Richard Corey....

Emotions have been running high, constantly changing and leaving me exhausted.  My family has been in crisis mode since Wednesday.  That is a long time to be on edge.  Our house seems to have a revolving door for the mass congregation of family that has cloistered under our roof.  It is leaving me with the excitment of being around them, I do honestly enjoy spending time with my extended intimate family, but then the reason for the sudden influx of family surfaces in my mind.  It happens suddenly, the catalysts being a look in his eyes, a quiver in a voice, or a seemlying innocent comment on his part.  

The thing is, I get it.  I completely understand.  the all consuming pain, feeling like there is not way out of a sinking hole.  But I will never forget the shake in my knees as we rode to his house.  My voice was lost in my throat as my feet took me to the door behind my dad.  What will I find in there?  I wanted to turn and run, to hide behind my father and let him deal with it.  I felt like a little girl, wanting her father to protect me from the pain that might be lurking inside.  I could not handle what might have been behind that door.  But there he was, blood still pumping, watching Star Trek.  My heart stopped, I just followed my dad's lead, sat across from his cluttered dinner room table.  I could not look at him, I knew that I would see death staring back at me.  I would see a blank stare where hope was gone.  And I could not handle that.

I love him, and although mom says I have the patient of a saint, it comes reletively easy with him.  And to she him that weak, that... helpless, it shook me.  Body racking sobs from a grown man.