Gifts

On this day a whole whack of years ago, my parents welcomed me into the world. After a couple of days of de-gooping at the hospital, they brought me home. At that moment, my life was spread before me - and them. All potential, all forward.

Despite the fact that it's my birthday, I find myself not feeling particularly celebratory. That's because my father spent the day in the ER yesterday, and as I write this, is on his way back to the hospital after being tended to by paramedics after a particularly wobbly episode at home. Yet more milestones on a journey I know he'd rather not be on.

In the overall scheme of things, it hardly merits headlines. Earlier this week, untold numbers of people perished in a storm in a brutally-repressed nation and continue to suffer while their government puts up obstacles to rescuers at the border. Yet another Canadian soldier is coming home from Afghanistan in a body bag. Entire communities of people not too far from here can no longer afford to keep their homes. I get it: the world sucks on a grand scale. But my life isn't about overall schemes of anything. It's about my dad, and the fact that he just can't seem to get well. It doesn't have to make headlines to be significant.

All those years ago, he looked at me through the nursery glass and saw a life ahead of him. Today, I look into a detached screen from far away and try to erase thoughts about his own stage of life. As I fight to find comfort in looking back, I avoid looking forward because then I'd have to deal with whatever uncertainty lies ahead. That's right, I'm an avoider. Like all children, I fear losing my parents, facing life without them long after I ceased to rely so completely on them. I know it's a fact of of our very mortal life, but that doesn't make it any easier to swallow.

So if I receive any gift on this somewhat sombre birthday, I hope it's news that he gets to go home, and that this latest chapter moves quickly to a happy ending for him. I'll deal with the bigger picture another time.