Passings
Father-in-Law passed away last night between 8 and 9pm. I'm told it was "a circus" with the EMTs, fire department, cops, and the whole nine yards. Apparently he didn't have his DNR filled out properly so they were required to attempt to resuscitate him. Henry and I were waiting to hear which hospital he was going to as we live in Med Center, and didn't want to come over and add to the chaos, then got the call a few minutes later that he was gone.
We had to wait about two hours or so for the funeral home to show up and pick him up, while he just laid there in the middle of the floor with his arms sticking out from beneath the sheet. Everyone just kept casually walking around him and holding what would have been fairly normal conversations if it weren't for the fact that they were already discussing the obit, funeral arrangements and even if they should hold a luncheon after the funeral. It was all so horribly surreal - the kind of thing you watch silently from the sidelines and wonder what you took, when it's going to wear off, and when you're going to wake up.
On the up side, he'd had a very good day on Sunday. Henry had taken him to see some a cousin who was having a birthday party. They actually went to the wrong restaurant and ended up eating alone as a family, then joined the others back at the house. I chose not to go this week.
There's actually going to be two, technically three, services. One here in San Antonio for all Durwood's old students and local friends, then another in the Elgin/McDade area at a church there. After that, he'll be transported to Shiloh for burial.
It's so weird to feel a bit relieved that he's gone. He'd had it really rough as of late. He'd made it to his 50th wedding anniversary, which he'd always said he could go any time after that and he'd be happy. The 16th was his birthday as well. He'd been in and out of the hospital lately, more in than out. The latest was with a collapsed lung. They think his death was related to that, possibly an embolism. He went quickly, or so it seems. He'd told Christine that he was hungry and she'd gotten him some soup and some crackers. He passed between her setting that down and her going back to the kitchen to get his insulin. He got to die at home, which is what he wanted. He wasn't feeling too good on Friday, breathing troubles again, and I have to wonder if he knew that it was coming and that that's why he refused to go back over the weekend.
We had to wait about two hours or so for the funeral home to show up and pick him up, while he just laid there in the middle of the floor with his arms sticking out from beneath the sheet. Everyone just kept casually walking around him and holding what would have been fairly normal conversations if it weren't for the fact that they were already discussing the obit, funeral arrangements and even if they should hold a luncheon after the funeral. It was all so horribly surreal - the kind of thing you watch silently from the sidelines and wonder what you took, when it's going to wear off, and when you're going to wake up.
On the up side, he'd had a very good day on Sunday. Henry had taken him to see some a cousin who was having a birthday party. They actually went to the wrong restaurant and ended up eating alone as a family, then joined the others back at the house. I chose not to go this week.
There's actually going to be two, technically three, services. One here in San Antonio for all Durwood's old students and local friends, then another in the Elgin/McDade area at a church there. After that, he'll be transported to Shiloh for burial.
It's so weird to feel a bit relieved that he's gone. He'd had it really rough as of late. He'd made it to his 50th wedding anniversary, which he'd always said he could go any time after that and he'd be happy. The 16th was his birthday as well. He'd been in and out of the hospital lately, more in than out. The latest was with a collapsed lung. They think his death was related to that, possibly an embolism. He went quickly, or so it seems. He'd told Christine that he was hungry and she'd gotten him some soup and some crackers. He passed between her setting that down and her going back to the kitchen to get his insulin. He got to die at home, which is what he wanted. He wasn't feeling too good on Friday, breathing troubles again, and I have to wonder if he knew that it was coming and that that's why he refused to go back over the weekend.