father

My dad has three to six months left to live.

My sister and I got the news over the weekend, preceded by a discouraging call from my mom saying she had some "news" about my dad. It turns out that the brachytherapy he'd started last year (as the laser ablation treatments were proving less and less effective) had greatly damaged his liver and that the cancer was now spreading rapidly. I could immediately tell, as we all sat at the kitchen table, that my parents had some serious things to say. I sensed a slight jump in my heartrate but didn't find tears until later that night, my eyes closed and hearing nothing but death's door hovering closer and closer, now more tangible than ever.

My dad was very calm about delivering his sentence -- to him, these past 27 years with liver cancer were all a bonus on top of the life he'd already had: growing up in a Japanese-occupied Korea, escaping the violence of the Korean War by travelling south by train and leaving behind family and friends and pets, building a life from the piles of rubble that became South Korea, working for the US army (as librarian and interpreter), marrying my mom and moving to Canada with a fresh baby boy, and starting a new life in Toronto, first as factory workers and laborers, starting a corner store franchise (yeah), starting a computer store business, and finally retiring to days of golf and cruises.

Eight-five is a respectable number of years to reach, is what I tell myself. I will try to make the most of the time we have left but it's so soon, too soon. How can I sleep when all I hear is that door? We all must pass through it, the deep darkness, and I hear its empty howl straight into my heart, my inside me. I suppose I too have outlived my personal tragedies, and will likely outlive this one. It's natural to survive your parents and I wouldn't have it otherwise (the pain they felt when I was in emergency is too much to bear) but still my dad's approaching death hangs heavy.