I Still Miss You Dad

Today is a sad anniversary for me. My father died April 12, 1990. I was 21.

I wrote about this before. But I have more to say about it now.

His name was Harland and he passed away peacefully in his sleep, but it was well too early. He was 55 when a brain aneurysm took him from us. We know it was peaceful because my mother was sleeping beside him and didn't know anything was wrong until the she was up, making breakfast, and couldn't wake him up.

I was working a night shift at the time and had been gotten home and gone to bed as my mother was getting up. Just over an hour later my mother woke me up. She didn't want me to be woken up by my pager going off and calling me to an emergency at my own home.

See, at the time I was a member of the local volunteer fire department, and being that it was a rural area the fire department were the first responders for all injuries and similar emergencies as well as fires.

I remember that whole day quite vividly.

I remember my mother telling me to go back to bed.
I remember thinking I would never sleep again.
I remember holding it together while my sisters fell apart.
I remember my mother breaking down in the hospital.
I remember calling one of my friends and her coming to support me.
I remember seeing my father in a hospital bed with a lot of tubes and no brain activity.
I remember them declaring my father dead and us having to discuss what to do next.

I remember walking out to the hospital and going to pieces in Sandra's arms on a park bench because my legs wouldn't hold me anymore.

I remember my friends keeping me company and making sure I was not alone for the next few days.

However, much of the next few days is a blur, and I don't remember much of them.

...

Every year on this day I take some time by myself to remember and reflect.

I still miss my dad but I am eternally grateful for the 21 years he was in my life, and the lessons he taught me. Especially the lessons I learned when he didn't realize he was teaching.

I am the man I am today because of my father.

Thank you Dad.

Hibernation

How did it get to be April already? It seems like just last week it was New Year's. And I feel like I have been asleep for months.

I didn't feel like I was asleep at the time, at least not until the last couple of weeks, but now I certainly feel like I am waking up. And it has taken me those weeks to wake up. Or at least to get to the point I am at now.

I still don't feel fully awake, but I am starting to feel more fully myself. Spring must be just about here.

Some people seem to think it is here. As I sit here typing this I am looking at a mix of people, some wearing heavy jackets and hoodies, some not, and at least one wearing a golf shirt and shorts.

And me? I don't think Spring is quite here yet, but it won't be long now. This bear is finally starting to come out of hibernation.

I think I'm going to get out of my cave and into the woods to stretch my legs. I can't wait for things to be Green again.

Peace.

99 Things meme

{Nicked from Mosher, but if he really misses it he can have it back.}

I hope some of you will follow along. If you do, please link back to this post. OK, let me lay out how it works.

Everyone uses the same list of 99 Things.
You will want to remove any brief comments I've added. {They will look like this.}
Feel free to add brief comments of your own.
Change the font of each item as follows:

Things you’ve already done: bold
Things you want to do: italicize
Things you haven’t done and don’t want to: leave in plain font

99 Things

1. started your own blog {This one should be obvious}


2. slept under the stars


3. played in a band {an elementary school band, but still...}


4. visited Hawaii


5. watched a meteor shower


6. given more than you can afford to charity {It was not much at the time, but it still left me short on bus fare.}


7. been to Disneyland/world


8. climbed a mountain


9. held a praying mantis


10. sang a solo {Trust me, no one wants this.}


11. bungee jumped


12. visited Paris


13. watched a lightning storm at sea


14. taught yourself an art from scratch {Balloon sculpture if you are curious.}


15. adopted a child {Under the right circumstances this would change to a "want to"}


16. had food poisoning


17. walked to the top of the Statue of Liberty


18. grown your own vegetables


19. seen the Mona Lisa in France


20. slept on an overnight train {And it wasn't in a sleeping car.}


21. had a pillow fight


22. hitch hiked


23. taken a sick day when you’re not ill


24. built a snow fort


25. held a lamb


26. gone skinny dipping


27. run a marathon {Walk one maybe.}


28. ridden a gondola in Venice


29. seen a total eclipse {Solar and Lunar}


30. watched a sunrise or sunset


31. hit a home run


32. been on a cruise


33. seen Niagara Falls in person {And want to again.}


34. visited the birthplace of your ancestors


35. seen an Amish community


36. taught yourself a new language {Only if you count computer languages.}


37. had enough money to be truly satisfied {Didn't want or need as much as a kid.}{Never as an adult.}


38. seen the Leaning Tower of Pisa in person


39. gone rock climbing


40. seen Michelangelo’s David in person


41. sung karaoke


42. seen Old Faithful geyser erupt in person


43. bought a stranger a meal in a restaurant {OK, it was coffee and a muffin in a diner.}


44. visited Africa


45. walked on a beach by moonlight


46. been transported in an ambulance {After the worst of my car accidents.}


47. had your portrait painted


48. gone deep sea fishing


49. seen the Sistine Chapel in person


50. been to the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris


51. gone scuba diving or snorkeling


52. kissed in the rain


53. played in the mud


54. gone to a drive-in theatre


55. been in a movie {See an earlier post.}


56. visited the Great Wall of China


57. started a business {It didn't last.}


58. taken a martial arts class


59. visited Russia


60. served at a soup kitchen


61. sold girl scout cookies


62. gone whale watching


63. gotten flowers for no reason


64. donated blood


65. gone sky diving


66. visited a Nazi concentration camp


67. bounced a cheque


68. flown in a helicopter


69. saved a favourite childhood toy


70. visited the Lincoln memorial


71. eaten caviar


72. pieced a quilt {OK, an explanation here... My mother and Grandmother made a lot of quilts and occasionally would ask me to help them layout pieces, and always asked me to help them stretch them for the actual quilting.}


73. stood in Times Square


74. toured the Everglades


75. been fired from a job


76. seen the changing of the guard in London


77. broken a bone {It was even mine.}


78. been on a speeding motorcycle


79. seen the Grand Canyon in person


80. published a book


81. visited the Vatican


82. bought a brand new car


83. walked in Jerusalem


84. had your picture in the newspaper


85. read the entire bible


86. visited the White House


87. killed and prepared an animal for eating


88. had chickenpox


89. saved someone’s life {I hope I'm not in a situation where someone's life needs saving.}


90. sat on a jury {Called several times, never picked.}


91. met someone famous {Bill Cosby, Lee Aaron, and Willie Nelson for a start.}


92. joined a book club


93. lost a loved one


94. had a baby {As the father, not getting pregnant myself.}


95. seen the alamo in person


96. swum in the great salt lake


97. been involved in a law suit


98. owned a cell phone


99. been stung by a bee

So that gives us totals of:

44 Things I have done.
37 Things I would like to do.
18 Things I have not done and could do without.

What have you got?

4 Hours

That's how much sleep I managed to get last night, or should I say this morning. 4 Hours. And that started a LOT later than I had really wanted. Late enough that it might have been better to get none at all.

It was just past 5AM when I published my last post and tried to get to sleep. It didn't work and I tried different things that I thought might help, none of them did.

So around 7AM I gave up and got in the shower. That at least made me feel somewhat better and I started thinking about what I'd have for breakfast. Then I woke up about 4 hours later.

As I check the clock now, it is 1:38AM and feel a lot more awake than I would like.

Good thing I picked up some generic form of Tylenol PM. I'll be trying that out in a few minutes to see if it helps me get to sleep before 2AM tonight. Good thing I don't have to get up early tomorrow.

...

Oh, and as for the phone call(s) I was talking about last night...

None got made today. In fact, I didn't talk to anyone I know today. I barely spoke to anyone at all.

When I got out and around this afternoon I constantly found myself either in a lot of traffic or a crush of bodies. Neither of which I seemed to be equipped to deal with today. I was only able to keep a pleasant demeanour when I kept my mouth shut.

When I went to say anything I found myself ready to tell people what I really thought about being knocked around by the crowds trying to beat each other to the best sales. However, if I kept my mouth shut I was able to smile and be pleasant. {OK, it might not have been much of a smile but it was more than anyone else seemed to be wearing.}

And to quote Jimmy Stewart's character of Elwood P. Dowd in the movie "Harvey":

My mother used to say to me ... "In this world you need to be very, very smart, or very, very pleasant."

I've been smart. I recommend pleasant.

Not quite the same circumstances, but something to keep in mind. {And a movie well worth watching if you haven't already seen it.}

I think I've begun to ramble. So I'm off to take the PM and head to bed.

Wish me luck.

What Am I Doing?

It's 4:00AM and I am sitting here at the computer when I should be sleeping. But I wasn't able to sleep earlier. I'll be trying again shortly, hopefully with better results.

I've spent the last couple of hours trying to figure out if any one I know is located in a time zone that I could call without causing panic. No one expects anything but bad news when their phone rings after midnight.

I really wanted to talk to someone. But I didn't NEED to talk to someone. If I had I know there are a couple of people who would have forgiven the late call.

Well, I'll make a call or two over the weekend when I'm ready to talk.

...

I should mention here that I'm not looking for anyone to call me. In fact there is a good chance that my phone will be off this weekend if I'm not making calls myself.

Unfortunately there are things about this that I can't write about here due to promises I made.

Yes, this is some of the heavy stuff alluded to a couple of posts ago which has been on my mind.

...

And it is now past 5:00AM and I am going to go try to get a couple of hours sleep.

Seven Random Things

I don't know if any of you noticed, but this site was down for a couple of days at the start of this week. I am using the Custom Domains feature of Blogger and made a few changes. Apparently a couple of those changes worked together to confuse the system and things stopped working.

I got the issues straightened out and things seem to be working correctly again.

...

I was tagged by Ricardipus and so it is time to give you:

Seven Random Things About WyldWoods

1. I was driving by the time I was 11 years old. This was largely because I spent a lot of time in the country and working relatives farms when I was a kid and needed to take my turn driving the trucks and tractors while we were bailing hay, gathering the harvest, etc.


2. I have stuck my foot into both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. I swam in the Atlantic a lot growing up in Nova Scotia but have never been west of Niagara Falls in my home country of Canada. I have however been on both coasts in the United States.
   


3. I have been to more than one Tractor Pull as well as a Monster Truck show. And I enjoyed all of them.
   


4. I had to wear a back brace for almost two years. For the second half of the 5th grade through to the first month or two of the 7th grade. Narrowly avoided back surgery.
   


5. I have been hit by a car. I was riding my bike when a car hit the front of the bike, completely mangling it and throwing me across the hood. The driver didn't stick around.
   


6. My father died when I was 21. I am now 40 and I still miss him.
   


7. I worked at a mental hospital for 2 years. From what I saw there I can say that some of the patients were more sane than a lot of the staff.
   

So, that's seven and that's all I have for tonight. Mostly because it is almost midnight and I need to get some sleep.

Peace.

Oh, and I guess I'm supposed to tag others. Well, it's late and I can't think of anyone in particular, so I guess I'll say anyone who reads this who hasn't already done it. {If you link your post back to this one it will make it easier for me to find them.}

A Day of Remembrance

Today is Remembrance Day. At least it is at home, and several other places I could name, but it isn't here. Here it is Veteran's Day. The big difference between the days being that around here nobody really seemed to notice, other than the school children who spent the day running around or playing video games.

In the past I have posted "In Flander's Fields" and "The Fields of Flanders" and I once posted some thoughts about people who serve.

Today I have been thinking about my family and friends who have served / are serving.

Lest We Forget...

...

But what about those times we can't stop remembering?

For a few weeks now I have not been able to get certain people out of my mind. Some are people who have passed out of my life for one reason or another, while a few of them have passed out of this world entirely.

I think I miss the ones that are still here more. I know that I will not be able to talk to the others again while I am still here.

There is more to say, but I can't say it yet. I'm just not ready.

...

Oh, and I know I've been tagged by Ricardipus but it is getting late and I desperately need to get some sleep. I'll get it posted within the week.

Maurice Foxx ( 1948 - 2008 )

Maurice was a good man and a great friend. Who, over the years, told people that he didn't think there would be more than a handful of people at his funeral.

Well, his funeral was held on Wednesday and there were more than a handful of people there. In fact there were hundreds and it was standing room only in the foyer once all the seats (and several spaces on the floor) were taken long before the receiving line was complete.

Several people, both family and friends, spoke and by the end there was not a dry eye in the place. I know I was brought to tears several times during the service.

And then in was over.

And then we found out that his family and his tribe were leaving to spread his ashes and they had decided this ceremony would be open to his friends as well if they wished to attend. Which we very much did.

So we all headed out to a relatively quiet section of beach where the tribe performed a cleansing ceremony {They smudged everyone} and prepared for the final part of the ceremony in which Maurice's daughters took his ashes, got in a canoe with two rowers, one of whom was also Maurice's son, and started rowing out into the ocean. However Maurice got the last laugh.

The canoe was sitting very low in the water, much too low for the height of the waves, and as they rowed out the canoe kept taking on water as the waves broke over the gunnels.

By the time the canoe was out almost out to where his ashes would be spread it was completely swamped. And then another wave hit and the canoe went over. The people who had been in the canoe were now hanging onto the canoe while one of Maurice's daughters shook the skin, which had been used to wrap the ashes, over head and let the wind spread the ashes behind them.

Once everyone on the beach was sure that those in the water were safe there was much whooping. This was accompanied by a lot of cheering, laughter, and shouts of "Maurice never would have wanted to go in by himself."

It certainly lightened the mood, and reminded everyone of the sense of humour Maurice had, and his good nature.

He will be sorely missed.

Not The Fresh Start I Was Looking For

I know it has been six months since I last posted and a lot happened in those months. However, I am not going to get into all of it right now. I wanted a fresh start on this journal.

Unfortunately, this fresh start is going to be a sad note as I will be going to Cape Cod for a funeral tomorrow.

Thursday night a very good friend of mine passed away. About a week after surgery on his neck, while recovering at home, he died from complications from said surgery. The Cape Cod Times published an article about him.

...

That aside, I am back and I am posting.

Hopefully with happier news from here on out.

Adding Injury To Insult

My weekend was uneventful. At first because of the pain, then because of the Vicoden.

I had a tooth get very painful very fast requiring an emergency call to my dentist. Once I had described everything to him, he said it sounded like the tooth had developed an abscess and suggested a treatment of antibiotics for a day to make the it easier on everyone when he treated the abscess.

He also said he would give me a painkiller to help get me through.

So, I went to the pharmacy to pick up the prescriptions and picked up a one week supply of Amoxicillin and a two day supply of Vicoden.

The Vicoden wiped out the pain, but it pretty much wiped me out as well. The rest of the weekend was spent feeling half asleep.

...

It was drilled and drained this morning, but due to how inflamed the nerve was, it could not be completely numbed. In fact the dentist had to give me an extra injection directly into the pulp and nerve of the tooth after it had been drilled.

Try to avoid this is you can. It is even more painful than it sounds.

But the Pulpectomy was completed and once the rest of the infection is treated I get to go back to complete the root canal.

Wheeeeee...