The Keepers

Four years. And I wonder sometimes who still conjures you—the keepers of you?

              Dad was not a very social guy, you see. He didn’t cultivate friendships the way one fertilizes the lawn. They were mostly accidental. Bluegrass in a stubborn patch of dirt. A dandelion squirming through a sidewalk crack. You knew him because he was your coach or college roommate or the neighbor you’d spy doing chin-ups outside on a blustery November day. He was an introvert at heart but when you heard the vibrations of his barrel laugh or caught the sparkle in his eye when he relayed a joke, you felt privileged. Like you had just stumbled upon something rare. A white rhino in the wild.

              Dad spent the last 10 years of his life as a patient in my parent’s home. The final stretch confined to a bed. He left the way he came in. Immobile and not saying much. He died slowly. His body was there, but his spirit—his essence—had departed long before. We were keeping a candle alive that wanted to burn out. And it was hard to watch.

              I turned my head a lot.

              But Mom, she couldn’t afford to. She was the one, morning-in and night-out, urging him to sit in the sunshine, to wash his underarms, to hobble to a chair, to eat canned pears. She’d point to the driveway where he wouldn’t have to encounter anyone or suffer the pink-heat of embarrassment and encourage him to do laps, slow as a turtle. “You must move,” she’d say. “Every day you have to move.” She organized and counted his daily medications like some tackle The New York Times crossword. With precision. With patience.

              For the entirety of my childhood and the time that preceded me, Dad was the athlete. The broad-chested bear who’d run around the Concordia track until his sweatshirt was soaked through and goaded us to descend the Grand Canyon with a pair of 8oz water bottles when my brother was only five.

              Mom, on the other hand, threw like a girl.

              And yet, that woman once carried Dad on her back down my deck stairs when he couldn’t take one more step. There’s labor in dying and it’s not solely borne by the one departing.

              A few months before he passed, I stopped at my parent’s house to grab something. The house felt still and empty when I unlocked the door—the only sound was mechanical, a whooshing from the portable humidifier. I knew Mom was out without even calling to her. The car was missing from the driveway. I also knew Dad was upstairs; he never left.

              After I retrieved the item, I hesitated in the downstairs hall. I wasn’t even in a hurry, but I pictured that conversation—the one I would have if I climbed the stairs, still zipped in my coat, and found him lying supine on the bed, eyes closed, that stale smell of inertia inhabiting the room. I knew that conversation like I knew my own skin.

              I’d hover in the doorway, maybe crack the shade and cause him to squint in the sudden spill of light. I’d say “hello” and “how are you?” like an actor delivering a script, anticipating the line that came next. Or the lack of one. The sigh. The hollow reply. I’d scramble to come up with something to fill the silence. An anecdote about the girls. My list of errands for the day.

              “Do you need anything?” “Are you comfortable?” “Mom should be home soon.”

              I didn’t trek up the stairs that day and it haunts me. Years later. The selfishness of the act—to simply walk out that door, turn the key in the lock, and reverse out of the driveway. Leaving behind a person unworthy of acknowledgment.

              Writing these words still plunge me into a vat of shame. I know he likely didn’t even hear me. Or if he did, he may’ve even preferred that I let him sleep. Shade drawn, tucked in his cocoon. Rationally, I accept my going upstairs wouldn’t have made any notable difference. It wasn’t going to cure him or bestow any miracles, but it may have given him the smallest moment of reprieve, a reminder that he wasn’t alone, that glints of hope, of life, of his legacy existed and persisted beyond those four walls.

              Regrets are the burden of the living.

              Today, four years in, I wonder who keeps him close, who still keeps vigil. In truth, he’s been gone much longer. My hope is that memories of him may scatter like ashes. Stop an old acquaintance in his tracks. Spark a recollection. Pull a tender smile.

              The softball coach, roaring for you to round third.

              The hardware man, cutting you a new key for the side door.

              The neighbor, nodding at you as he takes out the trash.

              The Dad—unwavering and giant, rough callouses and warm flannel arms—waiting for you to come upstairs.