12-14-08 Gift Power

This week notice the early gifts that your might be receiving from your family and friends for the Holiday season. Below, is a short story on my early gift from my father.

My Early Christmas Gift

This past weekend my mother was invited to a Neil Diamond concert by my sister and her friends. Early Friday morning my mother was so excited to be on her own and having fun with her long time friends from North Carolina that she drove herself to the airport and left me in charge of my father who is experiencing midlevel Alzheimer’s.

Initially I was concerned that I would not be able to play my weekend golf game and enjoy what I love to do, yet I ended up creating just that. It all began on Friday evening when I chose to cook dinner together with my father instead of taking him out. That is when I realized that I had not been alone with my dad perhaps since the day that I was born 57 years ago. He was always with my mother or with one or more of my six brothers and five sisters.

I had shopped for cold shrimp, two big steaks, organic salad and avocados. At home we had left over spaghetti, chocolate ice cream and of course we would have a bottle of Spanish red wine and “Cuban” cigars for post-dinner relaxation.

When I told him my plans, he was fired up. My dad always loved to cook, eat, drink wine and smoke cigars with his friends and family. Every 15 minutes, from the time we started barbecuing the steaks, he asked where my mother was. I patiently told him that mom had flown to North Carolina to go to a concert with Ana and Carol.

He kept repeating "all the way to North Carolina" and he looked at me with a little concern in his face. As he did this, I diverted his attention to the task at hand asking him to eat his shrimp or take a sip of the wonderful wine that we were sharing.

After enjoying dinner, discussing what was happening in the world, and my dad inquiring several times where my mother was, we decided to go sit on the porch and end the evening by smoking his cigars on a cool Miami night.

I chose a 4-inch La Gloria Cubana and he had a 7-inch Romeo y Julieta. As we lit the cigars, I became present to the fact that I seldom made time for my dad or anybody else in the family. So I put my whole attention on my dad for the rest of the night.

I did not have to say anything. I just listened and answered all his questions. The conversation was simple and to the point. He observed and commented on all the Christmas angels, pillows, plates that my mother had placed throughout the room.

As he talked and observed, I would notice his eyes and the way he enjoyed his cigar. I pointed out to him how present he was to the moment and how he was enjoying himself. He told me that was the only thing that mattered because he had a hard time remembering.

He also noticed how my cigar was burning faster than his. I let him know that my cigar was 3 inches smaller but proportionally we had smoked the same. He said it made sense and since he had a bigger cigar he would end up smoking a little longer than me.

Then he heard far away sirens and said "there goes an ambulance." I realized that he was being present to all the sounds and objects around him, but no interior thoughts.

Then as we finished the cigars, I became present to his greatness and felt that I was talking to an enlightened being. I sensed that he was in a state of quietness and fulfillment of everything he had experienced in his life.

Here I was for the first time really experiencing my father, while he was enjoying himself with what he loved to do. So I asked him, is there anything better than this? He simply said "no, it's just life."

Then he looked at me, took his last sip of wine and holding his cigar he continued … "life is very simple it comes to you and you have to be ready to live it and I am living it."

I just closed my eyes and experienced the joy of being aware and present to this moment and the feeling of being ok with 57 years of missed opportunities with my father, because this experience was the best Christmas present ever.