Storm Signs

The flies were flying lower, and the deer flies were flying lower, too. And they were biting. The air was heavy with humidity portending some serious weather. I always loved it in the hours before a storm. The silver maple leaves rustled in the wind enough to see their silvery undersides. Once the silver made its appearance, it was only a matter of time before the thunder, lightning, maybe straight line winds, would kick into gear.

The damned flies. Unlike mosquitoes, flies' bites didn't itch--they just hurt. We sold our house and moved in with my mom and dad. My dad refused to part with 'the family home,' even though my mother had been urging him to move someplace smaller they could manage. The house was not a house that was senior citizen-friendly. If you couldn't navigate stairs, then, good luck to you. Every time I saw Dad coming up the stairs from the walk-out basement, I pictured him tumbling down the stairs, breaking his hip, back, neck, arm, leg, whatever. And even if that happened, I didn't think he'd be willing to leave this house.

I found my dad sitting in his Adirondack rocker, reading an old newspaper from World War II that one of his old-man-friends had given him. Most of his old-man-friends had gone the way of the Dodo, but there were a couple hangers-on, God love them. One of them brought my dad a stack of News of the World, and he was slowly making his way through the yellowed periodicals.

"What's happening in the war today?" I asked.

"Not too much. Same as yesterday's issue," he responded. "Do you ever read Smithsonian Magazine?"

"I don't, but Jim does," I answered.

"In one of the issues, they talked about one of the oldest living trees on earth--the pinus aristata. I found photos on my phone. Come see." He took his phone out of his front shirt pocket and poked around on the screen. The really old trees were shockingly and starkly beautiful, looking like living driftwood. The younger trees looked like some kind of Christmas tree, unimpressive without ornaments.

"Dad, you should come inside. A storm's coming."

"I know. I've been alive so long, I can smell a storm from 20 miles away," he said.

"That's a powerful sniffer you've got there," I said. "I hope Jim doesn't get caught in the storm on his drive home." When we decided to move, it meant that my husband now had a one hour commute each way on his in-office days. Weather always made me nervous. There were so many semi-trucks on the road between here and Jim's office, and heavier rains had a crazy way of wicking off the trucks and slamming into other vehicles on the road. And didn't I tell him we needed to replace the wiper blades on his car? I wished he had taken my car. It was an SUV--more substantial than his very low-to the-ground sedan--and fared better in inclement weather. It actually had a button for rain.

"Let's look at the radar and see where the storm is," Dad said. This guy. He couldn't work the TV, but he could pull up the weather radar. "What time is it? Four? If he leaves now, he can beat the storm."

"He won't leave until five. That's who he is. Should I call him?"

"Can't hurt," Dad said.

I called. I heard the echoey sounds of a cell phone connecting in a car. He was already on the road.

"Hey, hon," he said. "A bunch of us left early because this storm is supposed to be a doozy. They've already had flooding and tornadoes and stuff in St. Louis. I should be home in around 20 minutes. What's for dinner?"

Prayer answered. He'd be home before the storm hit. "I don't know what's for dinner. I haven't planned anything yet. It might be by candlelight, though. The flies are biting. The dogs don't like it."

My dad added, "I don't like it either. Damn flies keep biting me on the leg." My dad had this thing that if anyone was on a phone call within earshot, then he was on the call, too. I ended the call after exchange of all the regular sentiments.

I looked at my dad's legs to see the pinpricks of the fly bites. The skin had become tissue-paper thin, stretched and tight around his bones, muscle, and remaining flesh. Every bump became a bruise. Every scrape became a weeping, bleeding mess of a sore. He had given up on bandages because the adhesive caused more sores, and it was like some kind of redacted map, with gauze pads instead of black marker. He had become the walking wounded, what with all his gauze pads and paper tape. I laughed a little.

"What's so funny?" he asked.

"I'm looking at your legs, and your arms, and it's like you're trying to become a mummy...while you're still alive. How many gauze pads can we put on you?"

"Getting old is kind of like this storm," he said in a faux-lofty tone, albeit with a philosophical approach, belying his years of being a teacher. A lesson. He could give a good lesson. "You know it's coming. You can buy bleach and bottled water and a generator...all that stuff people buy. Or you can decide not to buy the stuff and tough it out. But. You know it's coming. I, apparently, did not prepare my body for the storm of old age. And you, Jim, and your mother are dealing with the continued aftermath of the storm that is me." He paused. "And for that, I am sorry. Do better than I've done."

I was sort of glad he acknowledged everything everyone was doing for him, all the parts and pieces of our lives we had given up for him to remain in his house, but it was a lot, and it would continue to be a lot because he wasn't miraculously going to improve or wake up 50 years younger and make better health and life choices. Before we moved back to my childhood home, I darkly joked with my mom that she was in husband-jail. Now, by choice, Jim and I were elderly-dad-jail.

"Did you notice the silver maples? I can see the silver sides," he said. He pointed to the west. "Look at that squall line." The sky had begun to darken, taking on the dark green cast that would ultimately give way to something darker accompanying a good lashing from Mother Nature. Sure enough, though, the squall line was clear, and it was coming.

"Daddy, we should go inside. The flies aren't getting friendlier, and it takes you a while to go from point A to point B. Besides, there's air conditioning inside."