Every New Beginning’s End

Despite my optimism that 2011 would be a better year, and outlined how I thought I could make it better by making specific decisions on how I could do that, on January 5th, barely just a few days into the new year, I was kicked straight into a tailspin with a phone call from my sister at 9:30 p.m.

“The doctor just called Mom,” she said. “They’re saying Jason took a turn for the worse – it could be a matter of minutes.”

I had fallen down my back steps that morning. It was a foggy, slick, kind of icy morning, and I took the steps too fast, slipping on the rubber mat at the bottom and landing practically under my car, going down hard on my right knee and elbow. I’d managed to make it into work and through the work day, biting down hard on extra-strength, rapid-relief Tylenols like they were delicious candy.

By the end of the day, I was still in a fair bit of pain, and I knew that I would have to lie down. So when I got home, I did just that, thinking – Jason is in the hospital and I will see him tomorrow. My sister came by briefly to pick up something I had borrowed from her and told me that when she and my mom had been to the hospital that afternoon, he was doing good – better and lucid.

Jason had been admitted to the hospital on Monday with low blood oxygen. I had the day off from work, so I went to bring my mom some dinner when she called in the afternoon to say we couldn’t go to Costco that day like we had planned. Knowing how to circumvent Kaiser’s rather lax security procedures, I made my way past those into the ER and gave my mom a burrito and saw Jason.

I was there for awhile, and he was being crotchety, which was to be expected. At one point he noticed I was there, and said to me, “Hey, Babe! Weren’t you laid off?”

I responded with a “Uh, yeah, but I found a new job awhile ago,” and that was that. Due to lack of oxygen in his blood he was a little loopy but otherwise coherent.

The next day I went by to see him again, but they had put a full face mask of oxygen on him and he was sleeping, so I didn’t stay long. Then on Wednesday I fell down the back steps and went home after work to lie down, instead of the hospital, which was only a few minutes away from my work.

And then the call came. I had been dozing in front of the TV, my knee aching.

My stomach churning, my heart racing, I grabbed a jacket and ran. With a clarity I rarely see, I headed straight to the hospital; it only took me ten minutes on the freeway.

I was the first one there. And it was too late. He lay there quietly. The doctor said they thought a “catastrophic event” had taken him, a heart attack or something like that.

To say that I miss Jason is the understatement of the year. He was my grandfather, but he was also so much more than that – he was my friend, and he was always there for me and my family no matter what. He let me live with him twice. There will be a hole in my heart for him for the rest of my life.

I love you Jason.