Indeed.

Here it is.  We are taking mom to Minnesota to see her family because that's where she needs to be.  Dad is in Respite care.  Meaning a "nursing home" with full time care while we are gone.  It's part of his VA benefits.

I'm not sure if I chose not to see the difference in dynamic.  I've mentioned it before, but did I really see it?  The dynamic of this loss we are experiencing.  I mean, he's our dad.  But he's the love of my mom's life.  I realized I can't imagine this.  Heartbroken is a cheap word for what I feel for her.  He was her prince.

We are looking into nursing homes.  Permanent ones.  Like "he won't live with mom anymore" permanent.  Today was the first day I walked into their house without him there.  It felt painfully hollow and I was dismal and bitter all at once.  His barren chair with the blanket me and Drew had made for him draped over the back.  His water bottle.  That damn water bottle we push on him every day that he fights us on.  I smiled a little.  But then the emptiness was all consuming.  The floor he walks on, the doors he touches, the forks he eats with, the clothes he wears.  All there.  The ticking of a clock I can't see.  The only noise.  And he's not there.  It's so quiet, it feels loud.  I wondered at that very moment where the real daddy really is.  Is he really in the nursing home, understanding but not able to communicate it, or is he really gone?  Is he lonely?  Does he know I love and miss him so much I have a physical pain in my chest?

The finality of this stage has hit me so hard today.  It is indeed over.  When I say over, it is watching my dad with my daughter, able to hold a conversation.  It is watching my dad love my mom from across the room, writing her love letters that she'll find later.  It is driving up to the house and seeing him in the driveway, watering plants or mowing the lawn.  It is watching a baseball game and hearing him rattle off stats and reminisce about taking the kids to Tiger Stadium.  It is asking him questions about his childhood and getting the answers that I can pass on to Drew.

It is indeed over.

Did I ask him enough questions about his life, his opinion on white bread vs wheat?  1950's vs 1960's cars?  Oh wait!  I just remembered he was an amazing painter of cars ... I do know that Candy Apple Red was his favorite color to paint, but why?  Have I taken enough pictures?  Most importantly, has he always known he's all I could ask for in a father and does he still, somewhere in there, know that?  Does he know that he was my mom's knight in shining armor, and the first hero Drew ever knew?

What I wish for now is peace for the most outstanding woman I've ever had the benefit of knowing.  She's my mother.  And there isn't any word in the English language that can describe not only what she's done for him, but what she must feel.  What the Hell must she feel?!?  Someone very close to me explained this dynamic.  He said, regarding my siblings and I losing our father that we love him because he's our father and he's all we know.  The first man we ever loved.  Regarding my mother losing her mate, she CHOSE to love him.  And who she CHOSE is now gone.  She is certainly mourning the only man she has loved with her whole heart and soul.  For me, his explanation was profound.  Of course.  They CHOSE each other.  My dad took care of my mom through her brain aneurysm, my mom took care of my dad through 2 heart attacks and triple bypass surgery.  But those things had lights at the end of the seemingly endless tunnels.

Not this time.  It is indeed over.

So I'm going to keep my head up.  That's what I do.  I'm going to continue to keep my ears and eyes open, soaking up the experiences and living like I only have today.  The moments of defeat come; of course they do.  But they're fleeting.  Not only does my mother need me to stand strong, but a very sweet little girl with the oldest soul I know needs me too.  Drew's eyes when we talk about papa bring me to my knees.  She loves him fiercely.  While I appreciate that she will be stronger for this experience and just having known my daddy, I can't help but want to shelter her from what is to come.

To dad, my God if there were any words for me to say to you, I'd say them now.  But I can't find them.  I miss you.  What a fighter you are.  Wherever you go, you will really never leave me.

That's all I got.