People ask me, "Hey, what are you doing for St. Patrick's Day?" I say, "Nothing." If they press me on it I just tell them I don't celebrate it.
I hate St. Patrick’s Day.
My Dad died on St. Patrick’s Day. The night before he died, I was the last person to see him alive. It was my freshman year of college at The Ohio State University. I was coming off a particularly grueling quarter of hard core mathematics and physics and astronomy. I never studied so hard in my life, or got such great grades.
My fall quarter: I almost got kicked out. Let’s be honest, I partied all the time, drank like a fish ...It felt like a vacation. Every time I talked to my family back home in Cleveland I got the guilt trip for not coming home enough. I turned all that around my Winter Quarter and I really worked hard to improve my grades. I felt like I was becoming a man. I made the Deans list for cryin’ out loud! My friends in the dorm were all getting ready for Spring Break - going to Florida. But I made a conscience decision NOT to go away for spring break. I decided I was going to stay home and reconnect with my Father. Ever since my parents got divorced in 7th grade, I blew off my Dad in favor of hanging’ out with my friends. I would spend all my free time just being a dopey adolescent. My brother in law would say, "Ya know Chip, you better spend some time with your Dad while he’s still here. He’s not going to be around forever". My little Brother would hop in my Dad’s car and drive off. I waved bye-bye.
So my freshman year I really felt like I was changing. I felt like I was becoming the person I was going to be the rest of my life, ya know? I decide to spend the day part of Spring Break looking for a summer job and then I would hang out with my Dad during the nighttime. Spend my time that way. I could end my day talking to my dad about my job search - maybe get to know him again.
Well, it was my first day home from spring break. The house was all packed up for the big move to River. My mom was re-marrying and selling the house in favor of a ranch in the city next door. My child-hood room was now in boxes. Everything was ready to go; even my Star Wars curtains were packed away. My mom asked what I was doing and if I was hungry for dinner. I told her that I could eat but I wanted to get over to my sisters so I could see Dad (He lived with my sister ever since the divorce).
In writing this now, I can't remember if I had dinner. I remember someone came over to take a survey of some sort from us, and if things went differently that day, I may be writing about that survey instead. Or maybe not at all. I went over to my sister’s house - about a forty-five minute walk from my mom's.
By the time I got there it was dark and my sister answered the door and said Dad was sick and was having another flare-up. Crohn's disease is a horrific and terribly painful condition for anyone to go through. People are relieved when they find out that they have Crohn's disease, and not cancer. One Doctor told my sister that they don't realize that in many ways it is way worse than cancer. It’s an intestinal condition that causes great pain and suffering. My Dad developed it the year I was born. So as long as I can remember, he was always inactive and debilitated from his condition.
Google on Crohn's:
Crohn's disease causes inflammation in the small intestine. Crohn's disease usually occurs in the lower part of the small intestine, called the ileum, but it can affect any part of the digestive tract, from the mouth to the anus. The inflammation extends deep into the lining of the affected organ. The inflammation can cause pain and can make the intestines empty frequently, resulting in diarrhea.
Crohn's disease is an inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), the general name for diseases that cause inflammation in the intestines. Crohn's disease can be difficult to diagnose because its symptoms are similar to other intestinal disorders such as irritable bowel syndrome and to another type of IBD called ulcerative colitis. Ulcerative colitis causes inflammation and ulcers in the top layer of the lining of the large intestine.
Crohn's disease affects men and women equally and seems to run in some families. About 20 percent of people with Crohn's disease have a blood relative with some form of IBD, most often a brother or sister and sometimes a parent or child.
I knocked on his bedroom door. Come-in, he said. The door pushed away and he was standing over his dresser off to the left looking for something. He wore a white T-shirt and slacks. He was way thinner than me. His hair was long and silver like metal. This was unusual because he normally had a military cut - 'High and Tight' you would call it. As a kid I would sit on his shoulders and pat his hair with my open hand to feel the spikey-ness.
I said hi how ya doing, how's the pain? How’s the bout with Crohn's disease this time? Something like that - what are you doing? He said he was looking for a thermometer, the last time he took his temperature It was 104.
I told him that was way too high, why not go to the hospital or something. He said, "Ah son, I've been in and out of hospitals for so long. I’m sick of them. I don't want to go through that again." It was true, for I remember him going into surgery and having them take out many feet of intestines. I would learn later that these feet were dead and or infected with Crohn's disease. He told a story to my cousin once about his experience with morphine. He said that the window in his hospital room overlooked a vast english country expanse, and little creatures were climbing in his window and crawling on him. I think he called them goblins. A big chunk of my memories from childhood involved my father always going to the hospital.
He found the thermometer and took his temperature. It was 108 at this time (it would eventually reach 112). I told him he should call the doctor, and he said all he'd do is tell him to go to the hospital for observation.
So we watched TV the rest of the night, (I sat at the foot of his sofa as he lay resting) and talked about school and my classes. "Matt Houston" was on - a show like VEGAS, and MAGNUM P.I. but set in Texas. Anyway, I told him about my possible majors and how I think I did exceptional this past quarter. He seemed happy. Anytime we did anything noteworthy or something that made him proud it was always followed by a steady strong sounding one word phrase: "Good."
He was a man of few words.
The news was on and it was getting late. Dad fell asleep and I didn't want to wake him to say goodbye. So I turned to see his face at rest on a pillow as I closed the door before me.
That was the last I saw of him, alive.
ML offered me a ride home, something told me just to walk home. I did, I went by my old girlfriend’s house and the old Detroit Theatre where I used to watch movies. Around Christmas time the theatre would give our gradeschool free tickets to see movies like "Godzilla VS Mothra" and "The Towering Inferno". I later learned that this was a device used by mothers to get the kids out of the house so they could get Christmas shopping done. I soaked in the spring night air as I walked the rest of the way home, observing how different my hometown looked now that I was away in school.
The next day I woke to the phone ringing and the morning sun blaring through my curtain-less windows. My mom was on the phone downstairs. After she said hello I heard her say "Oh no" and then break down in tears. I knew something was really wrong. I jumped up and threw my cloths on has quickly as I could. Before she was finished on the phone, I was downstairs before her. She hung up and said that Dad had a heart attack. He collapsed on the floor this morning and ML heard him outside her bedroom door.
After a failed attempt at finding my brother, we went to the hospital (Eventually we tracked him down, it was difficult - but we picked him up along the way at a friends house). We parked the car and I ran ahead, up to the emergency room entrance. It was blocked off. They were doing construction on the new entryway and the walls were now covered in large sheets of plastic. I ran through the front door to the new ER entrance and into a long tunnel of plastic milky white curtains flowing in the breeze. The faster I ran the longer it seemed to take me to reach the end of the tunnel. I turned the corner to the old ER entrance and went right to the receptionist desk.
There before me was a gigantic green shamrock pasted above the receptionist's head. Her area was decorated with St. Patrick’s day paraphernalia. There were shamrocks and green clovers and a Lucky Charm looking goblin dude - smiling that sick smile. I asked in rapidly depleting breath were Chuck K. was and when was he brought in. The lady couldn't - or wouldn't answer my questions. I turned and ran through a doorway that normally would be blocked to non-patients (but was open from someone on their way out). This was a doorway to a hallway I knew all too well.
I was brought to this very ER as a boy. The first of many times, was for stitches under my chin. These types of stitches were almost a rite of passage in my neighborhood. Every boy and a few girls could, or eventually did, get this type of scar from stitches under the chin. It comes from falling on your face and hitting the concrete chin first. Mine came from the sandstone steps we had in the front of our house. I fell UP them and landed on my chin, blood flowed freely down my Uncle Bill's department store T-shirt. When I was put in the room at the end of this hall, the ambulance driver did my stitches. He was chewing gum and stitching away with little regard to my young feelings. The room was much the same then as it was now, cold steel and bright lights.
Now I was at the end of this same hall, looking into that sterile room. I began searching the rooms one at a time before security and a nurse came after me. They tried to talk me down but I was too hyper to listen. To me they appeared to be speaking gibberish, trying to avoid answering me directly. The nurse got me to settle down in the waiting area as my Mom and Brother came in, and it was then I noticed all the St. Patrick's Day decorations all over the place. The TV was playing the parade downtown live and the local anchors were wearing green in celebration of this holy holiday. The broadcasters were all laughing and exchanging banter back and forth. Plus the volume was turned up way too loud for an Emergency Room waiting area.
The nurse and the Doctor approached us from the ER. They crept forward and we knew, just by the look on their faces, that he was gone. They didn't even tell us. In the movies the Doctor at least gives the bad news with some consoling wisdom. He didn't say a word. We just all broke down in tears. There was a small group huddle and my brother and mother joined me in holding the doctor and nurse in a small cry-off. I said I wanted to see him, now. They took us down that hallway.
We walked down and went to a room that I didn't get to. There he was lying on a table with an adjustable light blaring in his face (the kind that has a magnifying glass in the center). I moved the lamp away and instinctually looked at the ceiling in case he was floating up there - looking down. I looked at his face. It was the same look he had the night before. I left him with a sleep on his face and now he had the same sleep look. I touched his forehead with the palm of my hand. It was hot to the touch, and then I brushed his hair away from his eyes. I can't tell you how painful this moment was. For a split second I thought they may have gotten it wrong and he was alive still. I expected his face to be cold and clammy, not so warm and full of life. I wanted to burst forth and do CPR on him. I looked at the Doc and asked "...are you sure?" He just nodded once.
I told dad that I loved him very much, and I was going to miss him with every living and breathing fiber of my being.
We waited for the rest of my family out in the ER lobby. When they arrived, they listened in disbelief and the crying would start all over. The televised parade and the local live shot became the background music for this scene before me. Its then that I realized the Doctor that worked on Dad had a green St. Patrick’s day pin on his lab coat. Under that he was wearing something green - something non-surgical green. The nurse was also wearing a green outfit under her lab coat. And she wore a green carnation pinned to her lapel. She also had a fancy gold trim green shamrock pinned to the opposite lapel. The receptionist wore a cheap paper sparkled green hat, as she sat in her green decorated desk.
When the Priest arrived to give last rites, he wore an all green priest outfit. Even the collar was a light green instead of white. He too wore a green carnation and had a shamrock pin on his lapel a little dissimilar from the nurses'. When he gathered us around in a circle to pray I half expected him to sound like a leprechaun. We started to give a group prayer. I imagined him breaking into a thick Irish accent at any moment. It was hard to hear, you see the TV was still playing loudly, broadcasting the happy St. Patrick’s Day parade music and the laughing commentary. At the end of the prayer, I finally went over to that TV and turned the volume down all the way.
At the showing and funeral I was such a mess with despair that my Mom handed me a few pills of Valium. I didn't want to feel numb. I wanted to feel this. I remembered what my 78 year old professor in film school told me about taking a language subject. Drvota said this; "Sometimes a thing is so high (like a mountain) you can't climb over it. Sometimes a thing is so wide you can't go around it. Sometimes a thing is so difficult, you can only go through it." He was talking about learning a foreign language, but like all advice coming from this wise old pedagogue, there were many layers of meaning. I was going to go through this. I may not have my Dad, but I was going to have this. So I pocketed the Valium and used it later in school for recreation.
I got back to university at the end of that spring break. Everyone had lots of fun stories to tell. When I told mine, nobody believed me.
It’s been a long time now, since my Dad died. A lot of years in fact. Ya know, they say "Life goes on", and it does, and "Time heals all wounds", and it does. But, let me put it to you this way; I will never be able to look at a calendar or open a date book and flip through the pages and say; "Let’s see, I have a dentist appointment on the twenty-second...at one thirty... hey there, wait a minute! Three weeks ago was the anniversary death date of my Dad! Huh. How about that? It’s been that long already?"
No. That will never happen, see? Instead, there is this glaring, huge, green, shamrock shaped, St. Patrick’s Day book-mark sticking out in the calendar of my Date book. It looms ahead, warning me of the approaching St. Patty’s Day Anniversary. It cries out in print ads and television jingles, tormenting me, it says glaringly: "It’s coming. It’s two weeks away now... the day your Dad died. It's a week away now...the day that everything he was and everything he was ever going to be was taken away. It’s coming, St. Patrick’s Day. The day you have to re-live all over again."
St. Patrick's Day.
The day I dig up something new every year. Like a horrific buried treasure, I dig deeper, some years not so deep. This year I found something buried really deep; A horrific gold nugget. I find that it’s my fault my Dad died. If I had only insisted he go to the hospital, what kind of person sits back while their father burns a 112-degree fever? Some idiot, that’s who! It is my fault he is dead. I did it. I killed him! Instead of sitting around, watching TV, I should’ve been dragging his ass to the hospital, against his will. The hospital, which is only three blocks from my sisters house, where he died. If I got him in there, they might have found that the infection from the Crohn's had spread in his gut and made its way to the blood vessels near his bladder, weakened the walls of the vessels and, while there, formed an aneurysm. They can find those things! They may have been able to treat him, to stop it from bursting, to stop it from taking his suffering away! To stop it from ending his all to short life, if you ask me.
I hate St. Patrick’s Day!
But I miss my Dad more.
