Emerson loves her big brother

My brother received a call that Dad was still alive and in some sort of hospital or nursing home.  We went to see him and he was pretty out of it and was needing full time care.  We asked the staff what was up, we thought he was dead since April.  They said there was some sort of mix up at Southwest Medical Center and the cremation place - they didn’t really check to make sure he was dead and they cremated another body and mistakenly told us it was Dad’s.  He ended up somehow at another hospital and the staff had been trying to get in touch with us for 7 months.  Dad talked with us and I said something like it was a pretty good April Fools joke.  And he talked about other stuff too.  He seemed pretty happy with us.

Turns out it was just some sort of fraud - these people at the hospital had created a creature that looked and acted like Dad.  They were using predictive analytics software (like my company makes!) to somehow forecast what Dad would have been saying to us in this situation and how we would best relate to him.  These people said that he needed full time care just so they could take all of the money in the estate for his care.  My brother and I sleuth-fully got proof and told the police.  The hospital folks got arrested.  And Dad was still dead.  And I guess it turned out I was relieved that he was still dead because I didn’t want to take care of him in this condition.

My interpretation:  The night before Dad died unexpectedly, I was watching a special on health insurance and the cost of keeping old people alive and taking care of people with alzheimers and stuff and I thought OH GOD I NEVER WANT TO HAVE TO TAKE CARE OF DAD.  I feel responsible for his death.  I know it wasn’t karma or anything but I worry that this feeling was present in my voice or actions to him while he was alive, and wonder if he would have taken better care of himself if he hadn’t sensed my dread of acting as a caregiver.

A friend of mine from church lost her 5 year old in a car accident.  A girl I lived next door to as a kid lost her sister.  A friend from high school lost his mother.  A student in my high school and his mother burned to death in one.  Even when I just hear about one on the news such as the big pileup on the Oklahoma Turnpike this summer, I feel pretty low until something else fills that part of my brain.  It pretty much ruined my mood on our Chicago trip.

I went to an awesome women’s group at church last night.  It was our first meeting.  I’m usually pretty meh about girls-only time but I really hit it off with these people.  I was feeling good about the balance in my life and was feeling the least amount of stress I had felt in weeks.

Then my usual route home was blocked due to flashing red lights.  I tried coming at the intersection from another direction.  Also blocked.  I went down a mile and turned around to catch the far southern edge of the intersection.  The wreck that had happened there was pretty bad.  Lots of people standing around with concerned looks on their faces.  I was pretty sure it was a fatality accident, and this was confirmed on our local morning news today.

I drive through this intersection every day - It’s a fairly mild, four-lane plus center turn lane traffic light controlled intersection.  It’s less than a mile from where we live.  I didn’t know the guy who died.  But it’s just had me down most of the day after the brief moment of relaxation I was feeling at church last night.  Fragility of life and all that.