'Death, old friend, I wait for you' (Tears 8)

Missed Part 1?

Baby hates doctors for reasons of her own I can hardly compete with, not even by throwing in the odd lawyers, cops, politicians etc. However, still isn't exactly that I like doctors either, wrong number, no way.

Just supposing I might get into physical violence against others some day, the first person I'd like to seriously hurt physically (like breaking his nose at least) still is this one particu-liar!-ly fine doctor, teaching me never going to a hospital alone again by carving it into my body: guinea pig readily strapped on table, doctor harvesting my lungs for samples, going on and on and on, knocking me out intravenously the very moment I started complaining ...

At which point in my life I hadn't even met the other nice fella from airport prison yet. Not to mention another old or new friend here or there. No, I don't like doctors.

But why I personally really hate them all as a caste stems probly from eventually learning how my grandfather had died. Read it and weep, cause no matter how dead I'm inside these other days, this one always makes me cry.

His body and stature had always been pretty similar to mine, though I'd grown a bit taller in the end, and I reckon he also shared this particular experience, that what worked perfectly fine on thousands and thousands of other patients, almost always would f**k up terribly wrong on this one particular body. All of his life, with regards to health related issues, he (like my father almost till today) strictly observed one rule and one rule only: Never ever go seeing no doctor at all never ever. Not as long as you can walk or crawl in the opposite direction. Never unless some one else rolls you in unconscious or else unable to resist. Never. Literally. Ever.

So, after my grandfather's second stroke, rolled him in once more. Eventually still makes it. But then, apparently there's something's wrong with his feet ... turning black ... cut up a toe, blood all curdled inside ...

Tough decision: If they'd not amputate both feet quickly, he'll die for sure. However, weak as he was after the stroke, if they cut off his feet now, he'd most definitely die on the spot.

So they let him die slowly with his feet on. Obviously as per usual without even hooking him up on morphines properly, them bloody f***ing b*stards.

Looking backwards, still can't get over how having been such a hopeless letdown that I didn't go to see him in the hospital just because I was told not to. It's such a lie, pretending preventing me from doing so'd prevent any harm to anyone, in contrary. Just the same old 'grown-up' fuss of shying away from death, making it just all the worse, and plenty of it, praise be.

My grandfather was probly the hardest man I ever knew. Thogh 'hard' mostly not in the sense of being so to others, but in terms of being able to go on relentlessly despite any pain. Would hardly notice it in the corners of his mouth, but then onwards, always onwards. Like the song in school, about the heart that always has to run like the river, day and night, but in death may rest, eventually. Things that would have others cringe and/or going up the walls, he wouldn't even mention, let alone complain about.

And there he was, lying in this hospital bed. Dying slowly, day after day, night after night. Praying to die faster, screaming out loud from this room to the lord, to hurry on, to take away his left leg, then the right one, then hands, arms, and all of the rest, please, please, now! Hours and hours, day and night, night and day.

Which is why I eventually still learned about it in the end , cause everybody in this part of the hospital couldn't help but to bear witness, including somebody I got to know much closer couple of years later down the road.

Still, how sad and hard it ever might've been to learn about this firsthand, it's better to know. And it's a bloody lie that he'd suffered more if I'd been allowed to see him or just had gone doing so anyway.

He always was fond of me like probly nobody else except a grandfather carefully making up for the mistakes when his own son was of the same age. Seeing me would've meant less pain, not more. For both of us.

Truth hurts, sometimes plenty, yes, but seldom as much as lies. While on the other hand, lies hurt always more.

Silently I wore my pain from not having seen him again for years to come, muffled inside this nameless dark grown-up cloud of don't mention it, not to the young ones, it's better they don't know at all, for their own sake. F**k you!

About his pain, reckon I only started actually realising what must've happened to him when the thing on my head went wrong and my skin started dying off on me. Which was one of the most painful experiences ever and a pretty nasty one for that too, cause it hurts so f***ing much and it takes so f***ing loooong til the dying parts finally turn dead and are done with. And that bit on my head was just skin and for that only the size of about one single toe, as compared to his two whole feet.

It's so unfair. Yes, my grandfather was a stubborn man, sometimes even irate, but whatever he demanded, he also backed it up on his part, and always more than just that, dying breed an all. No, it's so not fair.

How could I ever forgive God? Perhaps because he would want me to. My grandfather, that is.

Bloody f***ing b*stards, too. Could've turned off his pain no sweat. But no, obviously didn't care to. Just tight on the morphine, now that'd come as a surprise, wunnit? What worked for thousands and so on. Doctors. Yes, there's hardly a fouler word, and in case I didn't mention, no, don't like them b*stards either, no way.

However, at the end of the day, what really bugs me is something else.

Like, how to forgive myself?

I'm quite sure, he'd tried to pretend the pain wasn't there if he'd seen me, and I'd played along with it mostly, but I would've taken his hand and he would've known. That I wasn't there, I'll take it to my grave, and as long's there's a single tear left inside this body, just the thought of it will probly always make me cry.