My last (but not final) conversation with Dad

This is what I recall from my last conversation with Dad on Sunday November 14, 2010.

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Dad was alert. There were a couple nurses just outside his bedroom, who had been hovering over him for what seemed like hours working on the colostomy bag. Ellen took them away after we started talking/crying and closed the door.

After crying for quite a while in his hands which were still fairly strong,
I told Dad how much I would miss him and talking to him. Especially on the phone. I told him that much of his advise rings in my ear without ever talking to him though, and thus he would always be with me, as often I have had conversations seeking his advise in my mind when he was nowhere present, and that these sessions would continue. I told him that I often knew what he would say before he spoke. I told him that he was my hero, and about how much I learned from him and about how much he had done for all of us.

I let him know that as a very private man he went through a very degrading process to his body and privacy and that he handled it with incredible dignity. Crying he said "I hope so."

He told me that he was concerned about all of us. I told him not to worry that he had taught us all well and he knew that. He said "Are you sure." I said yes and he said, "I think so, but I worry about all of you." I told him he knew so. I asked him how much he was able to help us over the last six months, and he said "none." And I asked him how we all did and he said "just fine". I told him, then, you know so (that we would all be all right) and he said. "Yes, I know." I told him that we would all take care of each other. He said "I know, thank you."

I also told him, if he could, to check here now and then as I was sure that we would all have some things to say to him through the years. He said "ok I will". (with kind of a 1/4 chuckle)"

I let him know that I hoped/thought we would meet again, and that I guess this is arrivederci. He repeated "arrivederci" cried and closed his eyes. I tickled his feet (one of his favorite things, only slightly in front of attaching a foreign word or phrasing to a situation) until I thought he was asleep. I flew back to Indiana just an hour or so later, he died 5 days after our last conversation; Before I could return for Thanksgiving. I am truly thankful that Mom, Ellen and Mary Anne were all there those final days and that Dad left us peacefully.

'Til we meet again Dad,

Dean