Wednesday, October 3, 2012

The Laugh

Aunt Becky went with Mom the last time she went to visit Dad.

Beforehand, she (Becky) had been pretty pessimistic at the idea of Mom caring for Dad as she (Becky) imagined him.

Not so afterward.

He trusts you, Terry, she said.

He knows you. He knows that even though he doesn't understand what's happening, why it happened, when it happened, what will happen now or after ... you have his best interest at heart. You'll take care of him, no matter what.

He trusts you.

I think ...

I think I never understood the gravity and the commitment in a marriage until I'd had that picture painted for me.

Absolute, unquestioning trust.

Completely yielded vulnerability.

It was so heart-breakingly beautiful to think of. So perfectly my parents - however quirky they may be.

I cry now to think of it.

And I feel, for the first time, incomplete without another person to trust that way - without that vulnerability.

* * *

In the early days of Dad's waking up, no matter who he didn't recognize or how painful that was to see (or feel), he always knew Mom.

His face lit up - every time - when he saw her.

She was his anchor. Still is. He counts down the days (when he knows them) until her next visit.

He's still infatuated with her.

I wouldn't be surprised (or at all hurt) to learn - some time down the road - that hers was the only voice he heard during his coma; that hers was the only face he looked for each time he woke up.

* * *

My dad has not been rendered less intelligent in any way as a result of this disaster - far from it. His acute intelligence shines through in his "murky moments."

Dad gave me the best description of where he is mentally: "I know that I know things ... I just can't grasp a way to tell them to other people."

You've grasped more than you know, Dad.

* * *

Aunt Becky had another measure for determining Dad's all right-ness.

"So many people, after they've been through a brain injury like this, they ... they just don’t smile amymore. They don’t laugh."

The times I've laughed with my dad over the phone in the past couple weeks are enough to carry me through a lifetime of Christmases.

To hear my dad laughing again - truly, genuinely laughing - is a sound I wish I could bottle up & listen to in my most doubtful moments.

Dad is laughing again.

There is nothing that can't be overcome.