uncommons

Just when all appears well, a floor drops out. Early Wednesday morning I received a frantic call from my Dad. He was in the hospital, slurring his speech, seemingly dazed and scared. He suffered a heart attack a few hours earlier in the morning and was being prepped for heart surgery following a transport from the local Lenoir City medical clinic to the more advanced Park West hospital in Knoxville, Tennessee.

Now, Dad is usually stubborn, shrugging off problems the same way he would swat at a gnat. Not this time — he was scared, and there was a foreboding feeling of uncertainty surrounding the circumstances. Coworkers John White and Robert Cohen, who overheard me in the newsroom field the call from the hospital, saw the reaction on my face and instinctively pushed me out the door. The Post’s current photo intern, Adam Wisnecki, picked up my building construction assignment.

Karla took the drive to Tennessee with me. At times we were quiet, worried, mildly irritated at drivers who wouldn’t leave the left lane, anxious to hit the hospital following the seven and a half hour drive. Dad went into surgery. The phone calls went silent.

Somewhere Silent in Kentucky, I-24, Kentucky

Finally, the phone rang. Thank goodness Sprint wired this highway – it wasn’t like that the last drive through. Dad was on the other end. The angioplasty was successful, there was no major blockage in his arteries.

Turns out he suffered a heart attack from a severe reaction to a combination of medications prescribed by the combination of doctors that keep watch over his blood pressure, emphysema, pain, and breathing difficulties. My old best friend from high school, Brian Rapp, now Dr. Brian Rapp in Indianapolis, used to passionately complain to me about overmedication and the potential hazards of too many drugs in a system. He said it could kill people. Well, it appears that he may be right. Somehow, the perfect storm of drugs sent my father into cardiac arrest. Damn.

We spent a few nights in the local Holiday Inn Express. The front desk clerk, Helen, asked about Dad everytime we walked through the doors. He’s better, I said. Still dizzy, slow-moving, tired…tired. Karla and I took his dogs out for a walk at the lake on my birthday. Dad went with and followed slowly behind. His wife Florence kept a careful watch over him.

Dad in the driveway, Lenoir City, Tennesse

The next day Dad’s stubborness crept back – a sign of recovery. He kept pushing his Nikon D70 (that he got used for a great deal from KEH he said) on me. Take it, he said. I don’t have the breath to walk around and shoot anymore. I kept refusing. I have staff gear, you know, the Canons and what not. Well, but do you have your own personal digital camera anymore? No, I sold it — the D200, remember? Well then, you need it, and he puts it in my hands. Then he opens a junk drawer in the night dresser, and hands me a Nikon F3, a N90s, a N80, a F4, and a a Sekonic light meter from the seventies. Good mercy, what am I going to do with all that film gear. I hardly even shoot film anymore, and when I do it’s slide through my M6. Well, it’s easier to take part of it. The F4 crashed in a hurricane (Francis,) so it’s now holding up his books. The N80 still awaits film. He’s happy that most of the gear has a new home. Ironically, I gave him the F3, the F4, and one F5 that I bought from the Palm Beach Post for a hundred and fifty dollars. He thinks the inscription, “Palm Beach Post,” scribed in the F5 with a dremel tool, is the coolest thing. The camera I would never have thought of ever buying — the Nikon D70 — is now my favorite personal camera. Combine that with my 17-35mm Nikkor and it’s by far a great combination — I love that camera because he gave it to me.  Looks like I won’t have to worry about breaking a staff camera on a personal trip.

While driving along Indian River Drive in Port St. Lucie last week, we thought about the move to Missouri and all the reasons that we continue to take it on the chin with the house in Florida. One reason is that one would have to be a fool to pass up the opportunity to learn under Robert Cohen and the gang again at the Post, especially with all the talented new faces. Shameless plug or not, who cares, but if you’re looking for a place to work or intern, come on down to St. Louis. Things are just warming up with a great staff. The second reason is family, of course. We’re close to family and we can take care of our families. Whether it’s my Mom here in St. Louis, Karla’s family here, or my Dad in Tennessee (with a hugely shorter drive than coming from West Palm Beach), family is a priority in life. The fragility of everything carries such a slim margin. Things could have been so much worse with Dad, and I’m extremely thankful to be closer in physical proximity so that these visits and drives are much shorter and insanely easier. It feels arrogant to say that this feeling — a feeling of the necessity of family — is a feeling grown from maturity. Yet, when it comes down to matters of life or death, it’s the people that you care about that makes this small world of ours such a beautiful place to live. The stories – whether we tell them for work or for personal reasons — are the threads that forms the quilt of life. This fragility, so fragile, so incomparably human.

An old colleague — if I could even call him that because I completely and with shame forgot about him, died. His name was Phil Kavanaugh, and he was basically a comic with a huge heart for education and learning. Alex Boerner reminded me of his passing, and it was saddening on many levels. The threads of his last few days, the last story of Phil Kavanaugh, was aptly photographed by Deborah Silver. It’s worth a look to appreciate the fragility of the body and soul. It faintly reminds me of the life and death series by German photographer Walter Schels and his partner Beate Lakotta published in the Guardian.