There are many phrases representing the positive nature of a temporary experience: A fleeting glance, an evanescent whiff of the smell of flowers, ephemeral pleasures. With human interactions, I do love the phrase “like ships in the night,” or in modern parlance “missed connections on Craigslist”; one certainly more poetic than the other, but all convey the yearning for more. More of the scent that the wind blew away or more of the fun that only a roller coaster could provide. Usually though, it’s just more time.
But since then, my father has passed on rather suddenly. In the gravitas of death, my first draft was far too light. Rather, a more appropriate piece would be a thoughtful conversation on what happened and the implications.
This is not intended to be an obituary; it is far too selfish a piece. The longer I ponder, the more I feel that a person is too multifaceted to be summarized in a few short paragraphs by anybody, especially by their own child. Society imposes certain expectations on a parent: to teach, educate, care, and stand as a role model etc. I felt my relationship with my father was primarily through that lens. It was interesting to hear of the impact he had on others, as a friend or organizer, during the funeral service, and yet, I was vexed that I was only hearing about it then and there. Of course, there are even larger parts of his life, like those in Japan or his own childhood, that I have only glimpsed through pictures.
It’s awfully unfair that humans can only see in three dimensions, and are not able to see a life like a Tralfamadorian where time is but another perspective. We cannot see our end, accept our allotment of time, and look at the triumphs and failures, the phases of life as a whole. Once decline sets in, we can only observe the frightening power of decay. What really stood out to me was the emaciated body of someone who were once very healthy and exercised constantly. The irony is that he was reduced to skin and bones by mutinous cancer cells which refused to starve. Those cells played a match the last couple of years against science; sometimes treatments would hold, and other times the cancer would break. The trajectory used to be oscillatory, but over the past year, it has been strictly declining. I guess in this silly metaphor, it was match point.
But before talking about that, it would be a shame not to reflect on the middle. I think I inherited part of my adventurousness from him. At new places, I would watch with a tinge of embarrassment as he would talk to random strangers, but would eat humble pie when he got the best local scoops. He was limited economically early in his life (China wasn’t exactly rich then), but managed to be a landlord with a capital L after being financially savvy enough to purchase properties after the ‘08 crash. To get to that point, he had to hustle or 吃苦, especially after being laid off earlier in the decade. One of the weirdest memories I have is of us cleaning a mansion owned by a Super Bowl winning quarterback in Tallahassee. Looking back, I’m grateful for his relentless work ethic and the sacrifices he made to build a better life for us, and allowing me to meander through life.
The ending happened rather fast. What I thought would have been a long hospice stay took a sudden turn. A low oxygen warning brought him to the ER, where pneumonia was found in his lungs. At late stages of cancer, the body’s immune system is so devastated that these bacteria deserve immense respect, which I think none of us paid. Sometimes I wonder if I was partially responsible for bringing in the germs after flying back. His heart rate couldn’t go down, staying consistently above the 130s, and by the end of the week, he took his last breaths in the hospital rather unexpectedly. He had been eating full meals the days prior, and was self-sufficient albeit bed-bound due to the maze of tubes. Honestly, he seemed to be recovering nicely. I wonder now if that was the classic terminal lucidity phenomenon.
It’s an odd feeling: the hard demarcation of death; the literal crossing of the Rubicon (or I guess Styx), that I still couldn’t wrap my head around. For a bit, I felt that the whole situation was a vivid dream, and I would emerge days, weeks, months or even years ago. Sitting there in the hospice room, it seemed that maybe he was going to just get up at any time.
But this being a selfish piece, the whole process also makes me reflect on what I want at my end of life. If the situation were exactly the same, how would I behave? Without digressing too much into nature versus nurture, parents, sharing half the genetics, offer a realistic lens, albeit at a small sample size, to how their children will behave. For a little while, I almost felt an unhealthy observation of my body, with the aches and pains of daily life magnified into thinking each minute tic or ache is a life-defining disease festering underneath. Is it just the physical manifestation of grief or something sinister underneath? Mindfulness can be a double-edged sword.
Besides the “standard” grief, there’s also inner anger tinged with regret in this swirl of feelings. There was a time in the hospital when I got a bit annoyed when he would rush to get dressed and to sit straight up, inevitably spiking his heart rate, and further preventing him from coming home. Now, that annoyance takes a rueful tone. The goal was to allow him to go home, a place of deep comfort, and be taken care of there. Instead, one night, he woke up confused and alone in the ICU at 2 a.m. and called us. There’s some anger at myself now that I was irked to be woken up then. There’s also misplaced anger: why then? Did he have a sense that the end was near, and didn’t want to tell us?
Not all my emotions are negative though. I’m relieved that his pain is over, and that he’s finally at peace. I’m content that our last interaction was his expression of gratitude and my acceptance of it before leaving his room for the night. Sometimes, content is all one can ask for.
