My father passed away on June 8. He was almost 71. He has been ill for the past ten years, and bedridd for the past three years and a half. In this last period, he could only move his left hand. Even so my mother and I were not entirely ready to let him go. I suppose one never is. He did not imagine he would not recover after his last major stroke, but every step forward was marred by several steps back, which took him closer and closer to the end. His favourite adage was "while there is life, there is hope". He had lost all extra weight and his constants looked good, but the lack of movement and the lack of ability to move slowly destroyed every part of his body.
He was optimistic until the last year when he lost hope that he'll ever get well again. Yet, somehow, he found the strength to keep going when all the pain seemed pointless even to him. After I accepted the job in Barcelona, he'd ask "when do we go to Spain?". He was impatient for change, which could not really be provived in bed. He'd call friends and relatives and persistently ask them to visit. Only two did visit in the years he was ill. Whenever I'd ask him if he wanted to go outside, his face would light up. So, I'd lift him together with my mom and one of the kids would push the wheelchair under him. At first, we'd go on the street. He wanted to vaccinate from COVID-19 early and even thought that vaccines should be tested on people like him. They kept announcing on the radio that elederly people could vaccinate, but there was no mobile team in Lugoj. So when we'd go on the street, he'd scream "vaccination". Eventually, we drove to the vaccination center, and convinced the doctors to come to the car and vaccinate him. They said it was not legal, but agreed to do it. Like almost everything my father did, it opened an unorthodox path. They have been doing vaccinations in the car since then for people in similar conditions.
In the last few weeks, he gave up trying to change the world, and preferred to stay in the yard and watch the children play and pet the kittens who'd climb on him or the dog and the goat as they walked by his chair. The only day he did not want to go outside was the day he died. Then I asked him if he'd make it until Mihai would come on June 15, and he said "I don't know". Our last last conversation was a joke "Chiar si magarul lui Itic a murit cand n-a mai mancat nimic" ("Even Itic's donkey died when he ate nothing".) The original joke is longer and involves Itic training his donkey to be economical, and complaining that when he succeeded and the donkey ate nothing, he died. My father did manage to eat until the last day -- mostly fruits and yogurt. My mother tried to make him breathe better with various medication, and in the last afternoon, when it was clear nothing worked, she held him and told him they'd meet on the other side. He died in her arms while she was calling him "my dearest darling". After that she had trouble letting him go for the next two hours until the funeral home came. When they placed him in the coffin, his spine was so bent that they needed a bunch of empty bottles to make it seem straight. He had managed to live until all resources were exhausted and life held mostly pain. Mihai did show up the morning of the funeral. He flew through Cluj, and then took an overnight train to make it in time. His cousin, Cornel, also drove from Bucharest to be there. He would have been pleased to see both of them -- their presence helped us get through the day.
My father was buried on June 10, on the day that Romania commemorates its heroes, i.e., those who died while serving their country. Since he had been a colonel in the army, he had the right to a military funeral. So, his colleagues from Lugoj came to the funeral with armed personnel. Their commander was a woman. My father would have been pleased by that. They put a flag on the coffin and gave my mother a flag to take home that commemorates his service in the military and 50 lei instead of a wreath (it's better for the environment). Then there was a speach about my father's career, and as the coffin was being lowered into the grave, they shot blanks.
If I could, I would like to forget most of the last three and a half years. I want to remember my father as I knew him when I was growing up. He was the man who could lift me, Mihai and my mom up all at once. He had boundless energy and often could not sit still. He'd say (Daca stam ne sta norocul) "if we stop to sit down, our luck lays down with us". He was always reparing something, always planning something to do. When unsavoury characters would ask me for my phone number, I would give them his number, and say my father is a doctor at the military hospital. Then I'd mention they could reach me through him whenever they wanted. None of them ever called him. Even after I came home from Switzerland, when I felt threatened I mentioned my father and his career in the military. As a doctor in triage at the military hospital, he evaluated police, other military doctors and even aviation personnel. They all knew and respected him. He was known for never giving a wrong diagnosis, and for going out of his way to help when there was a problem. On their last inspection from Bucharest, the colonel inspecting the hospital mentioned he felt out of sorts. He thought his stomac was upset. My father diagnosed him with a stroke, did the EKG, and went in the ambulance with him until he got to the point where he received adequate treatment.
When my father was ill, our family doctor helped with paperwork as well as medication. My father needed the address on his ID updated every year. A person in charge would come to bring it home as a personnal favour. My father was grateful, but would also later say to me that all handicaped people should be helped with their paperwork as a norm -- not just those who had once had fancy careers -- and that the paperwork should be simplified and automated. It never was, but, perhaps, it will be some day. We had trouble finding people to help with the caretaking beyond the therapist who was retired and who came for an hour or two a day -- just not Sunday, and very few people asked how my father was doing until he was gone.
His life is perhaps best summarized in his own words. So, I am listing all his previous posts below.
Tickets to the other world
Another house, another story
Defeating Dr. Death. A house, but not a home.
Batles lost and batles won.
The most efficient prison
The Beginning and the end
A version of Snow White
The Thief who saved my life
An Opinion from near the grave
