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Apr. 4th, 2007 08:43 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
winterbadgerNeta and I were at the Screaming Eagles viewing party, watching the end of the second leg of the DC United-Chivas de Guadalajara Champions Cup series, when my phone rang. It was my sister Cornelia, calling to let me know our dad had died.
I feel as if I had a chance to say goodbye the last time I was there, and I don't feel as if he, the person I knew and loved, has really been there for a while, so I'm not sad I wasn't there at the last. My mum went to see him the other day, and C. says he was just overjoyed to see her and they had a very happy time together, so I hope she won't be having any lingering feelings of guilt, which I was afraid of before.
I'm sad, of course, but mostly I'm mystified as to exactly what happened. It sounds as if he was lucid and happy, but in considerable discomfort, so his going now was probably for the best. But the reports I've heard have seemed so completely disparate (one minute he's in a decline, then the next he's talking and eating and getting stronger), and so little actual medical explanation for what's happened has been forthcoming that I'm terrifically puzzled.
But, in the end, that isn't really what's important. What's important is that he seems to have been relatively happy and calm at the end, instead of furious and unhappy as he was when he went to the hospital. That we all got a chance to see him and say goodbye. That he isn't suffering in body or mind anymore.
Being the English teacher he was, I know he'd like to be remembered in a poem. I looked for one and had a hard time choosing. For now, I think this is a good one.
Do not stand at my grave and weep,
I am not there, I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glint on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you wake in the morning hush,
I am the swift, uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circling flight.
I am the soft starlight at night.
Do not stand at my grave and weep.
I am not there, I do not sleep.
Do not stand at my grave and cry.
I am not there, I did not die!
I feel as if I had a chance to say goodbye the last time I was there, and I don't feel as if he, the person I knew and loved, has really been there for a while, so I'm not sad I wasn't there at the last. My mum went to see him the other day, and C. says he was just overjoyed to see her and they had a very happy time together, so I hope she won't be having any lingering feelings of guilt, which I was afraid of before.
I'm sad, of course, but mostly I'm mystified as to exactly what happened. It sounds as if he was lucid and happy, but in considerable discomfort, so his going now was probably for the best. But the reports I've heard have seemed so completely disparate (one minute he's in a decline, then the next he's talking and eating and getting stronger), and so little actual medical explanation for what's happened has been forthcoming that I'm terrifically puzzled.
But, in the end, that isn't really what's important. What's important is that he seems to have been relatively happy and calm at the end, instead of furious and unhappy as he was when he went to the hospital. That we all got a chance to see him and say goodbye. That he isn't suffering in body or mind anymore.
Being the English teacher he was, I know he'd like to be remembered in a poem. I looked for one and had a hard time choosing. For now, I think this is a good one.
Do not stand at my grave and weep,
I am not there, I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glint on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you wake in the morning hush,
I am the swift, uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circling flight.
I am the soft starlight at night.
Do not stand at my grave and weep.
I am not there, I do not sleep.
Do not stand at my grave and cry.
I am not there, I did not die!
