The Last Call

It has only been two days since that last call.... it seems like a lifetime ago now.... 

"Aaron... Dad's gone."  

It was dark and early in the morning.  I jumped at the first ring... The blasted call that I knew was just up ahead, foreboding, lingering in the shadows, just waiting for the right moment....had come.   The call I wanted to avoid, the call that hung heavy in the air like an imposing humid fog.

I had written about Dad a few days before.  A post that came to me late one night  and I wrote without even knowing why... but I went with my gut.  What came out was: "The Last Farmer." Looking back, I now know why the prompting was there.  Something told me to sit down and capture some thoughts that were circling my heart and mind....to pay silent tribute to him in word, in my own way.  What I didn't know was that it would be the last one before he passed.  2 years ago I wrote "Who is this Man?" and then 10 years ago I wrote: "50 Words" as birthday gift to him.

We quickly dressed and left to help his wife with the details and tasks that always come after this type of call.  The busyness of plans and tasks kept my mind focused for a while.... a few hours later I went into his office to look for an email.... 

I made the mistake of sitting down in his chair....I pushed it back a foot or two.. and then looked all around.....and started to soak.....and then the rushing emotional waterfall came crashing down all over me and took over.

I can't express everything I saw... but there were quotes, and pictures, and drawings and doodles, and half written poems, lists of what he was working on, cards from kids and grandkids... I looked at all the placques on the wall, recognition from all over the world.  It was like being in the cockpit of his mind, seeing what he saw, trying to feel what he would have felt.  I started to focus on a few.  Here is one that caught my eye. 

He had this taped to his monitor:  I particularly liked No. 6: That stemmed the tide a bit as I laughed out loud... Then I read No. 8 and was caught off guard how I was immediatley filled up and rendered useless as I wondered what went through his mind as he so subtley wrote that one down... What is one more step after you have done all the obvious ones.  It felt so intimately personal and this one wasn't about the will, or the insurance.  It wasn't about that email response or grandkid birthday reminder.... This was something else....

What if this was something he was working out with his Maker?  Could it be that they were conversing about what that next step should be? Could he have been preparing to acquire the grace of "letting go" and being ok with that gesture.... to release his life unto the Father of his own free will without that clinging "one last look" ache?  Maybe that was the most courageous and noble thing he would ever do.... quietly, with no one looking, no one knowing.  So personal, so intimate.   

Is this a list that you or I will have posted on the mirror when we are 87 riddled with cancer?  Makes me wonder....

I have learned more about my Father in the past week reading oodles of stories from so many friends and family that I have been overwhelmed in just trying to take him all in... I can't.  It is the most beautifully heavy load I have had to bear in a while.  

I had the good fortune of taking him to the Dr's recently and so I picked him up in my little two seater sports car and the first thing he said was: "What possessed you to buy a two seater car?"  as only Dad could..... I laughed out loud...This meant he was still "here", his body was betraying him, but he was still in there... We went to the visit, we had some quiet time, and then he would say..."It will be nice to see Mom and Roland...... and my parents too."  I knew then he was leaning differently... before the fight was still there, now it was a reflection of what was just up ahead and he was ok with it.  I held back the tears and said "It will be so great Dad."   Afterwards he took me to breakfast.  He had an omelette and I found a bottle of Cholula because they didn't have Tabasco sauce... He doused it and ate the whole thing.  Simple, quiet, but the moment was filled with meaning for me.  I drove back and I told him how much I loved him.  He squeezed my arm.... I got out to help him into the house and he gave one of Mom's relentlessly ferocious desparate hugs that felt like he was hanging on to life itself and said "Thank you!".   

..... Yeah, that was a pretty good day.

HIs whole life passed before I hung up the phone.... My guess is he did the same thing as he received his last call from Heaven asking him if it was time and as he looked one last time through all of his life, he smiled, nodded and said, I am ready.

Now the glorious aching begins.... 

The Last Farmer

Farmers are anything but rock stars. They get up early and work. They sow, plow, toil, and protect. In all of it, they beg God for rain.  No, they aren't rock stars but they are built like rocks.  Solid, unmoving, steadfast.  They have a gaze that sees things that most don't.  They squint and the world comes into focus.  They know when it rains when the familiar pain twinges in their knees.  They smell the weather...they feel the world.  They seem to just know things.... how things should and shouldn't be.  They know about right and wrong in their bones.  They move slowly, but always lean forward and their wit is lightning quick.  They don't need to use a lot of words to get to the real meaning of things.  

Yes..... my dad was a farmer.  

The last in his line.... 

When he was baling hay, tending to cattle and watering the crops, something beckoned inside... He was a cowboy that started to form big non-cowboy ideas... Ideas that grew and became bigger than the state of Arizona.  They needed more land to grow in and he needed a wider horizon. So, he traded in his boots for an airplane and took us around the world.   You can't take the farm out of the farmer..... Although he dined with Ambassadors and Presidents, he always put tabasco on everything he 'et and always fixed the car himself. 

He painted the world with his wit, he made every joke understandable in every language and culture.  He was welcome at every campfire in every nation.... Though no statues will be raised, no monuments with his name, he will leave a lasting legacy of himself.  

The seeds of his posterity have been sown deep in rich soil and have sprung forth in a multitude of goodness.  His gaze has shifted from vast foreign lands to the eternal hinterland of his mind... and lingers on those that have gone after him.  What joy he has in tending to these that are fruit of his vineyard of eternal increase.

Now, as he wrings every ounce he can with every interaction he has, he finds something to give, of himself.  He has done this his whole life.  He has been willing to give his life away to other people.

I am one of those other people..... 

He has given me laughter, he has given me understanding, he has given me hope, he has given me mirth.  He has given me the world, so that I could see things differenlty.  He opened up doors that few ever even knew existed, doors to inexpressible joy, doors that connected me to people all over this world.  Doors to diversity, doors to awakenings, doors to understanding, doors to empathy, and doors that allowed me to love more uniquely.

I do not know what he will give me next, but I know it will be something solid, unmoving and steadfast.  It will be like a rock, that I can find my footing with, where I can stand with surety and strength.  

Yes, my dad was a farmer,... The last of his kind.  

And although I will never really know what that means, and maybe, just maybe I don't need to as I watched and learned what it meant to him.  What makes a farmer isn't the crops, the animals and the land after all....What makes a farmer a farmer comes from within.  It is part of who he is.  I have spent my life watching him give his life away to others..... one precious piece at a time with every touch.

He is in charge of the number of days that are left now.... He will know when to give away the last of himself.....His eyes will be perfectly focused, his gaze clear and he won't use very many words...but it will be lasting, this I know.

And then...in a coming day I will be left with the defining burning question that will cause me to refine my focus, raise my gaze, and sink me to my knees and decide if what I have given away thus far, has been enough.... and then spend the rest of my life making sure that it is.

Can't Find The Words

Just wanted to let you know... that I am struggling to find the words to connect with all the beauty and blessings in my life.....


                                                 I feel things, but I just can't find my way to the words right now....