Thursday, September 10, 2009

I never thought it was possible to hold your breath all day and still be breathing until this moment. The nurse just came in and told us that my father’s quadruple heart bypass surgery went great, they were closing him up, and the surgeon would be out in about an hour to speak with us. It was amazing. You could almost hear this huge collective sigh from everyone in the room. All day, since the moment we hugged him and watched as they wheeled him into the area we were not allowed to enter, we had been trying to keep ourselves busy. A walk around Chinatown, through the open markets, even to an art exhibit, we laughed and talked, and contemplated, but the whole time there was a heaviness in the air, a timer attached to our smiles, and a faraway look in our eyes that never went very far. We had all been ‘holding our breath’.

My Daddy made it through surgery, his heart is beating all on its own, and these last six hours have changed one year into who knows how many. I want to find the tallest building, stand on the roof top, and shout it to the world! Instead I hug my Mom, hug my brother, and then venture out into the streets to find a pizza place so I can bring back something for us to eat while we wait for the surgeon. I said “Hi” to everyone I passed, they looked at me strange, like I should be pushing a shopping cart filled to the brim with my worldly possessions, and you know what? I didn’t care!