Dad

Dad

Tom McFadden was a lot of things in this life - a kind and compassionate man, a devoted husband, someone who lived a life of service to his community, the bravest garden gnome that ever existed and most importantly, my father. He left this plane yesterday and is spending some time in the bardo. I don’t know if his spirit will return or this was his final journey through the sensory world of the flesh. If he does come back, I wish for him something quiet, perhaps a tortoise quietly munching leaves listening to the sounds of the forest, or watching fireflies emerge from a meadow, syncing up their lights. He certainly deserves the peace.

The last nine years have been hard. Since his first stroke it has been difficult to watch his struggles with aphasia, or loss of language. He maintained his extraordinary intelligence but couldn’t really express himself with language or understand abstraction. The loss of reading and writing I found to be extraordinarily cruel for someone that so loved to write.

I have generally avoided writing about our time in Viet Nam because writing about the experience sets it permanently somehow. Currently it exists in golden memories in my mind which remain malleable. 

I was so afraid to go back because I thought the Vietnamese would still be angry about what we did to them. The exact opposite was true. The love the people we met there showed my dad was a life altering experience. Forgiveness is perhaps one of the greatest things of human experience.  To forgive and be forgiven are not easy tasks. My dad loved the Vietnamese people when he was there and it was amazing to see it returned to him when he returned.

If you have ever seen the man, you will immediately understand why I call him a garden gnome. After his stroke, realizing he’d never travel the world with me again, I began to imagine him like the gnome in Amelie. She steals her father’s gnome and gives it to a flight attendant friend who photographs it everywhere they go so she can give her father the pictures. The gnome forever rides in my pocket, peering over the seam to see this wonderful world full of beauty and conflict.

After we got back from our trip, dad looked at me and said that he had been able to reframe his time there and I made all his dreams come true. I feel so lucky, I’m not sure how many children get such a gift from their dad.

Thank you to everyone who has supported my and mom through all this, or offered support. Thank you to all who sent cards and letters. It meant everything to us. Thank you mom for all you did to take care of him at the end. So many things in this life are hard. Love and care are the only things we have to soothe the bruises we get on this trip though it all.

I was looking through some of his writings this morning and this popped out at me. This is from the memoir he wrote the year after he got back.

“And suddenly the fire horn reminds me of home here in Yarmouth and the

recently spent night out at Shelley’s not believing that people are having a good

time while troopies die. The whole world didn’t stop while you were gone and

life continued on not breathlessly anticipating your return and you were simply

overcome with your knees wobbling so your legs could hardly control your slow

migration. How do you act, what can you say and to who. Will anyone

ever hear or more hopefully, take heed? The only thing to do is continue to

pretend my life will never end, catch that horse if you can or crack that nut.”

Much love to you all.