My mom had yelled his name. Nothing else. Or maybe she had yelled other things. I just remember her yelling his name. There was terror in it. I ran to their bedroom. I saw him. I picked him up. I carried him to the living room and sat him up on the couch as he seemed to come back to consciousness. The ambulance drivers got there soon after that.
Called them ambulance drivers. Not E.M.T.'s. I call them that now because that is what I thought then. Simple. Primitive thought. An ambulance in our yard. It got there because of ambulance drivers. That was as complicated as my thought got.
It turned out to have been a seizure. But I carried my father. He had lost weight following his first heart attack. His second had prompted surgery and inaction. His arms no longer held their power that I remembered from my youth. I had heard stories about those arms.
The sawmill was a constant in my life. My father and his friend Ralph bought a sawmill in Nicholls, Ga. My daddy moved us there to live in a trailer on the yard of the sawmill. My earliest playground had massive saws and log trucks and stray dogs and sand that smelled of diesel fuel.
The mill moved to Douglas and years later while a teenager I worked there during my summers. I remember Kevin Bullock telling stories of my daddy. Kevin started at the mill as the log turn at the head saw. My daddy ran the head saw and as it cut parts off the log, the log has to be turned. Kevin did that.
Unless the log was too big. Too heavy. Too unwieldy. Then it would be left to my father. Kevin described the veins that popped out. He was not discreet or modest. He did tell one bit that I will tell here -my father bit down on his own tongue. I had seen him do that too often to doubt the veracity of the lewd tale of how my father had flipped the largest, most onerous logs. His arms were powers.
I picked up my daddy. I carried him to the living room. Ha! That name.
As the heart disease took more and more from him, I held out my arm to allow him to steady himself as he walked. I lifted him up to help him dress. I bent down to my knees to remove his shoes.
Later in my life I found my life - Priscilla. I am coming to love her family. The easiest of them to love was her Uncle Billy. A kind old man. Jovial. I met him briefly before we were married. He was the uncle that every movie ever gave us.
I was with his family days before he died. We came to visit him on one of those horribly optimistic "Good Days". His eldest daughter had moved back home for a few weeks to help care for him. As more and more family gathered, she asked me to help her dress her father and get him into the chair to wheel him out to spend time with everyone.
Interesting choice of me. I was the only male. I was also a stranger to her. Dressing him caused him pain. His pain, caused her pain. I knew that look whether I ever saw it on my face or not.
A week later we were in the family area at the hospice center. His three children were trying to decide how they could take their father home to die. I sat quietly for a bit. I smiled. "You want to take him home. You know you will feel guilty if you don't do SOMETHING. But the something you want to do, you can't do. On one of his best days, one that you, yourself, said was a good day, you could not dress him if I had not been there.
I talked a bit about how my daddy died. Or how he lived till he died. And how we lived with him. I told them to leave him with the people at the hospice. They would see to his care. They, his children, would see to his soul. Be there. Everyday, I said. But let them care for him. You love him.
I told them how helpless they would feel. And that it was alright. They were helpless. Be at his side as often as you can. When he is there - when he is with you - talk. Talk about ancient history or yesterday. Talk about what he remembers. Ask the questions about his childhood or his adolescence or the day he met your mother. Don't waste time sitting here trying to figure out how to take him home. That is beyond you. That ain't your fear talking. This is from a man who walked too many miles in your shoes. This is froma man who spent years wondering why he was on that road. I am here to tell you - comfort your father. Don't cater to the things you think you ought to do.
2 Corinthians 1: 3-4 " 3 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, 4 who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God."
My cousin was diagnosed with breast cancer. I never knew her from my childhood. I met her in a funny way. She was waiting on her interview at Walmart DC 6010 years ago while I worked there. She was waiting in personnel. I was in personnel for some reason and running my mouth as those of you who know me would expect.
From behind me she asked, "Are you Ray?" she asked. I liked her voice before I turned around. I was in my early twenties. I liked most any female voice sight unseen back then. I answered that I was. In a cool way. I am sure it was in a cool way.
"Are you Ray Mancil?" I had had dreams like this. Are you Ray Mancil, the man who could run the two man cut off saw at the sawmill by himself? Are you Ray Mancil who could name every secret identity of every Marvel and DC comics superhero EVER! Are you Ray Mancil with what Nightline and 60 Minutes refer to as the largest ever measured male... Well. This is a family blog.
I answered yes. She said I might know her brother. As a pick up line, this absolutely sucked. But she was cute. And blond. That bought patience.
Who is your brother I asked.
"Micah Japuntich," Oh. Oh. GOD. The evil of that. I am a PROUD SOUTHERN man. But not that Southern. But just that proud.
"OH. Then we are COUSINS."
I love that story. Even when I recite it in my head. I can remember the trailer home paneling in the old Walmart offices in Douglas, Ga.
Facebook is miracle and curse. I have a grand niece I have not seen but for Facebook. Miracle. I first heard about my cousin Aimee's battle with cancer on Facebook Curse?
I promised and lied about shaving my head. Her brothers shaved their heads with her and I wanted to too. But then I realized it would be an intrusion. I decided it would be a lie and let them be the THREE in the picture.
I prayed for her. I asked you all to pray for her. I asked even those of you who don't pray to pray. I promised to owe you one.
She has two you kids. She has a loving husband that I like and that I surmise doesn't approve of me. At least I hope he doesn't. I love the idea in my own head of being the black sheep. But why did she have to deal with cancer?
Her father, my cousin, a man that might as well be brother to my mother had a tumor on his kidney. It was large and as I type this they only know it was cancer. They don't know how much a bully the cancer was and so they don't know what kind of treatment is in store for my cousin.
My cousin - the father of the girl and her brother who told me my DAD had died. My cousin - the father of the children who were all bald on the same day. My cousin who served two tours in Vietnam and then was a preacher. My cousin who did things in Iraq where he had to fly out of Indianapolis while I lived in Indy - taxi service to James Bond.
My mother loves this man like a brother. I love his children like long lost siblings that I never abused in childhood. My wife and I count the days until we can again drink good beer and wine with his son and daughter-in-law.
Her father faces terror. A veteran of Vietnam. Facing terror. And the mother of two of this grand children, the slight girl that he protected from the monsters under her bed, his little girl - she takes his hand. She tells the former minister that this is how the LORD OUR GOD LEADS US THROUGH THE VALLEY OF DEATH WITH NO FEAR.
2 Corinthians 1: 3-4 " 3 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, 4 who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God."
The world is not easy. It is not pleasant. But the tested among us shine. They provide light on the path. I was a poor, poor reflection. But I was mentioned by Cilla's cousin as a "sweet man". I am not. I was then.
The world is not easy. What lesson will a father learn from the comfort offered by his youngest child? His little girl? And I am the ultimate optimist. What lesson will he one day teach from this time?
"Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ..."
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