THIS WAS SCANNED IN WITH OCR SOFTWARE AND CONTAINS MANY MISSPELLINGS AND
STUFF. I'M IN THE PROCESS OF FIXING IT NOW
Do you know how to get out of this place?" His eyes are fixed, his gait
a shuffle, and he's asked me the same question twice. He's wandering up and
down the hall in pajamas, bobbing in and out of patients' rooms. He doesn't
know he's in a locked psychiatric ward in Chandler, Arizona, or why, and I'm
wondering that myself. He looks harmless enough. Pushing against the door;
he sets off the alarm again.
I wish I could set him free, along with my father; who'>i nol h~s2lne,
justa viclim ol slroLc who koops longing out loud lor "Ihc happy hunling gl
ound." In this cullure, dcalh-wishillg just won't wash. So the doctors pul
him herc and signed hin1 up for "Group," hoping to coax him hlto scntiments
mole fitting of an elde~: rl'bey don't want to hcar thc trutll, th2lt my fatller
wants to die, thollgll it makes perfcct sense to mc. Hc can't walk, read,
or write, and it's not going to get any better thun this. I might wish it
over too.
In Group the attitude police ask, "~;Vhat is onc thing you'd like to accomplisll
today?" Whcn his turn comes, my father answers, "I'd like to find a way to
gc~t out of Group." Hc may have lost his mobility and zest for life, but he
sure hasn't lost his edge. And he's still handsome, r egal even, with his
hawklike face and silvcry hail: Two of the women have fallen for him. J'hcy
call him "Professor" and say they'd like to take him home. So would 1, but
it's too late for that. I'd never get him on a plane, and he was too stubborn
to Icave his home for mine in New ()rleans when he had the chance. 'I'he
insurance has him covered herc wllile we find an assisted-living home, so
wc'rc making thc best of it, playing it l'or lauglls.
"Come on, Datl, Ict's go pl2ly the llUthullse olgan," says my brothc'; Tom,
for all to hetu: We wheel him down thc h2tll and help hUli play thc standards
wc gre\v up hettl ing oll thc old piano my mother told llS WtlS thc first
piece of furnitule lhey ever owned. His fingers are locked
into almost-claws, so my brother pulls the hlne out for'him, a whiny organ
version of "Willow, Weep for Me." My fathe1 used to play that stmg in long,
stridc strokes with the pedals pumping and his voice off-key above the melody
To the last, plaintive, "Weep for Me," he'd add a final touch, "Dlrty, old
me," with thu "me" drawn out until the last notes encled. I smile, r emembel
ing all that now.
Tom has launclled into his J2lck Nicholson routine, clcatl-on 2tntl de2ltlly
h1 this "CuLkoo's Nesl": "You g~'ys do nothing but complah1 about how you
can't stand il in this place, antl then you haven't got thc guls to walk out.
Wh2lt'tl you thillk you arc`, fol Christ's sake, crazy or sometlling? Well,
you'lc not. You're no crazicl than thc avcrtlgc assholc out wallcing armnld
on the slrecl." kIy father misses the allusion. He's lost much of what he
once knew, birds, for examplc, his life-list washed from memory, or names,
detached IIOW from the stream of faces—students and colleagues—that used
to crowd around our table whele the stolies and thc wine would flow. "Tonight,
we live," my father would say, lifting his glass.
Now we ask if hc can eat in the lounge with us, a feeble stab at festivity.
But he's not hungly hasn't bcen for months. I cut up his meat and coax him
to eat, "just a bile ol breatl, a taste of pie," I say—then r ealize I'm doing
it too, steering him toward life, against the current of his O\VII desires.
And what gives me the right'? Or Tom, wllo's selling Life, in Nicholson's
lines, whenevel there's a pause? "Yoll're just 21 ym~ng kid. What're you doing
here? You ought to be Ollt in a convel lible, bird-dogging ehicks." NVe'rc
only holJing thal thc stall is rigllt—th2lt hc's just deprcssetl—antl wherc's
the harm hl lhat'' 13ut 1 know bettcl; know hc's dyhlg antl l'vc lailetl
him when the ehips arc down, latched onto hopc, when I could havc stood square
and looked it in the face, thc way hc~ taught me to.
One night at Lake Itasca, Minnesota, where we spent our SUmmerS in thc sixtics,
a bal gol into my i'oom. It swoo,ued dowll over my bed and then my siste,'s.
We shrieked. Then it disappeared, having navigated through the wide log cracks
and ended up in my brothels' room where they set at it witl1 cries and pillows.
My father tad a class in the morning, an all-day biology lab, and was having
trouble sleeping. He e amc roaring up the stairs, tulned on thc light, grabbed
the bat burehantlcd and threw it out into the nighl, then scolded us for our
panic.
A few years earlier, in the desert, wc had found a tar.lntula and, at his
coaxing, had let it walk ovel our hands. Hc promisetl us it wm~ldn't bitc.
Thc nightmal e disal metl becaille a gentlc touch of p2ltldetl 1oel. 13ul
b`~Ls antl spitlers ure O,lC thing, dealil quile another. My datl's Ihe only
one who isn't flinc hing now.
Tom's still al il: "That Nursc Ratched, man. She ain't honest. Shc likcs
a rigged gamc, you know wh2lt I mean?" And he's put his finger on it therc.
At thc eleventh hom; the rl,les .rll change. I''or 81 years ,ny f2llher pl2lyetl
iL fast and loose, pUI suing happiness as he saw fit, eccentric and ir r everent.
He never lied to us about the Easter Bunny, Santa Claus, or (Iod, and the
desert landscape backed him up, brooking no illusions. I was wcaned from
the breast directly to the cup, the bottle but another crutch wc weren't aHowed,
like those consoling tictions. But here my fathcl's options shlink. He can't
call a shade a shade, much less embrace one.
It's Sunday and I've got to go, be back at wolk on Monday. I kiss him goodbye
and tell hi,ll I'H retuln. But I know hctll be gonc. He has that look around
the mouth, his tceth too big no\v, getting in the way of words. It' I couLl
make one wish for hh1l, I'd \Nish him de2tth, a speedy by-pass of indignity
and p2lin. But I know \vherc wishes Icad, cspeeially this onc, a thousand
miles from ()regon. [~~`n'nO\V, lhorc's no one to guide US out ~o[ this plum``
und, in my fatller's C`21SC, a pcn2tlly jusl 1~n asking. fi
