The drive from my mom’s house to the memory care unit where my dad lives is becoming familiar. Past the thrift store I keep meaning to stop in to browse. Around the corner and up the hill, and then right at the light by the rehab center. When my parents moved from Indianapolis to Florida, we knew my dad was beginning the journey of cognitive decline. By moving to the retirement community for my parents’ mission organization, we hoped that he would be surrounded by familiar faces and history. We didn’t know that within two years he would withdraw into an uncharacteristic silence and begin having seizures that would mean losing basic physical functions and being unable to care for himself. We didn’t know that within two years he would be living in a small room with sterile white walls and five shirts hanging in a closet without a door.
My stomach knots up as I follow my mom into his room. I’m in town from Winnipeg for a week and have been visiting every day, but today I try to lock every memory of my dad into my mind in case I don’t have many more opportunities. I lock in the image of his 6 ft 6 frame folded into a wheelchair wearing a faded white Hanes undershirt and black athletic shorts that are easy for the aides to change. His feet are covered by bandages and socks guarding sores on his ankles that aren’t healing. I notice his name tags on his socks. His legs are too thin, even for him. But his knees look like they always have.
His eyes focus on me and his face lights up with what might be recognition–but also might just be his profound enthusiasm for visitors. “Hello, hello! Look who it is!” I lean over and give him a hug. “Hi, Boss. We came to visit you for a bit.” The irony of the nickname we gave him in high school when we encouraged him to contribute to important family discussions tugs at my heart as I sit next to him. I think of the series of decisions we have made related to his care over the last year, and I wonder if there’s any part of his life where he still feels like the boss. I pull out a laptop, and we go through a digital slideshow of the actual slides my brothers and I have spent hours scanning into a computer. In a voice that has gotten soft and fuzzy from lack of use, he recognizes landscapes, faces and vehicles from so many years ago. We play UNO. My mom helps him choose which card to play.
Soon it’s time to wrap up our visit. An aide will be here soon to take him to the dining room down the hall, and tomorrow an airplane will take me back to Winnipeg. Before we say goodbye, we have time for one final family huddle. The Boss was always the one insisting we take time at the end of a visit to pray together. Today my mom starts with a prayer for my siblings and their families. When it’s my dad’s turn, he slowly strings together words stretched between a lifetime of adventure and struggle. He begins with “Dear God, thank you for this afternoon, and for letting us be together.” His voice gets quiet as he searches for what comes next, and I am suddenly back in 3rd grade.
It is the night before I go back to boarding school at Rift Valley Academy. My brothers and I have been at home in Eldoret for Easter break, but tomorrow we will make the 5-hour drive to Kijabe for the third term of the year. When I’m at home, my dad comes into my room at night to say goodnight and pray with me. My stomach has been in knots all week as we have gone through the packing list, arranging items in my trunk and making sure my name tag is sewn into each piece of clothing and onto each sock.
Tomorrow we will drive the familiar roads between where my parents live and where we go to school. Cross the equator where my mom will remind us to pick up our feet so we don’t trip. Turn right at the top of the hill where the fruit and vegetable stands display pyramids of mangoes, avocados, tomatoes and potatoes while stray dogs sniff around the mud for their next bite. Wind down the escarpment through the forest before turning off the pavement onto the dirt road that leads past the sign announcing we’ve arrived at school with the words “Welcome to Buffalo Country.”
Tomorrow, I will watch my parents’ green Datsun fade into the dust as they drive away, having assured them they don’t have to worry and that I will be okay. But tonight, I pull the Strawberry Shortcake comforter up to my chin as my dad tucks my Cabbage Patch doll between me and the wall. He bends down and gives me a hug, sneaking in a whisker rub that makes me giggle before praying, “Dear God, thank you for this good day.”
The background voices of the staff preparing residents for supper draws my attention back to a whisper of a voice that lodges in my heart and mind as my dad says something I can barely make out about “all the pictures that stir up many memories.” He robotically returns one last hug, and I silently fill in the words he can no longer find but that float through the memories of so many goodbye rituals: “Jesus loves you MOST of all.”