I lost my Dad

[Grizzly]

As I start to type, I have no idea what I'm about to say, or if I'll ever even post this, but it feels like something I can do to release a little of the most profound grief I can possibly imagine. I am not a stranger to pain and grief. Between 1985 and 2005, nine of my friends and collegues have been killed by any number of violent means...but it never hurt like this. In 1992, I held the hand of a collegue and reassured him while he slowly died from the bullet fragments lodged in his spine...but it never hurt like this. In August of 1991 I was shot at point blank range. I laid in the dirt, badly injured, scared senseless and waiting to die before my people found me, but the pain and the helplessness never felt like this.

At 1:15 on Thursday morning, my brother called from Philadelphia. It's not unusual. He's a Philly cop working permanent midnights.

"I hate to do this to you dude, but you gotta get up here. They're rushing Dad to the hospital. It's bad".

"I'll be right there".

It's a hundred and forty mile drive.

As I walked out of the house, I turned and told my wife "I'm not going to make it. He was dead before they got him in the ambulance". I don't know why I said it. I knew. I don't know why I knew, but I did.

Two long hours later, my brother appeared at the emergency room doors and said the single worst thing I have ever heard, "He didn't make it dude, I'm sorry".

Crushed? Devistated? Heartbroken? Annihilated? Obliterated? All ****************ing childsplay. I need a new word. None of these can pretend to capture the essence of this pain.

How could a man like my father have been so cheated? He spent his entire adult life serving others, at great personal risk. Every morning when he rose, his knees and back and shoulder and neck were all there as painful reminders of the years of selfless service he provided to total strangers. Could he and my mother not have just a few years of leisure as a small token of appreciation. After ten years of relentlessly fighting an unbending township over the building of a little retirement house at the edge of a stand of trees, on a piece of property owned by our family for more than 150 years, is it too much to ask that he have more than 9 months to enjoy his accomplishment before he was taken away? Is it too much to ask that he be able to see his little grandchildren learn to walk and talk, and get to know him enough that they will even be able to recall him? After all that my father has done for his Country, his city, his family and friends, and against all odds, is it too much to ask that he be able to spend his twilight with my mother, basking in all that he has built? Apparently it is all too much to ask.

I can't begin to tell you about my father. There aren't enough words in the English language. I know, I'm biased because he was my father, my hero, my heart, my world...but you have to believe me when I say that this man was special. How could he have been so cheated?