My dad wasn't around much when I was younger because he was in his residency until he was 36. Usually if we were out and about and he was called in, I had a book ready. I often sat alone in the car, reading until he finished doing whatever it was he did in the hospital. He'd come out in his hospital scrubs and we'd go out for tacos or head home to relax on Sunday evening. I expected the same out of one Sunday afternoon call, but ten minutes after he went in, my father emerged from the hospital as I was settling in to read. He knocked on the window with a key and beckoned me inside.
We changed into hospital scrubs and walked past the nurses already in their nursing uniforms scrubs. After we walked through all the double doors we finally arrived at the right room. A boy lay on a bed at 45 degrees, looking close to death. His pale head was shaved and he was stark naked. During a gang shooting a bullet had entered the boy's head in between the left temple and ear. Rather than the bloody mess I expected, there was only a tiny v-shaped cut. The bullet was lodged in the left ventricle of the brain, causing massive hemorrhaging. There was no exit wound. This kid, who a few hours before had been running around, doing teenager stuff, had been shot and was most probably going to die. My father conversed with the nurses about how the kid had become brain dead.
My father summoned me onwards to a room where he said the boy's mother was. I knew what was coming and began to protest that I wanted no part of it. I had no choice. We entered the room and sat akin to how it's done in movies. When my father began to explain the situation, the mother began to sob. Not uncontrollably, but with deep steady sadness. The man to her left was stone-faced, arm around her, trying to stabilize her bobbing shoulders. The whole time my dad was solemn and grim — he knew exactly how to handle the situation.
My father's poise allowed me to garner a further appreciation for what he does. I couldn't believe he was able to keep a straight face and not show any emotion. For me this experience showed the thinness of life's thread, for my dad it was just another day at work.
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