graceland's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Aisle Regret Things have been hot and hectic, with me traveling home one day last week to drive my Dad to his appointments. I spent the rest of the week working the extra hours to cover the day I'd be out, returned back to work Friday and then turned around and headed back home. There was some fun mixed in there. My Dad seems much more relaxed now that the whole family knows he's sick; I imagine it must be a big relief to not have to carry that knowledge alone. My parents house is like a pharmacy. The bay window is a few rows thick with bottles of pills. I made a crack about it being a pharmacy and my Dad noted that most of those pills are my mothers. "Except for this one, Oxycontin," he laughed. "I got that after my hand surgery a couple of years ago. Never took them," he said. "Good God," I commented. "I don't even think that's prescribed anymore. I think it's blackboxed." "What do you think I could get on street for these," he asked. "I have no idea," I said. I sensed a trap here. Plus I'm not a pill popper. And if I were, I certainly wouldn't buy them off the street. He wouldn't let it go. He brought it up again at dinner. "How about those Oxycontin's, what do they go for these days." "No idea," I said blankly. "C'mon. What do you think?" "I would guess it depends on what part of the country you are in. Portland, ME and OR were big on Oxy but it's been so limited for a while now, I have no idea what the market would be for them. I don't know if there's a demand anymore. Those users probably moved onto Meth." I thought that would satisify him, but he couldn't let it go. He wanted an answer that he believed I had. It was a test. "So how much?" he asked again. *sigh* I chewed my food and said, "I don't know. $30 a pill, maybe as high as $50 in poor areas." He leaned back in his seat and relaxed. He'd gotten what he wanted. I assume that's laying the foundation to ensure that someone (eg - me) is going to come through with some medical maryjane for him in the event that he has to get chemo. So I answered his questions. Just to indicate I'm here for him. He seemed pleased with the response. Let's just hope there is no chemo needed. The Peter Jennings news is a blow to us all. He was our family's news source for my life. Every night we ate dinner with Peter Jennings. We discussed if he was being arrogant in delivery or simply Canadian. Later we decided he was simply worldly. Even later, we watched as he was one of the few anchors able to report without bias and as we saw during the terrorism attacks in 2001, he was a strong intellectual who was able to look at the nation and somehow calmly deliver news to the world that our eyes understood but our mouths could not speak. He shouldered that burden for us; he said what we could not. In doing so, he removed himself from who he was personally and how he felt about it, to explain what was happening to a world removed from the horror. Somehow, all of this, he did inimicably, with more than a splash of grace and with a hint of compassion. He very much reminded me of my Father. Just 5 months shy in years to my Father, he announced his lung cancer just a few weeks before my father would have been diagnosed. I couldn't help but think of his 25-year old daughter, who won't have a Father to walk her down the aisle someday when she gets married. I couldn't help but relate the parallel to myself. That will be my biggest regret; my biggest failure in my mind if that happens. So, the Peter Jennings news is definitely a chink in my confidence for my Dad. I'm working pretty hard at keeping my hopes very high, but it shook me. It shook me more than it should have. Everything's a little bit shaky for me right now. 10:13 p.m. - 2005-08-08 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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