My Father's Father

There was never a funeral after my father’s wreck. The doctors kept his body alive and were so proud that they had overcome what seemed to be the will of God. Everyone said it was a miracle that he had lived, but I felt like it was a curse. Several years and hundreds of thousands of dollars later the medical experts pieced together what was left and gave the living remains back to the family. My father had been reborn, but he was not the same. Everything about him was different. His physical appearance was mangled from slamming into the car windshield at 45 miles per hour. His left eye sat lower than the right and the cheek under the damaged eye had lost its original shape. The scars around his mouth changed the shape of his lips. His nose almost cut from his face now had geographic lines and was reformed into a blunt form. There was a large gaping hole in his throat from the tracheotomy that was performed to allow oxygen to find its way into his lungs. The procedure aged the sound of his voice, and when he spoke it sounded strange and unfamiliar. Although accepting the physical changes was easy, adapting to his new mental state was not. Only fragments of memory remained. His recent memory was all but lost, and he focused more on the past like a person suffering from Alzheimer’s. From then on the mind of my hero was not the same. Sometimes he forgot to brush his teeth, or forgot our home address, or the names of old friends, and sometimes he forgot my name. In my heart my father died on a hot day in March when the pollen was thick and the sun was shining. There was never a funeral.

Time passed as it always does, and the family tried to adapt to our new life. My little brother was angry that his Daddy had been replaced and he never passed up the opportunity to argue and fight when our dad went into one of his emotional outbursts. My mother became worn down by the verbal abuse directed at her as she tried to care for what had become the equivalent of a child and no longer a husband. He was not the same man she married and she felt forced into a divorce in an attempt to free herself from the curse. I kept my distance from the situation by hiding out in college. I returned for holidays and special occasions, but kept as much emotional space as possible. The pain was not so bad when I didn’t have to face it. I avoided the new man and the new odd world. The man that raised me was gone now, and I was unable to find the will to get to know the new person.

With my mother’s absence and my immature state of mind the county probate judge appointed a local lawyer as the overseer of care giving. From the beginning this was a disaster. The self serving lawyer placed his friends and criminal cohorts as care givers. The group of small town gangsters managed to steal my dad’s money while ignoring his person. They neglected him until his feet were covered in open wounds and undiagnosed diabetes attacked what was left of his broken body. My family pleaded with the probate judge to stop this crime, although she ignored our cries. We gathered the support of several lawyers at extreme expense to fight the embezzling care givers. After several more years of ups and downs we won a legal battle gaining control of my father’s care. With the removal of the felons and corrupt caretakers, I was left with the challenge of providing care for the man that had raised me. I became my father’s father.

A person that I had denied my affections was now my responsibility. My new job would be to come to his house each day and ensure that daily routines were performed. In the morning I laid out clothes for him to wear and then ensured that each button was in place and his shoes were tied. I would help him shave and brush his now graying hair. After breakfast we would drive around town, and he would tell me stories about different buildings and houses we passed.

“That is were the old radio station used to be” he would say.
“My friend Buster and I once walked through the woods behind this house and came out all the way over on Bullsboro Drive.”

We would make jokes each day and use humor as a way to get through the odd moments; like two people that don’t know each other might do. His mind could only muster up small amounts of information, so he would repeat the same story many times during a day. The most trying times came when I selected the appropriate foods for meals. The last remaining pleasure my dad had was eating, and now with his diabetes, that was restricted too.

“It’s my life, and I want to eat whatever I want!” he would yell at me as his chest went forward and his arms back near his side with fists clenched and his face turning red.
“Go ahead, and eat what you want then… I am just trying to keep you alive… can’t you understand that! Fine, go ahead and die” I would yell back in defensive anger trying to hold back my extreme frustration.

There would be no way to win these fights and I would retreat outside trying to find a way to release the pin up anger inside my heart. When I returned later still mad, he would be totally relaxed and wanting to joke around again. He could be angry to the point of violence one moment and a few minutes later not remember the fight. The constant reversal of his emotions was the most difficult part of the job. People on the outside always saw him as the funny and sweet head injured man; and that was true, but few saw the side that I experienced.

Days passed and I continued my search for the man I once knew. I often caught myself looking into his eyes and longing to see a glimpse of his soul that I knew had to be trapped deep inside. We drove around each day and I would listen to the stories of his youth, trying to learn about the person I missed so much.
Then one day when the radio was tuned to an oldies station, my Dad started to sing along with the words to an Elvis song, “About mistakes, I’ve made a few…”
And there it was. The sound of him singing was the same as before his accident. I then remembered sitting in the back seat of the car growing up and hearing my dad sing. His speaking voice was different now, but when he sang it was the voice I had been missing so much.

He sang, “I did it myyyy waaaayyyyy." The sound was his gift to me. For the first time in years I heard the sound of my father’s voice. My hero had been there all along, trapped inside a damaged mind and body. He had found a way to break the bounds of the curse and with music he let me know that he was still there.