The sunshine spilled over Knoxville like it does on many a May afternoon.  The earth hadn’t tilted quite far enough to create those hot, hazy Knoxville summer days.  It was just warm enough.

My father was dying.

A lifetime ago, an evangelist preaching in Knoxville explained the Gospel and then baptized several new believers in either a creek or the river, I’m not sure.  My grandmother did say that a couple of my dad’s brothers were baptized with him, along with the other people.   The name of the preacher is lost to time.  And I only have my grandmother’s brief diary entry to mark the beginning of my father’s Christian faith.

He had fought “the good fight” against a cancer that started in that walnut-sized prostate gland.  Bill Foulk was a relatively young man when the cancer was discovered.  That might have worked against him as his body reacted to the hormonal changes caused by the ravaging cells.  They migrated to his bones…and father and father until his body could not take the strain.

Quietly, William Foulk died.

Quietly.  Peacefully.

Several days before his death, something remarkable, unexplainable happened.

I left work and drove straight to the hospital to be with my father.  He wanted company, but not conversation.  After a couple of scary hospital stays of my own, I understand his desire a little more.  I would sit quietly in one of those big chairs beside his bed.  When Daddy needed anything, I would be there.  Sometimes it was just an adjustment to his bed or his pillow.  Other times, he might want something else.  I remember one time when he told me he thought some lime sherbet ice cream would taste good.  I found myself walking through the bowels of the hospital kitchen, and thanks to a compassionate worker, my dad got the ice cream he wanted.

But this story is about something far more mystical than lime sherbet.

There was nothing on television, so it was turned off.  I was sitting quietly, making occasional small talk with my father.  Then he looked up toward the foot of the bed and asked “Sir, can I help you?”  I wasn’t quite sure I heard him right:

“What’s that daddy?”

“I was asking this man if I could help him.”

“What man?”

“That man standing right there at the foot of the bed.  Don’t you see him?”

“No.  Where?”

Daddy was starting to get a little frustrated with me.   I was becoming curious… and cautious.

“He’s standing right here at the foot of the bed.  Can’t you see him?”

My father wasn’t frightened, or agitated by the person he saw… just a little concerned that I couldn’t see him.

“No, Daddy… I don’t see him.  But you do.  What does he look like?”

My father described the man standing at the foot of his bed as a tall fellow wearing some kind of “white outfit”.  The visitor, according to my father, was wearing a white skull cap, “the kind like The Pope wears”.   I asked him if the man at the foot of the bed was saying anything.

“No, he’s just looking at me.”

A couple of days later, again one afternoon while I was sitting with my father, he told me there were two visitors.  Same clothing, and again, just looking at him.  I saw nothing.

But I don’t believe my father was hallucinating.  The entire time of his illness, there were no other encounters, no other indications that my father was anything but conscious, aware, and in control of his faculties.

So the question remains- what.. or who did my father see?

I believe there are times when there is a partial opening of the veil between this life and the next.

It could have been the Angel Of Death, keeping watch.

It could have been “The Helper” God promises to send us in times of peril, and maybe my father could see this Spirit, because he was the one who needed that help.

Nearly every night now, I read verses from The Bible he read and carefully used a ruler to underline, then highlight his special verses.

And I wonder.. Who were those visitors who silently stood at the foot of my father’s bed?

Will I see them some day?

 

Hey Mister
Where you going in such a hurry
Don’t you think it’s time you realized
There’s a whole lot more to life than work and worry
The sweetest things in life are free
And there right before your eyes

A diary entry for a forced slowdown:

The barrier of rose shrubs hid me from view this morning as I watched a very busy front yard.

Finches, wrens, cardinals and other aviators were stopping by the bird feeder.  A red-headed woodpecker made a visit to the roof, making the gutters sound like a machine gun before it moved on to more buggy opportunities.

There was a lizard who slowly crawled onto the porch, and found a spot of morning sunlight, his nose against one of the rose petals that had fallen the previous night.  I think mister.. or missus lizard was moving as slow as I was this morning.

I couldn’t figure out a crunching noise, until I looked down, through the stalks of the rose shrubbery and saw a squirrel as big as Jakey dog.  The squirrel had eyes on seeds kicked out of the feeder.  Later today, that grey bandit will be nose-down, and tail-up–eating my songbird mix.  But, hey..a squirrell’s  gotta make a livin’ too.

The pond has an early season algae bloom, and I hope the cooler weather and maybe some rain will knock it down.  But there are still the usual characters like big fish who nearly come out of the water to snare huge insects… bugs from another world…that look like genetic throwbacks that would impress my bugologist gunslinger friend Dayton Hylton. 

A heron  likes to preen in between searches for small frogs and fish in the shallows beneath some willow trees.  The other day, we scared each other as I walked around the pond.  The giant bird wasn’t expecting me, and likewise…as I heard this tremendous flapping and watched a take-off from a few feet away.   And for all their beauty, heron have a really raspy voice.

Since I’ve been home recovering from surgery, I’ve had a lot of time to watch out the front and back windows and see things like a fox on patrol for food…maybe for some young’ins.  Turkey also make regular rounds as do deer.  I always thought most wild animal activity was centered on eating and reproducing.  But it sure seemed to me some rabbits were playing as they scampered around the other evening.

There are no good or enjoyable side effects of having colon cancer surgery.  In addition to the two more obvious “cleaning outs” I received…there’s the cleaning out of rainy day savings for expenses not covered by insurance.  I suppose it’s raining.  I’m lucky to have “fall backs”… when so many people have no insurance at all, and no job, with savings spent.   That’s when trouble compounds trouble.

There is, however, something to be said for being forced… or at least made able to watch things other than the twenty-four hour news cycle.

You got to stop and smell the roses
You’ve got to count your many blessings everyday
You’re gonna find your way to heaven is a rough and rocky road
If you don’t stop and smell the roses along the way -Mac Davis

While waiting on a test today at Fort Sanders Regional Medical Center, I noticed an elderly fellow in a wheelchair sitting behind me.  I believe his son has escorted him to the hospital for some tests.  This aging fellow, in his 90s was wearing a ball cap with a U.S. Navy ship’s designation on it.

I’m really good at Naval Aviation history, and aircraft designations.  But I know nearly nothing about ship numbers, and even less on how to figure out all of those rank insignias on a Navy Uniform.

I made a mental note of the ship’s number and got to work on my smart phone and used Google to look it up.  In less than thirty seconds, I had found the ship..or boat as they call submarines.  I turned around with the image of the boat on the phone and asked  “Sir, is this your boat?”  The man’s son explained to his dad what I had done..and explained “Dad, that’s your boat.”

I could tell the older man wasn’t feeling so well, but he did say a few words about his service, and how so many young men died beneath the waves in our submarines in World War Two.  He had been the chief of his boat. That was about all he felt like saying.  But before he dropped his head again, he recalled the exact number of submarines that had been lost.  And I got the feeling there were friends in that recollection.

I thanked him for his service.

And as my pager went off signaling my turn…I left the lobby, and  wished him well in the battle he is fighting right now.

The Submariner’s Prayer- author unknown

Almighty,  Everlasting God,  the Protector of all those
who put  their trust in Thee: hear our prayers in behalf
of Thy servants who sail their vessels beneath the seas.

We beseech Thee to keep in Thy sustaining care all
who are in submarines, that they may be delivered
from the hidden dangers of the deep.

Grant them courage, and a devotion to fulfill their duties,
that they may better serve Thee and their native land.

Though acquainted with the depths of the ocean,
deliver them from the depths of despair and the
dark hours of the absence of friendliness and grant
them a good ship’s spirit.

Bless all their kindred and loved ones from whom they are separated.

When they surface their ships, may they praise Thee for
Thou art there as well as in the deep.

Fill them with Thy Spirit that they may be sure in their reckonings,
unwavering in duty, high in purpose, and upholding the honor
of their nation.

Amen

 

 

Very few things bring tears to my eyes.  When I cry, I try to cry alone.  Over the past several days, I’ve sat in my office and wept.. brought to tears by the number of promises of intercessory prayer and well wishes from you.  I’m more emotionally touched by your kindness than you can imagine.

That doesn’t mean there are still waves of dread and fear that wash over me at times.  It doesn’t soften the diagnosis of cancer and the promise that my plumbing will be involuntary altered at best, and there’s the threat of additional treatment such as chemotherapy.  You never want to hear a doctor tell you it “depends on how far it has spread”.

I panic at the thought of how it feels waking up on a ventilator.  Let’s hope that doesn’t happen.  I dread the thought of needles. … Always have, since I was a kid and Dr. Felix Line was the deliverer of hypodermic medicines like penicillin, or polio vaccine.

I decided to be up front and honest with you about my cancer.  There it is…that word again… the word nobody wants to hear, especially when it is preceded with the other two words “you have”.   So far, I’ve been able to obey that famous sign posted in the underground railways of London, and on street corners during The Blitz.  But that can be far easier to read… than do!

One reason I decided to talk about my diagnosis is the hope that you will schedule regular checks.  My colon scope was right on time.  Ten years for a guy my age.  Glad it was done.

How about you?  Want to walk under this  fedora instead?  Your choice: a night of drinking nasty tasting liquid while you drive the bus and blow the horn, then a quick and easy knock out, and you’re done.  Take it from a fat guy who has let it all hang out in the hospital more than once… the folks have seen it all and done it all, and you are not constructed any differently than most others. They will not be surprised at any of your equipment.

And all of those folks who promise prayers, and those who have mentioned my name in places of worship, and those who will do so this Holy Week, I hope you will pray for my wife, Dena, too.  My children and extended family are facing stress, too.

I read your messages and literally shake my head in amazement.  What have I done to deserve such kindness?  I don’t understand it.

And this week, it might do all of us well to ask what we have done to deserve such Amazing Grace… and ponder the incomprehensible, not logical, and undeserved, and immeasurable act that made salvation available to all who believe and acknowledge the Great Physician and the forgiveness and spiritual healing He offers.

I don’t understand that, either.

But I believe it just as I believe in the power of your prayers.

Thank you.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

 

I have handled all of the images, sights, and sounds..and even odors that at one time or another, triggered some very dark memories.  All but one.   I have an overwhelming fear of surgery.  It springs from a very tough time I had with gastric bypass a few years ago.

Now, it appears I will have to have another surgery soon.  A routine test, and the doctor found something.  It might be open surgery, or a belly scope.

As it stands, my family..especially my wife and I are waiting on biopsy results, and could know something possibly as soon as Friday.  The initial examination did not look good.

Please excuse me in the coming days..when I miss a word.. or pick up a cue a half second late.  It’s probably because I am fighting the terrible urge to run under the bed and hide.

 

 

Before I left work today, I got a call from the missus.  She told me that the battery in one of our smoke detectors had gone bad and it was making an annoying beeping sound every few seconds.  It was not just any smoke detector.  It was the only smoke detector in the vaulted ceiling portion of our house.  Our home is about the size of a nice apartment, but it has a generous alarm system.

We were out of nine volt batteries, so I stopped by the drug store and bought a supply.

Let me back track a bit.  Our smoke alarm system is hooked to our AC power, and has battery back-up.  You will want to keep the AC part in mind for reference.

I had visions of a spark, and my carcass tumbling off the ladder, then my wife using the kitchen fire extinguisher to put out my burning hair.

I climbed the ladder to the top, thinking about the very real possibility of a a broken hip or fractured skull.  I once absentmindedly stepped off a ladder while I was painting.  I broke a finger and and had a bruise that resembled the South American continent on my butt.

When I changed the battery… there was still this  BEEEEEEEEEP    BEEEEEEEEEEEP.  So I put another battery in the detector…still… BEEEEEEEEEEP… BEEEEEEEEEEP.

Years of listening to headphones cranked up loud, three thousand hours in a helicopter, and playing rock music as loud as I could, plus six decades of life on this planet have left me with some hearing loss.  So I asked the missus… “Are you SURE this is the one that’s going off ?”  She was a bit incredulous at the question.  She was sure.

That’s when I made the executive decision that the regiment would have to replace the offending detector.  After consultation with our builder, Ed Cook, I headed off to Lowe’s to buy one.  Thirteen-odd dollars and about forty minutes later I was headed home.

Not being one to mess with AC electric currents… and knowing the detectors were all wired together, I shut off the main breaker to the house.  .. Not because I was unsure of myself, but because I had visions of a spark, and my carcass tumbling off the ladder, then my wife using the kitchen fire extinguisher to put out my burning hair.

Even after the breaker was switched…  BEEEEEEP    … BEEEEP… BEEEEP.   I asked again… “Is this really the thing that’s beeping?”  More incredulity.   Back to the ladder.

That is when I called in an expert…my father-in-law.  He’s the smartest man on the planet and knows of such things.  Papa came over, and coached me through the re-wiring as the  BEEEP  BEEEEP  continued.  Finally… Papa asked his daughter… “Are you sure that is the one making the noise?”  No more incredulity.  This was a question from a daddy to his daughter… no matter what age either of you are, you always respect the inquiry of a parent.

The beeping was coming from the faulty carbon monoxide detector, placed in a lower outlet near the floor.

My wife had some serious thoughts of having me hospitalized at worst, and getting a hearing aid at best.  I was positive I was going to ignite myself in a shower of sparks before I toppled from a ten foot perch.

Papa just smiled.

If you have not checked the batteries in your smoke detector, please do it… now.  Just don’t ask me to tell you which one is beeping.

And if any of them goes BEEEEEP in the middle of the night.

Get out, stay out, get help.

031412 by Dave Foulk