(Warning:  Before I get to the main subject of this writing, I’m going to go off on a tangent.  Please bear with me, as you’ll soon understand why this lengthy so-called lead-in is relevant…)

Believe it or not, I haven’t yet had the experience of watching Groundhog Day from beginning to end — though it’s on my bucket list of things to do.

However, I HAVE seen the trailer (which you can, too, by clicking on the above link) and know that it’s about this news reporter getting the chance to live this day over and over until he gets it right.

Early in the morning on February 2, 2004, the idea behind that movie came to my mind, as I wanted nothing more than to go back to sleep and wake up again to a different beginning to my day (with the Groundhog Day I’d awakened to being nothing but a bad dream).

In my done over Groundhog Day, it would be at couple of hours later, and I’d be calling my mom so that we could do our usual 3-way phone call to the nursing home where my dad was staying to find out what kind of night he’d had.

He had been in one kind of medical facility or another since the last days of the previous March (I’ll tell you more about this in a near-future post), but he had recently been coming home for overnight/multi-night visits with the latest one lasting from around December 14 until a day or two past New Year’s Day 2004.

My folks would soon be married for 57 years, so we were hoping that the weather would cooperate to where he would be able to spend two or three nights that would include February 8.

He had done so well over the Christmas season that we had decided to call the nursing home to let them know that we would be down to pick up his clothes and other things but that he wouldn’t be returning.

We got talked out of this by a lawyer who was, among other things, advising us about eldercare.  This lawyer is now either on his way to prison or else is already there on unrelated charges.  He fed us this line about how we might be charged up-front close to $100,000 if we brought him home at this point because that would indicate that he hadn’t qualified for months of professional care that had been footed by Medicaid.

Anyway, we went along with the lawyer’s advice to let him stay until warmer weather.  That way, there would be no chance of EMTs not being able to give him any assistance should we all get snowed-in and separated from outside help.  He also dangled the carrot-on-a-stick of his getting to receive more physical therapy and occupational therapy while he was spending an extra month or two there — and he would STILL get to go home for brief visits.

He was given a couple of sessions of therapy before the therapy team said that this would be his last because he had not (and the verb they used is opposite of how we would say it.  We would say that he hadn’t proGRESSED enough, but the therapy team said he had not PROgressed enough).

Knowing what I know now, I think that lawyer had acted as if he were acting on our behalf and gave orders to stop his therapy.

To make a long story short, he was to stay in the nursing home until winter was over except for a handful of visits home with most of those being day visits with a sleepover visit on special occasions with one of those coming up over the weekend when February 8 would be on a Sunday.

Dave — who now drives for City Of Anderson Transit System (CATS) — drove one of the TRAM vans back then, and he was usually the one who transported my dad to and from our place.

We had various ways to transport him — and I’m going to be writing on that one of these days — but we usually had Dave to bring him for his home visits, and he was always very gentle and careful with him.

But, now, it was Groundhog Day 2004, and I wanted to re-do it so badly — to wake up ready to make that three-way call to the nursing home and soon be greeted with the news that he’d had a great night and was talking about how he and my mom were going to be married for 57 years.

But there would be no do-over.

His favorite CNA, Chauncy, had come into work that morning and began making his rounds.  When he got to my dad’s room, he found him in bed with a smile on his face, but he couldn’t get him to wake up.

The cause of his death was listed as “sudden cardiac death” — that is, his heart had simply stopped beating while he had been asleep.

Knowing what I do now, I’m wondered if my dad had some assistance in dying — not from Chauncy but, instead, either from another employee or else someone who had come into the building (which could be done at any time, as the nursing home had 24-hour visitation).

But I see no need to further discuss this in this story.

Anyway, my dad has been gone from this mortal realm for 14 years and several hours, and I’m always remembering little things about him that make him unique — like, if he couldn’t think of what something was called, he’d just call it a “whatchamacallit” until he could remember what it was called.

When writing his own blog entry about

Theme of the Week 7 – Which of your values do you value most?

@thediarymaster wrote:

“…This is a tough one for me, because I’d like to think I have lots of personal values that are good – and the one that comes to mind is one that I have trouble putting a name on…”

Read what he wrote about which of his values he most liked about himself, and you’ll know which value I most like about myself, because they’re similar enough to be two unique versions of the same value.

If you can’t put an actual name with it, why not just call it the…

Whatchamacallit Value
!?!