Emotional & Spiritual Issues | Hank Dunn

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Life at Fifteen Miles an Hour

Posted May 10, 2021 by [email protected]

Last week, I whined about how having breaking news always at our fingertips has left little room to reflect on that news. This reminded me of a piece I wrote in 1993 for the newsletter at the nursing home where I worked. It was about riding my bicycle on the Outer Banks, slowing down, and discovering what I missed at sixty miles an hour.

“From the Chaplain: Life at Fifteen Miles an Hour,” July 1993

The rain started just as I set out on the first of four days of bicycling that would carry me 185 miles up and down North Carolina’s Outer Banks. I had driven my car from our rented house on the northern end to Avon — 33 bike-miles from Ocracoke at the southern terminus of the Outer Banks. Just as I was unloading my bike, the rain started.

It was 7:00 AM, and I had come too far not to ride. It was also July, so I wasn’t worried about being too cold. But, how often do I get to Cape Hatteras? If I didn’t start on that day, then my goal of riding the length of Outer Banks would be in jeopardy.

Let it go

I put on my rain gear and headed south. I fought the urge to turn around (“This is so stupid!”). Within fifteen minutes, I was soaked through and through, rain gear or not. I found I was much more comfortable being drenched than fighting to stay dry.

It was one of those “let it go” experiences. I figured I might as well give in and enjoy the scenery.

After an hour, I took off my parka and rain pants and peddled in what had become a light drizzle. By the time I reached the ferry bound for Ocracoke Island, the rain had ceased. I still had the bulk of that day’s ride ahead of me.

The distances between points on the map have a feel to them when you go by bike. Each day brought new stretches of highway. The old cottages at Nags Head and new resorts at Duck. The long distances of the Cape Hatteras National Seashore. On that day heading to Ocracoke, I got to know each village (Buxton, Frisco, Hatteras) as I passed through at fifteen miles an hour.

Are we really better going so fast?

I had vacationed several other times on these islands. But, I had never “experienced” them before like I did biking the entire length. You see and hear and feel a lot from riding a bicycle at fifteen miles an hour.

I could read historical markers that are only a blur from a car. (Did you know the first musical notes over the radio were broadcast on Cape Hatteras?) You can look pedestrians in the eye and say hello. Try that at sixty miles an hour.

What else do I miss by not slowing down?

Living in the D.C. suburbs of Northern Virginia sure makes a slower pace difficult. Are we really better because we pack so much into our days? My bike told me, “No, not necessarily.”

A REAL Newspaper — How I Miss It

Posted April 29, 2021 by [email protected]

I actually touched a REAL newspaper last week. We were staying at a hotel across the river from Washington, D.C., and they gave us a FREE Washington Post. I could smell the newsprint and ink. My fingers started to take on an inky hue. I miss that feel and smell.

Hank’s father, Hampton Dunn (R), looks over his AAA newspaper as it is being printed

I grew up in a newspaper family. My father, Hampton Dunn, referred to himself as “only a newspaper guy.” He dropped out of college because he got his dream job as a reporter for the Tampa Daily Times, Tampa’s evening paper. More on my dad in a moment.

I still read newspapers every day: My former hometown paper, The Washington Post, and The New York Times. I find it curious that sometimes, when my wife asks me what I am reading on my phone, I say, “Reading the paper.”

Paper? It’s glass and silicon and plastic — no paper in it. These newspapers are no longer limited to a “final” edition with all the news that happened overnight. Now they update events “live” in real time.

The death of the daily newspaper

Like all major cities in the 1950s, Tampa had a morning and evening paper, the Tampa Tribune and The Tampa Daily Times, respectively. People stopped reading the evening paper because they could get the day’s news on network television. So, the Tribune bought the Times and dad was out of work — and out of the daily newspaper business.

He eventually became public relations director for AAA in Tampa and published their monthly Florida Explorer.Although many motor clubs were going with a slick magazine format, dad insisted on his being a real newspaper — on newsprint in a tabloid format. I remember him telling me, “When people get a newspaper in their hands it just feels like you have to read it now. It is NEWS. Not so with a magazine.”

He didn’t live long enough to have a phone that effectively begs you to READ THIS NOW, THIS IS NEWS. Where once it was in the paper morning and evening, now the breaking news is constant. I miss the slower pace of news.

Are we better?

Am I better because I know news sooner? Have we lost the ability to ponder what we have read simply because there is ALWAYS something new? And what else could I be doing if I am not reading the latest on my phone? Reading a book? Praying? Meditating? Talking to my family or friends? Walking out of doors?

In 1854, Henry David Thoreau cast a critical eye on newspapers and news at the post office. He wrote, “We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn, which does not forsake us in our soundest sleep.” And further, “Our inventions are wont to be pretty toys, which distract our attention from serious things.”

Poor guy. He didn’t have an iPhone.

Looking for a Sign… Calming Amidst Grief

Posted April 14, 2021 by [email protected]

I had NEVER seen a street sign like it – “TRAFFIC CALMING AHEAD” – and I collect photos of unique street signs.

Like the one we saw driving home from the Memphis airport the other night: “THIS IS YOUR SIGN TO BUCKLE UP.” (The folks at the Department of Transportation do try to make us smile.)

Or the one I saw years ago when I was speaking in Boulder, Colorado. It was February. I went out one morning for a walk on a pedestrian path. I approached an underpass and could see some patches of ice in the shadows of the bridge.

Not to worry! This progressive, free-thinking university city put up a sign to warn me: “ICE MAY EXIST,” it read. I thought, “This is SO Boulder!”

The sign begged more questions. Ice may or may not exist, correct? Do I exist? If I do exist, how did I come into being? What is the nature of existence? What is the nature of non-being?? Goodness! I was just going out for a walk.

Obvious signs

It’s not just in Boulder that I pondered the meaning of life upon seeing a road sign. While driving home from church in Northern Virginia, I saw a sign that read, “ROUGH ROAD AHEAD.” Ya think? Here I imagined Buddhists writing the road signs with their idea that “life is suffering.”

Then there are the obvious signs. I saw a “WARNING — ALLIGATORS” sign as I put my kayak in the Hillsborough River outside Tampa. The authorities-that-be felt the need to put another sign right below: “NO SWIMMING.” Really? Who was thinking of swimming with the alligators? The people in Florida really are crazy.

I was a chaplain for a hospice in Ft. Pierce, Florida, which had a hospice house for patients to spend their last days. There were tables and benches on the grounds for patients, their families, and staff to take a break outdoors. Beside a nearby pond, there was a sign, “WARNING BEWARE OF VENOMOUS SNAKES.” Good Lord, these dying folks have enough to worry about.

Family calming ahead

The “TRAFFIC CALMING AHEAD” sign was on a quiet, tree-lined suburban street in Alexandria, Virginia. This sign was followed by one that said, “SPEED CUSHIONS AHEAD.” I’ve heard them called “speed bumps” or even “speed tables” but “cushions”?

My wife, Sally, and I were in town to attend a funeral for a friend who died after living with ALS for years. Sally had known his wife since before they were married. Over the weekend we twice visited the widow’s home — once the night before the funeral and then for a gathering afterward – and saw the signs.

As we drove to her home, the words on the sign morphed in my head to “FAMILY CALMING AHEAD.” Indeed, it was. The widow and her two college-age children welcomed mostly family into their home the night before the funeral. There was lots of hugging and laughter. The scene was repeated after the service with a larger gathering of friends, business colleagues, and more family.

The grief process can be a rough road for many, but these calming events in the first days are a good place to start the journey.

Randomness, Death, and Mystery… It’s Okay

Posted March 30, 2021 by [email protected]

Do you ever do this while reading random obituaries?

I see some person, about my age, who died of cancer. I read on and see it was lung cancer. I’m relieved. Obviously, they smoked. I don’t smoke. I won’t die.

Then, I read, a healthy person about my age dies suddenly from an undiagnosed brain aneurysm. No warning. They just drop dead. A random chance occurrence like a victim of a mass shooting at a grocery store.

We humans look for patterns — for reasons “why.” Some find comfort in the idea (*SPOILER ALERT* — not me) that God is in control of everything and sends some people a quick, unexplained death.

There are no accidents… or not?

I conducted a graveside funeral service years ago as a hospice chaplain. A woman came up to me after the service and told me her story. “A couple of years ago, my eight-year-old son was playing on the swing set in our backyard,” she started. “He jumped off the swing, fell on his head, broke his neck and died instantly. In my grief someone sent me a card that said, ‘With God there are no accidents.’”

I thought (but didn’t say), What a horrible thing to tell a grieving mother. God killed your son. Before I responded, I studied her face to see if I could catch some glimpse of how she received this message. I didn’t have to guess. She told me, “Those words have been so helpful to me.”

I was almost speechless. This woman is a complete stranger and I have no pastoral relationship with her. I would never want to take away a word that was helpful to her. I must have said something like, “I am so thankful that was helpful to you. It must have been a horrible time.”

What do I know? The card may be right.

Everything happens for a reason?

Contrast this with best-selling author Kate Bowler and her book Everything Happens for A Reason: And Other Lies I’ve Loved. The book jacket describes her situation:

“At thirty-five, everything in her life seems to point toward ‘blessing.’ She is thriving in her job, married to her high school sweetheart, and loves life with her newborn son. Then she is diagnosed with stage IV colon cancer.”

Bowler is an academic who has studied the “prosperity gospel.” That would be the megachurch televangelists who teach that if you just believe hard enough (and make a contribution) only good things will come your way. In her research, she saw the downside of this belief is that when you’re thrown life’s random tragedies you are left feeling like a loser.

Do yourself a favor and watch her TED talk on YouTube. Over six million people have viewed this 15-minutes of wisdom. She has learned to live with mystery… with randomness… with not having a “reason.” And it is okay.

“Find in Yourself What You Criticize in Another”

Posted March 8, 2021 by [email protected]

Picture yourself at a restaurant with family and friends. The server places plates of delicious-looking food in front of everyone. Then one of your table companions says, “WAIT, WAIT, NOBODY EAT. I HAVE TO TAKE PICTURES.”

Then she takes out her phone, photographs each plate, and posts them to Instagram and/or Facebook.

When this happens to me, I think, “Oh my god! Can we just eat? Who cares what we are eating??”

The curse of social media: Every event is a photo op

Three years ago, we were living in Florida and my daughter was home on break. Out of the blue she says, “Hey. Let’s go for a walk on the beach.” I was so flattered that my college-aged kid would want to spend time with me. And as a bonus, I could get in a little cardio.

So, we drive over to Jupiter Island, park the car in the parking lot, and start walking north away from the crowds. After about a hundred yards she hands me her phone and asks, “Would you take my picture?”

Sure. No problem.

After about ten shots I hand her the phone. She looks at the photos and says, “Take some with more beach in the background.”

I do. Hand her the phone. She looks at them and says, “Maybe you should stand farther back.”

I do. My cardio op has now become my daughter’s photo op.

Photo ops in the swamp

In December, I posted a blog about my love of paddling in swamps. I really do love swamps. I was disappointed in my last trip to the Chakchiuma Swamp in nearby Grenada, Mississippi. This was back in the fall and we had gone through a dry spell. I could only access a small portion of the swamp for lack of water.

For a couple of months, I have been looking for several days of rain followed by a sunny morning. Last Wednesday was the day even though it was to be 32 degrees at my preferred launch time of sunrise.

It was all I had hoped for. Still water. The rising sun struggling to penetrate the fog. Quiet.

I had been thinking of a video I could make while paddling in this idyllic setting. I have been trying to increase my own social media presence by posting short videos on YouTube and Facebook. My plan was to condense that blog post by recording myself sharing my thoughts while paddling. So, I set up my tripod and mounted my phone.

I shot a video. And another. And another. And many more takes saying pretty much the same thing each time. Most were two minutes, but I shot five that were less than a minute so I could post one on Instagram. I shot seventeen videos in one hour and twenty-five minutes. I added up the times of each video and it came to a total twenty-seven minutes.

My many selves

Almost fifty years ago I was encouraged by an exercise in a book to discover my dark side, to look at my life and “Find in yourself what you criticize in another.”*

Bingo! I turned a wonderful time in the swamp into a photo op.

*From Our Many Selves: A Handbook of Self-Discovery by Elizabeth O’Connor, 1971. I wrote a previous blog about Elizabeth and the influence she had on my life.

My Birthday, Life Expectancy, and Regret Lists

Posted February 24, 2021 by [email protected]

“The death of one man is a tragedy. The death of millions is a statistic.” ―Joseph Stalin

NEWS ITEM: “Life expectancy in the United States fell by a full year during the first half of 2020 [to 77.8 years], a staggering decline that reflects the toll of the COVID-19 pandemic as well as a rise in deaths from drug overdoses, heart attacks and diseases that accompanied the outbreak…” Washington Post, February 17, 2021

“The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labor and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away.” ―Psalm 90:10

NEWS ITEM: Last week, Hank Dunn celebrated his birthday on Zoom with his family in Colorado, Virginia, North Carolina, and Mississippi. His age is north of the biblical “threescore and ten” and south of “fourscore.”

I tend to take life expectancy tables personally.

Here’s a sobering statistic — of every 100,000 people born in my birth year, only 73,246 are still living. CDC report “United States Life Tables.”

But wait…there’s more! Of those my age, our life expectancy is now about 14 years. That means in 14 years half of those my age who were alive in 2021 will be dead. So, it’s 50-50 I will make it to 2035.

Me with my sister, Janice, and my brother Dennis, 2017. Two weeks after this photo was taken, Dennis died on my birthday.

And looking at the stats closer to home is just as sobering. Of the six people in my family of origin (me, my parents, two brothers, and a sister) only two of us are still living. I hate to agree with Stalin. But the fact that 26,754 out of 100,000 people in my cohort are now dead is a statistic to me. But when my 64-year-old brother, Dennis, died on my birthday in 2017 — that was a tragedy.

Passing 70 and living under the threat that I could die abruptly from COVID-19 has gotten me thinking about legacy. What do I want to leave emotionally and spiritually to my children and grandchildren? And what about all this stuff I have written — some of it quite personal and self-revealing?

“Depend upon it, sir, when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.” ―Samuel Johnson (d. 1784)

I have said to myself what I tell patients with a terminal diagnosis, “Keep your regret list short.” If I were to die, are there things I would have regretted leaving undone? Gathering my personal writings like a memoir has been on my list. Thinking about my own death is not depressing to me. In this moment of time, while I am healthy, I agree with Samuel Johnson — thinking about my death concentrates my mind wonderfully.

I have been organizing things I have written over the last 45 years or so, and they are legion. I have printed out almost 700 pages and gathered them in two-inch thick binders. In these pages I can trace my spiritual growth (or lack thereof) over those years. I wrote about family tragedies, joys, and hurts I sustained.

Do I expect all my children and grandchildren to read all this stuff? Hardly. I would rather make it available and they never be read than someday one of them wonder what my thoughts were about a family event and not have my spin on it.

Keep your regret list short.

Check.

Human Kindness is Overflowing

Posted February 18, 2021 by [email protected]

When I saw it, I felt in my heart, “Isn’t that a wonderfully kind thing to do?”

It was our last hour at the beach, so my daughter Katie and I decided to walk down the sand one more time. Some very generous friends let us stay in their condo about a half mile from the beach at Marco Island on Florida’s Gulf Coast.

As we headed north, walking next to the water, I noticed a stick in the sand holding up some car keys. Obviously, someone had lost the keys. Also, obviously, someone else had found them and took the time to find a stick to sink into the sand so the keys would be on display for any passerby to see.

Katie and I continued our walk enjoying the birds, people, sand, and sun. She picked up a live starfish she found in a pool of water and returned it to the sea.

On our way back, heading south, we came upon the stick in the sand and the car keys were gone. When we got up next to the stick we saw, in large letters written in the sand, a very simple, “THANK YOU.”

Isn’t that a wonderfully kind thing to do? Kind of the person who found the keys and took the time to display them — and kind of the owner of the keys to write, “Thank you.”

Immediately, I thought of a line from a Randy Newman song, “I Think It’s Going to Rain Today”:

“Human kindness is overflowing, and I think it’s going to rain today.”

I think I first heard that song sung by Judy Collins on her 1966 album, In My Life. Bette Midler also sang it on the soundtrack for the movie, Beaches.

“Wait a minute,” I thought. Sure, it was kind act…but it was a kind act that served a very first-world problem. I didn’t notice the make of the car keys, but in this part of Florida luxury cars are common. Who knows, they could have been to a Ford Pinto. (But probably not.)

Regardless, someone had the means to have a car and the leisure time to hang out at the beach. Someone else also had the leisure time to rescue the keys. And here I was, lucky enough to have the leisure time to take note of all of this.

Photo I took of a sunset on Marco Island

I couldn’t help but think of this past year and the strain the pandemic has put on our kindness to one another. The keys on the beach proved that kindness is still out there, but what about the folks who don’t have a car right now? The folks who can’t drive to get a COVID vaccine? Or those who can’t pay their bills, let alone have leisure time at the beach? What about all of the families with children struggling with school during the pandemic? Those who have lost loved ones?

The list of those who could use a little kindness is endless.

I looked up the lyrics to Newman’s song and had totally forgotten that several of his lines were a call to care for those in need. Get this:

“Bright before me the signs implore me

“To help the needy and show them the way

“Human kindness is overflowing

“And I think it’s going to rain today…”

So, yes, let’s return the keys to our first-world friends. But then let’s extend the kindness beyond.

Signs of Hope Amid COVID

Posted February 10, 2021 by [email protected]

When will our lives get back to “normal?” Is there hope this will ever happen?

I had cable news on the other day and saw this in the crawl at the bottom of the screen: “For the first time, vaccinations outnumber new hospitalizations 10 to 1.”

I took that as a very hopeful sign.

Think about it. Each time a person goes into the hospital with COVID-19, ten more just got a vaccination. And right now, those getting the shots, are the ones most likely to end up in the hospital if they were to get infected — the elderly and those with pre-existing conditions.

I must say, just seeing that crawl lifted my spirits slightly.

And then, there was the day I got my first dose of the Pfizer vaccine. (Yes, I qualified.) I got in the line of cars, filled out paperwork, inched the car along until it was my turn, received my shot from a National Guard member in fatigues, and joined the wait line for observation. My fifteen minutes were up, and I was on my way home.

My spirits lifted a little more.

Zoom brought out his feelings like nothing else

Laura Fraser (in San Francisco) and her 92-year-old father, Dr. Charles Fraser (in Denver) pose for a portrait via Zoom (Carolyn Van Houten/The Washington Post)

Stories continue to be told about the good that has come out of the pandemic. Just the other day the Washington Post ran a great piece about how Zoom has changed a family’s life. Laura Fraser writes about her 92-year-old father, Dr. Charles Fraser, a former physician living in a retirement facility with limited visitation.

Between his flip phone and clunky old computer, Dr. Fraser did not have the capacity to participate in an online chat. So, Laura writes:

“My husband and I bought a cheap laptop, loaded it with his email account, photos, Zoom and a password written in indelible ink on the keyboard, and mailed it off. After many tries, voilà! There he was on Zoom, with his crooked nose from the time a horse kicked him, and the familiar warm brown eyes. I hadn’t been sure I would see that face again, and I teared up.

“That’s all there is to it?” Dad asked. My sisters and their kids dialed in, and Dad held a smile so long I thought his computer had frozen.”

“Before he signs off, he tells us he loves us.”

Laura’s dad had never been one to talk about his feelings, his childhood, how he felt about his children, or even how much he missed his wife, now gone ten years. On Zoom he has opened up for the first time. She ends her hope-filled story with this:

“A few weeks ago, over Zoom, Dad was able to see his great-granddaughter for the first time. He was delighted to learn that my nephew and his wife have named her after my mother, Virginia. ‘I just can’t wait to hug her,’ he says. His mood has lifted. He laughs as little Ginny burbles and coos. He does something else that’s new for him. Before he signs off, he tells us he loves us.”

Another little sign of hope in a time that needs so much.

Coming to Terms with the Loss of Control

Posted January 30, 2021 by kbrachle

Citibank… “Personal Loan — Take Control of Your Debt.”
ACP brochure from Rochester, NY… “Advance Care Planning — Know your choices, share your wishes: Maintain control…”
Sears MasterCard… “Take control of your finances.”
SunTrust Bank… “Stay in control — transfer money where you need it, when you need it.”
National Car Rental… “Take Control. Join the Emerald Club Today.”
TSA PreCheck… “Take Control of Your Travel.”
VW… “A new Volkswagen means a new adventure: Take Control.”

Do you see a common theme in these ads?

Advertising professionals hook us by using the word “control” all the time. They know how important it is to us. We spend our lifetimes trying to gain control. Yet, when we come to the end of our lives, we must let go of so much control. When I speak at events, I always leave this topic for last — “Coming to terms with the loss of control.”

My favorite quotes on letting go of control at the end of life

Elaine M. Prevallet, S.L., “Borne in Courage and Love: Reflections on Letting Go,” Weavings, March/April, 1997

“The idol of control holds out to us the hope that suffering and death can be eliminated. If we just get smart enough, we will gain control of pain and even of death. That false hope, in turn, has the effect of setting suffering up as an enemy to be avoided at all costs. We can choose never to suffer!”

Daniel Callahan, The Troubled Dream of Life: Living with Mortality

“Self-respect and integrity need not, and ideally ought not, to be grounded in a capacity to control our lives and mortality.… What has come to count too much is that our choices affect outcomes in the world; we are at sea when we cannot do so. Modern medicine and the modern temperament … reject solving problems of illness and death by adopting an interior stance of acceptance, choosing instead action and domination.… Our capacity to act, to do something, is cherished — something preferably affecting the outer world of nature rather than the inner world of the self.… We do ourselves a great and double harm by focusing the meaning of self-determination, and the shaping of a self, on our capacity to make external choices, to act.”

Scene from the play and movie W;t (Wit), by Margaret Edson

– VIVIAN (Terminally ill patient): I can’t figure things out. I’m in a quandary, having these … doubts.

– SUSIE (Nurse): What you’re doing is very hard.

– VIVIAN: Hard things are what I like best.

– SUSIE: It’s not the same. It’s like it’s out of control, isn’t it?

– VIVIAN (crying, in spite of herself): I’m scared.

Viktor Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning

Frankl was a psychotherapist, author, and holocaust survivor. He discovered that, even when he had lost so much control, he still had the freedom to choose his response to his situation.

“Man can preserve a vestige of spiritual freedom, of independence of mind, even in such terrible conditions of psychic and physical stress.… Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms — to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.… In the final analysis it becomes clear that the sort of person the prisoner became was the result of an inner decision, and not the result of camp influences alone.… It is this spiritual freedom — which cannot be taken away — that makes life meaningful and purposeful.”

The Serenity Prayer

“God, grant me the
“Serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the
“Courage to change the things I can and the
“Wisdom to know the difference.”

How to Get to “It Doesn’t Matter!”

Posted January 26, 2021 by [email protected]

“Pass through this brief patch of time in harmony with nature, and come to your final resting place gracefully, just as a ripened olive might drop, praising the earth that nourished it and grateful to the tree that gave it growth.” Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 4.48.2, quoted in The Daily Stoicby Ryan Holiday, p. 26

My father, Hampton Dunn, age 33, managing editor, The Tampa Daily Times

In many ways, my father’s death wasn’t particularly remarkable. His physical and mental abilities just went downhill and after four years in a nursing home — he died.

And, in many ways, his life was not so remarkable when compared to others who grew up in the Depression and fought in World War II.

Further, in many ways, his emotional and spiritual journey in his last days, months, and years were not unlike hundreds of others I had accompanied during my time as a chaplain.

I’ve been thinking about these things as I prepare for a virtual talk I will give on February 4^th on the emotional and spiritual concerns at the end of life. Last week, I listed the seven concerns I have noticed in my work and research. One of the concerns is “Gaining a sense that what is happening is okay: ‘Letting be.’”

Writing became my father’s life

Dad (right), age 49, public relations director, AAA

My father never finished college. It was 1936 in the depths of the Depression. He got his dream job as a newspaper reporter and never finished his degree. Some fifty years later he did get an honorary doctorate from his former school, the University of Tampa. Writing became his life: first at the Tampa Daily Times; then on TV in Miami; then back to Tampa as the public relations director for AAA; and finally, after retiring from his day job at age 70, he went back into TV work.

Hampton Dunn, age 73, TV personality

It was that final TV stint, doing a two-minute spot each week featuring an on-location story about Tampa history, that gave rise to my dad teaching me a lesson on how to prepare for death.

Dad developed Parkinson’s and had to give up writing, public speaking, and TV. He could no longer type or turn the page in a book to do research. He eventually needed assistance for all activities and a nursing home was the only answer.

A moment of insight… and acceptance

Me with Dad, age 82, nursing home resident

One day we picked up dad at the nursing home to go out for a drive. I was driving. My father was in the passenger seat. My mother and nephew were in the back seat. We got stuck at a traffic light in the dense suburbs of North Tampa. Across the intersection, on the far corner, stood an abandoned forest lookout tower. The forests are long gone, and the tower is now a historic site. From the back seat, Mom said, “Your father did a TV spot at this corner.”

Dad corrected her, “I did several!”

Still stuck at the light, I thought I could pass the time, so I asked, “When was that tower last used as a fire tower?”

Dad started thinking. That date was locked in his brain somewhere but the damage from Parkinson’s and strokes prevented him from finding it. Knowledge of history was so important to my father. He had written eighteen books on Florida history and now he could not remember a date.

Slowly he turned to me and with a big grin on his face he said, “It doesn’t matter!” He had gotten to the point of “gaining a sense that what is happening is okay.” Others have characterized this as “acceptance.”

My dad never looked forward to his decline, but when it came, so much else didn’t matter. It was “okay” in the sense that the vast majority of humanity follows this same path of decline toward the end and now he had accepted it, too.