Less than a year ago I experienced the worst pain I have ever encountered. I woke up groggy. I went to check my cell phone. It was odd that it had not made much noise that morning. Well, more like afternoon. I reached over and saw my cell phone was dead. I plugged it in and turned it on. I rubbed my eyes and stretched wondering what today was going to be like. My cell phone began to beep. One missed call. Two missed calls. Three missed calls. Four missed calls...all from my fathers cell phone.
Just than my cell phone rang again. It was my father. I picked up anxiously wondering if everything was ok. Than I heard his girlfriends voice. "Your father had a heart attack...." I instantly stood up from my bed and fell to my knees. They went weak. My body went lifeless. "What? When? Where is he? Where is he!!!?" I began sobbing hysterically and the room went warm and fuzzy. "He is alive...he is alive..." she said.
The phone fell from my hands and my mother came running. "Da...daaaa...dad, heart attack, not dead..." I managed to mumble. My mother placed her hand under my chin and lifted my face up so my eyes could meet hers. "Its ok...we can do this...we can do this..." she said with complete confidence. I put the phone back to my ear and got the information of where he was. I picked my son up from school and began to drive. The world around me disapeared. What would I tell my son? He instantly asked why I was crying. I told him grandpas heart had broken. My son looked at me with those big brown eyes filling with tears and said "Is he dead?"
When I was laying on my floor after receiving the news. I began to punch the floor. I yelled at God and begged and pleaded that He would spare my fathers life. I told God to put all my fathers wrongs on me and let him live. His heart had been broken emotionally many times in his life. The loss of his brother, an abusive father, expectations of himself and others, high demands and now the physical aspects had hit hard. His life was about to change.
I turned the corner in the cardiac care unit to find my father laying in a hospital bed. Covered in IV's, monitors and tubes. A scenario that was familiar to me, except I had always been the patient. I wanted to squeeze him, cry and hold his hand and pray for him but I didnt. Instead I gently hugged him, held his hand, thanked God for him and studied the lines of his face, the texture of his skin, the color of his eyes, the sound of his voice, I studied him.
Just as the IV fluids trickled down one at a time so did my realizations of what I had put my father through over the years as his naive little girl. I have always loved my father, more so sometimes than I know what to do with it. I have an incredible desire to protect him but from what? Pain, disapointments or regrets? I often feel guilty for my fathers misery. I feel like if he didnt have to be "responsible" and raise a family, that maybe he would have followed his dreams and been happy and never had a heart attack. Maybe it was the second child, that was one too many, that sent his heart into worries about bills, college and letting go of his dreams to make room for reality.
Now that I am a parent, I know that my father would still have his little girl all over again knowing how it all would end. I know the minute he held me his world changed and he somehow began to find his dreams right there inside his reality. I know I did when I held my son.
Sometime I think my father and I are too much alike. I see more of him in myself as I "grow up". But the truth is, no one will ever be as great as my father. He is not a hero just becasue he is my daddy and I am his little girl. He is a hero overall. He has always been responsible, caring, self sacrificing, humble, witty, full of knowledge and a sense of humor so dry, it might as well be an Italian wine.
While my father does and says things that often make no sense, or does things I would never agree with, its his heart and I dont ever want it broken. Ever. My father...his yittle girl...always, nothing can break the tie from my heart to his. He is my lifeline, my bloodline, and if his heart ever breaks, he can have mine...he already does.
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