The Doctor's Wife

We were visiting with my father yesterday in the hospital, sitting in the visitors lounge.  My sister was there, my mother, my husband and I.  My mom told him that my brother, the only one of us with children, would be stopping by later with the elder of his two sons.  My father's face lit up immediately.

There is no doubt in my mind as I watch my father's expression that this news, the impending visit by his wonderful, kind, funny, ADHD!!!  grandson was the best visitor he could possibly have.  My nephews don't know yet that my father is dying.  My brother and sister-in-law are working to protect the boys from this tragic news for as long as possible.  When C. arrived in the hospital he began to quiz my father for information.  "Why are you here, when did you start throwing up, did you eat something you shouldn't"  he's quite precocious for a 9 year old. 

The visit did something for my father.  He helped in healing in a way that our visit just couldn't...  But it also brought me to tears.  Even if I were to get pregnant this cycle... this very minute... there is a very good chance that my father will never meet our children.  No matter what our children will have no memory of him. 

My father is the man that I love to tease more than anyone else.  My favorite story is as follows:

My father had taken us skiing that day and on the ride home he began to experience chest pains.  It turns out that he had pulled a muscle in his chest, but at the time he thought that he was having a heart attack.  Despite that concern he drove 3 hours with his three children in the back.  When we got home my mother was livid for putting all our lives in danger... but she took him to the hospital.  There he went through triage.

"Name" said the nurse.
"Paul" he replied
"Doctor's name?" she asked
"Dr. Tan"
"Do you know his first name?"
My father barked back "no, I don't know his first name".
"Christopher" my mother supplied.
"Wife's name"asked the nurse.
"I don't know his name, why would i know his wife's name" came my father's incredulous response.
My mother looked at him.  Rolled her eyes and supplied her own name, "Jill".
My father looked at her... "How do you know his wife's name?"

That is my father.  To a T.  He is always on a different wave length from anyone else.  And I want for my children to meet him.  To sit in his lap and hear his stories first hand.  I sort of feel like they might not believe me if they don't get to see it for themselves.