PaPa

I've been sitting here looking at this blog for a few days, trying to decide if I want to post. I guess now I do.

I'm not okay by any stretch of my imagination. One of my favorite people in the world, my Pa-Pa, is gone. For the rest of my life, I'll never see him again. That hurts so much more than I can describe. Some people understand, and some, thank goodness, don't have to understand because they haven't lived it. I hope they don't for a long time.

(Mom-Mom and PaPa)

Another thing that has come to mind is this: I don't have anymore Pa-Pas. I lost my other grandpa (who was also a Pa-Pa) back in 2003. So there aren't anymore grandfathers for me. That thought makes me sadder than I have ever been. When Pa-Pa died last week, it hit me so hard. I have never felt so hopeless in all of my life.

(me and Pa-Pa)

I gave him one final doggie beanie baby about a week before he died. A dog that goes with the ones I had been steadily providing him for years, stuffed bean dogs of every sort. You can see some of them in the background of the last picture. It's a little black dog called Chaser. It stayed in his hospital room until the night we all came when the doctors called us. That was the first thing I picked up. I have in right in front of me. I look at it and that whole night comes back.

(me and Pa-Pa again. This picture was an accident, but I couldn't delete it even if I'd wanted to)

I am angry. He should be here. It was NOT his time yet. Yeah, he was 83, but it was a shock, unexpected. He was in the hospital because he'd been in a car accident on July 30th, my niece's birthday. He pulled out into a street from his road on a stormy day (his fault for "not yielding the right of way," supposedly). A 16 year old girl was speeding (I don't need damned skid marks to tell me that) and hit him directly in his side. All that was between him and that van was 4 inches of hollow metal. She hit him so hard that his car was bent on the side that was not hit, shattered all the windows, and knocked his glasses off his face and into the street.

He was hurt so badly. He suffered a broken scapula, cuts on his head that required staples, bleeding on his brain, massive internal & external bruising, a bleeding kidney and a bleeding spleen.

So much of that was healing though, and there was talk of moving him to a local rehabilitation hospital. That's why it is so hard to accept. He was getting better, and all of a sudden, he's gone. Just over two weeks to the day of his accident, we were called and told to come to the hospital, that they were trying to revive him, and we needed to get there immediately. Everyone knew what it meant but no one, including me, wanted to believe it.

I and my cousin had been sleeping over with Grandma for the entire time he was in the hospital, and I just happened to be there that night. Mom called me at 12:45AM and told me to get Grandma up because they were coming to get us. I knew that Mom had said they were trying to revive him, but I couldn't bring myself to say that to Grandma. I just told her to get ready and that I didn't know much. I prayed the whole way over.

I got there and walked into the hospital wing with my Dad. Or, I thought I did. Somewhere between getting out of the elevator and the waiting room, Dad stopped being beside me. Maybe he went over to Mom? All I know is that I was standing there for the ten seconds that felt like ten hours watching everyone cry, hoping they were just stressed and letting it out in a huge way. My aunt stopped what she was doing (hugging someone or just sitting there, I don't remember) when she noticed me standing there by myself. She got up and walked over to me like she was going to hug me. I remember saying 'no, don't you tell me that,' or something, her grabbing hold of me, and I never made it to the chair where she was guiding me. My legs failed to work and I was on the floor almost near screaming. I couldn't get up; I didn't deserve to get up, not when PaPa would never get up again. I remember grabbing hold of a coffee table with one hand, and my fingertips turning white on the other hand when I tried to strangle the floor. I couldn't breathe.

Somehow Dad ended up behind me. He put his hand on my back while I was on the floor. I knew it was him. He always had a gentle touch. I turned around and cried in his arms. He helped me up off the floor. Eventually, the on-call hospital chaplain was with us and trying to explain what happened before the doctors came out. I couldn't listen. I got up and walked to the elevator foyer. A short time after walking over there, Josh showed up with the best timing in the world. I had called him right after Mom called me and told him to meet us there. I cried in his arms for what seemed like forever.

We came back after some time and sat with everyone else. The doctors finally came out, and by now, my brother had come. He was by himself, and eventually I went over to him. The doctors explained that Pa-Pa had said he felt like he was being smothered during a late-night breathing treatment and he became non-responsive and then "coded." They worked on him for two hours. Two hours. I knew what it meant. It still didn't hit me. Not all the way. I'm not sure if it has yet.

We were eventually let in to see him. Grandma was so pitiful. She cried like I'd never seen someone cry before. So did my Mom, my uncle and my aunt (Pa-Pa's children). We all did, but we knew the four of them were even more affected. My uncle took it so hard. My mom passed out numerous times. The only other time I ever saw her pass out was over 15 years ago when she was having anemia problems. The only way anyone got her to stay alert after the last time was me, my brother, and my Dad's voices telling her that Grandma needed her.

I knelt down and took hold of his hand at some point and stroked his fingers. His hand was still warm. God, I swear that I felt it contract for just a second. That's just wrong to say, but that's what I wanted it to feel like. I cried for a long time. Josh never left my side. When I let go, someone else did the same. More people had shown up by then. My sister-in-law, almost the entire family. I had hold of the doggie and his pillow Grandma had brought from home for him. It still smelled like him. When I went over and grabbed his hand again, it was getting colder. That's when I really knew.

I can't write anymore tonight. Maybe some other time.