On this day, 1 year ago, I asked my father, what comes next. I don’t remember if he answered me. I told him I was going to get some cheesecake . He said I should enjoy it. 4 day’s later, he’d be gone.
Cheesecake and cleaning — before my father died, he cycled through a series of diagnoses that got worse and worse. At one point, they thought he had a mysterious respiratory illness, and made us wear PPE before entering the room. We took pictures in it, and pretended we were wearing space suits. I told him I was leaving the hospital to go to the Cheesecake Factory. He told me to have fun, He had his friend send a maid service to his house. I thought he wanted it to be clean upon his return. Silly me. He knew he wasn’t coming back.
Phone calls — the nurse called me at 3 am . Sharla Berry, we are intubating your father. Oh ok I said, certain and sure like one attempts to sound on an important call. I couldn’t keep up the act. What does that mean?, I asked. It’s a breathing machine. Oh, ok, I said. I breathed a sigh of relief. So he can breathe, right? She was quiet. I tried to reach your other family, she said. Are you coming? Yes, I said. Tell him to wait.
I went back to sleep. I woke up. I cleaned up. I went to the gym. I took a drive. None of it made any sense.
My father was not there when I was born. I wanted to be there when he died. Mothers should not give birth to babies alone, but fathers should not die alone.
It’s a strange thing when the doctor, and the chaplain, and the nurses come up to you, and tell you that they’ve done all they can do.
It’s a strange thing to watch a man’s body go cold. Strange thing how the heart rate, once so steady, steadily plummets to 40, then 24, then 12.
It’s a strange thing to watch blood pressure free fall. It’s a strange thing to feel a human body go cold.
I left to get a donut. It made sense. Seemed undignified to watch all indicators of life fall away, kind of like watching a car crash. A donut, chocolate on chocolate, covered in candy corn, made a lot more sense.
By the time I got the donut, he was gone.
Life support is only life support until it isn’t. The innovation of man eventually yields to the supremacy of the human body. To Gods will or mans lack thereof. It’s a strange thing to see these all powerful machines simply shut off, like TVs during late hours.
It’s a strange thing to see a dead body , my fathers’ dead body, on a cold table, being unclipped and unhooked from the once all powerful machines.
It’s a strange thing to see a body bag being draped on a man’s chest. Such stark white against such black skin.
Filling out a toe tag is a strange thing.
The ICU waiting room is a strange place, populated with Black people who’s loved ones could also not be saved, due to a combination of pre existing conditions starting with slavery, ending with this overcrowded hospital. A truly strange thing.
So many more strange days about that day, 10/22. Perhaps the strangest thing was that, after my father died, I ran back to the hospital and right into the happiest man in the hospital. What happened, I blurted out. My wife, he said. Just had a daughter. Congrats, I said! My father just died. Real circle of life stuff, I said. I burst into tears. You should be so proud, I said. Life does, in fact, go on.
