We just went down to Florida to be with Husband’s 89-year-old father who took a spill while out shopping. Seems he was in the parking lot of Best Buy where he went to check out the latest flat screen monitors for his new computer. A car backing out of a spot startled him and he lost his balance. After his fall, he picked himself up, drove himself home, parked his car and called 911. Before the ambulance arrived he made sure to remove all the cash from his wallet. These emergencies in life require preparation, you know.
By the time we flew down there he was in the Intensive Care Unit and really appeared to be in danger. Walking into his room after we donned protective gowns and gloves, I noticed he was still wearing his pricey stainless steel watch and diamond stud earring. If this were a New York City hospital those items would have been gone in sixty seconds. Every time my mother was taken to a hospital in the city some cherished personal item failed to reach the safe place hospitals promise they have for emergency patients. The lovely gold watch my father gave her for their 25th anniversary is now someone else’s family heirloom.
My father-in-law is a feisty one as I wrote a while back in Hurry Up and Wait. He’s hellbent on reaching 100 and pity the fool who stands in his way. Shortly after we arrived, he said we needed to go to his apartment and pay the bills sitting on his desk so they wouldn’t be late. I told him I had stamps with me so we’d take care of it. He said, “I pay my bills online, don’t you?” Uh, no, actually I don’t. He looked at me like I was so yesterday he couldn’t believe it. I wanted to say, “Well, I’m on Facebook, are you?” but considering the fact he was hooked up to an IV and 3 monitors I thought it might appear childish.
Husband and I went to his apartment and logged onto his bill payment site. When we opened his mail, we noticed his most recent cell phone bill was a staggering amount. Husband called AT&T and they confirmed the total due was $4315.53. His previous monthly bills averaged less than $60. One might think something was amiss. The customer service rep asked Husband if we had a lot of family in Haiti.
Obviously my father-in-law’s cell phone was lost or stolen and a rogue bill was incurred. While Husband was on hold with AT&T, I said maybe a desperate soul trying to locate relatives in Haiti after the earthquake was driven to dishonesty and there was some divine justification for this larcenous action. Husband, a social worker with a deep sense of human compassion, looked at me like “Give it up, Gandhi” making me realize just how exhausted he was. AT&T reversed the charges and canceled the phone number.
It was a tough visit all around, what with Husband having lost his mother less than two years ago, and me with memories of my own mom taking her last breath in a different ICU. As I watched Husband struggle with his father’s failing health, it took me back to 2004 when both my parents and grandmother were all dying in different places and I was frantically trying to be at everyone’s bedside. I predicted this trip would be difficult for me so I wore a little silver locket that carries pictures of the parents I think about every day. While we were down in Florida I opened my locket several times to look at their faces, never once missing that missing gold watch.
Today’s entry begins a series of Featured Fotos
by Daughter wherein Two Words Say It All
hoop tree
american glasses
animal parts
knock knock