CHERISH THE LOVE...

My dear old Dad reaches the grand age of 84 later this year yet strangely I have only started to really know him over the past two years. It's not that we have spent my life avoiding each other or anything like that but more a case of being busy living our own lives where since I have grown up and left the family home we have drifted apart and I don't think for one minute we are in any way unique in that respect.

As we mature into adulthood it's only natural that we start to build our own lives separate from the one we have shared with Mum and Dad and siblings.

All manner of things can effect and influence the amount of contact we maintain with our parents and in my case I suppose two of the main factors were my parents getting divorced while I was still in my teens and the fact that following the split from Mum, my Dad started to spend more and more time 'back home' in Jamaica.

He used to go out there most winters for 6 months at a time and built himself a house at 'Redground' in Negril. I still smile to myself when I hear him complaining about the cold British weather that he can't get used to after 60 years of being in this country and It just goes to show that you can take the man out of the Caribbean but you can't take the Caribbean out of the man!

It was on his last stay 'back home' just over two years ago when I got the phone call from relatives in Jamaica informing me that Dad had suffered a major Stroke. Talk about a 'bolt out of the blue?!'....My Dad is the fittest most energetic 80+  year old you are ever likely to find so the news was a great shock to me! I quickly made arrangements to fly out there and within days I was being met at the airport by my cousin who lived next door to Dad and he was going to drive me over to my Dad's place.

This was the first time I had been back to Jamaica since I was a young kid yet everything, all the sights and smells and sounds seemed strangely familiar. Cousin Steve got me up to speed on my Dad's situation as we followed the road along the stunningly beautiful  Jamaican coast.... he had been discharged from hospital after 3 days and although he appeared to be physically ok he was unable to speak...

A couple of hours after leaving the airport we were pulling up outside Steve's place and he pointed out Dad's house at the top of the hill which was too steep to get the van up so I set off on foot. There were half a dozen people at the front of the house but I could  make Dad out quite clearly and realised he was watching me approach but not recognising who I was. As I got closer he moved away from the others and moved towards me and as I went through the gate he realised it was me and walked right up to me and buried his face in my chest as he wept uncontrollably. I held him tightly for fully five minutes as he sobbed and he felt so little and frail in my arms. His tears seemed to be a mixture of joy and relief at seeing me but also of frustration because he was unable to communicate verbally and I knew in those moments that I would have to take him away from his Caribbean paradise in order to care for him for the remainder of his years.

That realisation became all the more difficult to bear as he slowly gathered himself then began to proudly show me around his house and land pointing and gesticulating but unable to speak. He turned me round to look down the hill and into the distance and said his first words since the stroke... "Look at the sea!"....the view from his hilltop retreat in paradise was indeed truly spectacular and I wondered how I could even begin to tell him that he had to leave this part of his life behind....

My heart was saying, 'Leave him here in the land where he was born and loves. OK he won't get the care and help that I can facilitate for him in England but he will be happy for whatever time he has left." but my head was telling me that I needed to get him back close to me in order to give him the best quality of life that I possibly could courtesy of the wonderful institution that is the 'British National Health Service'....

It's over two years since I had that wrestling match between heart & head and I still question the decision I made to take Dad away from paradise particularly at winter time when we get the snow and ice that most Jamaicans have only ever seen on Christmas cards but the old guy is doing OK and accepts that he's in the best place. He continues to get well and his speech is ever improving and although it's not as it was, he can communicate again and is steadily rebuilding his life and working things out as he goes along.


As his main carer I have spent more time with him in these last couple of years than I have in the previous 50 and it's as though we are 'father and son bonding' for the first time but in reverse....by that I mean it's as if we have swapped roles with me being the father figure this time round as Dad learns to cope with his new found limitations where anything remotely technical is a real challenge for him.
For example he gets so easily confused when attempting to work his television and radio and even light switches and keys can easily confuse him. The culmination of that role reversal came when I called round to do his shopping one day and he was so excited to see me because he could not wait to show me what he had learned to do for himself that week.....

As usual he was dressed ready to go on our weekly shopping trip to Asda ( that,s Walmart to all you American followers of my Blog)....except he was not wearing any shoes and for good reason too as it turned out....
"Sit down I want to show you something" he said. He waited until I was seated before he dissapeared out into the hall-way only to return seconds later clutching his trainers. "Where are the ones I bought you with the Velcro fasteners?" I inquired, (because laces are one of the technical things that his stroke left him unable to figure out)...."Wait"...."wait".... he said as he sat down in his armchair and put his trainers on his feet. I was fully expecting him to then ask me to tie his laces (yes the 'one armed Black Chap can tie laces!) but he didn't ask! Instead he ever so deliberately and painstakingly slowly tied his own laces, only looking up occasionally to check that I was still watching his efforts...I was watching alright...Granted I was unable to see much as by now the tears were pumping out of my eyes and streaming down my face but I was watching as my dear old Dad finished tying his laces before looking up at me with a beaming grin of proud achievement. Damn right he should be proud of himself too as he must have been practicing all week and I too was proud of him as I got a bigger kick watching him tie those laces than I did when Jaja learnt how to do the very same thing when not much more than a toddler!    

If I have any regrets where my Dad is concerned it's not with the fact that I took him away from paradise but the fact that it needed a near death experience to bring us closer together. Being a Dad myself I know how much I cherish the love of my own son and though I can't get back all those lost years I know that the times we have ahead of us will be times of pure love, respect and appreciation from both of us....

Dad now knows and accepts with a heavy heart that he will never be well enough to go back and live on his own in Jamaica but I will keep the promise that I made to him and bury him at 'Redground' next to his big brother Sydney but I know that will be a long time into the future because we have some catching up to do...

I love you 'Old Man'.....Always....