The limbic symphony for my 94 year old father’s death began Sunday night July 20th at 10:15 with whispers around his bedside. Then my choked calls to siblings and children raised sound of his death. Just one hard thing to say for now, and say it many times. Pass it on, the drumbeat that stops the other music.
What alarmed me was their timing. The first person to notice me in the doorway of their family room was the baby in the corner of the crib in the corner of the room. She locked onto me long enough to tag me as a stranger and then let out a slow, cat-like wail—loud but empty of urgency. Her father, Mitch, who faced the half-curtained window while folding baby pajamas near the laundry basket on the floor, finished his folding and carefully laid the pajamas on one of the stacks on the table before turning first to the baby and then to me. Apparently he hadn’t heard his mother greet me at the front door and or the shuffle of my feet in the doorway, even though the TV was on mute. He lumbered over to hand the baby her stray bottle in the crib and crossed the room to show me in.
