This morning began with a slew of text messages from my mother, who has an enormous tendency to over react, blow things out of proportion, and plain ol be a drama queen. The messages, in short, were her lighting a fire under my ass to call my god father. My god father has been battling AIDS since before I was even born. that's about 30+ years of this amazing man winning a losing battle. In my life, he has been everything. Standing in where my own father was absent in life and in death - girl scout and school events where it was daddy daughter whatever, he was the first to comfort me and stand by my side when my dad passed. He walked me down the isle at my wedding. He was the first person to call me after each baby announcement, birth, and so on and so forth. So, for all intents and purpose, he's my dad. And I love him. John has been in and out of the hospital since thanksgiving. Obviously given his circumstances, he has had serious health scares before, but now its real. I called his husband (yes. HIS HUSBAND, my two gay dads) this morning and had a long chat that I just haven't even got the words for. In short, when he leaves the hospital today, the expectation is that he will only keep getting worse, much worse, day by day, and the reality is, he may only have weeks left with us. It was expressed to me that i needed to speak with John. That he desperately wanted to talk to me and we needed to nail each other down. Given the time difference, my kid schedule, and his resting, john and i have been playing a LOT of phone tag. A couple of hours later, john returned my phone call from earlier in the morning. He sounded great! What the hell were these two hens getting their panties in a twist over! No more than a few minutes pass by before it is painfully clear, from 2,500 miles away that nothing is alright. His voice diminished, his breath all of a sudden became short and labored, but he just wanted to keep talking. So I let him. He didn't want to talk about himself or his situation. He just wanted to know what i was doing, how the babies were, and how C is coping with the latest unfortunate news in production. In no way shape or form did he mention, insinuate, or even acknowledge the severity of what was going on. Hey. If you need a little sunshine in your day; a few minutes not to think about it, be bombarded with questions, doctors, nurses, what ifs and so forth, I will oblige. I will fight back my questions, fear and confusion, to hear you laugh about my latest insignificant debacle in child rearing. Of course, i couldn't go on too long with out one of the kids harassing me to get off of the phone. He said he should let me go, and he will call me tomorrow after he's settled back in at home. While saying our see ya laters, he stopped me to say "i just want you to know that you are always in my heart, and i love you so very very much". I have seen this man cry twice in my life, and this end to a phone call had him choked up and fighting emotion. We say i love you all the time, but this was different. Im left now in Atlanta, while he is at home in Los Angeles. I can't go to him very easily to hug or comfort him. I can't even make sense of the whole thing. My mother and his husband lead me to believe there may only be weeks left. His demeanor and attitude tells me otherwise - that he's not ready to give up just yet. My gut tells me it may not be up to him. At the end of the day, John has lived an amazing life. Filled with traveling, friends and family, countless personal and professional accomplishments... Just so full of everything anyone could want, really. No matter the immediate outcome, I am relieved that he will be at home to relax and take in everything in his life that he has worked so hard for. My heart hurts, but its also so filled with love and admiration that i can't feel anything but relief. No matter what takes place in the next few weeks, it is what is supposed to happen. He will live to fight another day, or he will be relieved of all that ails him. At least that's what im going to tell myself to keep my chin up. he's doing it. So will I.
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