Thursday, May 31, 2012

Ron at Hope Hospice

My father has been battling various illnesses for the last year - In January he got a heart stent and most recently he underwent an amazing valve replacement operation - but after that he started falling apart and has been mostly hospitalized for the past month.



He has been moved to Hope Hospice and he's not expected to recover.


I found his piece on the Affordable Health Care Act in his drafts folder tonight.

I saw that he'd tried to post that piece to his blog, typing with his two fingers, but the technology defeated him, and me, his editor, was buried on something else, not paying attention, and he never got around to asking me to fix it.

So I just fixed it up and posted it.

My father could afford the best in health care for himself, but he fought hard, for it, here, because he wanted the best in health care for everyone.

He wanted a better society, one safer for women, and for people to remember the lessons of the Great Depression, and the truths of the recent recession.

I'm trapped in California and can't make it there until Saturday. I have so much enjoyed seeing my dad blossom as a writer, this past year was the first time since I was a boy where we could collaborate, rather than argue. And his joy when he could finally get all of his thoughts published, uncut, was overwhelming, as was mine, in his.

He has so many stories left in him to tell, that I only half remember.