Raindrops on grandpa’s hospital window.
Fresh from my sketchbook/journal. Somewhat nonsensical, sleepy stupor induced mushiness written late last night at Floyd Memorial Hospital:
Surreal; that’s the only way I can think to describe watching someone you’ve known all of your life slip away towards death. I’m not afraid of it. It’s actually a beautiful thing, seeing someone’s cycle of life come full circle. Grandpa used to watch over me like a shepherd even for something as silly as making sure I didn’t choke on his Life Savers. “Show me your tongue Ashley Kay” he would say (my middle name is not Kay by the way, but he always called me that to pull my leg). He would stay by my side until no evidence remained of the hard candy. Or how about the way he would fret every summer as I exhausted myself attempting to blow up pool rafts three times my size. “You’ll pass out Ashley Kay, you watch.” And now, I sit at his bedside and sleep with one eye open so I can catch him before he pulls and tugs at the foreign devices attached to his frail body as he lays in this hospital bed. Countless times we’ve told him, “Please leave that alone grandpa, you need it. It will make you better.” While it is sad to watch the man he was fade away to Alzheimer’s, there really is something precious about experiencing the beginning of life with him from the perspective of my childhood, and then witnessing his experience on the other end of the spectrum.
I remember this so well with grandma Cecil. As much as I hated to see her struggle in giving up her 80+ years of complete independence, allowing others to take care of her, I loved reciprocating some of the things she did for me, like brushing my hair, bathing me, preparing my meals just the way I liked them. Grandpa Chadwell was much more of a hands off care-giver to Paul and myself. He watched silently at a distance. We fished together, he hid Easter eggs for us, he let me turn the garage into my play house. He told me I was his favorite “fishing buddy.” He hooked my bait for me because I thought it was cruel, then he ducked when I cast my rod.
He worried about everything. I’ll eat too many cookies, fall down the stairs, the music will hurt my ears, I’ll drive too fast, I’m too far from home, so on and so on. As matter of fact, I’m convinced the reason he was so worried I would choke on a Life Saver was because, as the story goes, my aunt Ann choked on a Barbie shoe when she was a little girl. Ever since that accident, any object the size of a quarter or smaller raised red flags. I still thought it was ridiculous that I wasn’t allowed to be more than three feet from him until the Life Saver had dissolved.
I think that kind of worry runs in the Chadwell genes. Aunt Pat and mom definitely inherited it. And well, I have been called a mother hen a time or two. Looking out for others is one thing (and I’m not giving that up), but I could stand to take the self-directed personal worry down a few notches. Choke-size Barbie shoes do not mean Life Savers are bad. What the hell am I talking about? Ha, I’m going to try to loosen up and think less about past isolated experiences that don’t necessarily have a damn thing to do with what’s in front of me.
