我的Dad：送别致辞
附英文原作
My Dad
When Dad first came into my life, I was 7years old, this was in china. I remember being intrigued and rather suspicious- by his beard mainly, it is likely my first time seeing such a heavily beardedforeign gentleman up close! Mum told me later that dad had to discretely checkwith mum whether I was a boy or a girl at the time – mainly due to my shortdodgy haircut and my constant refusal to wear any sort of girlish clothes.
Mum and Dad got married in the winter of 92in Beijing, shortly after that we left our lives in China and arrived inEngland in April 93. I remember the customs officer detained us for some reasonand mums cousin Ying who travelled with us at the same time told me later thatdad was frantic with worry. When we finally made it out, he was so relieved andhappy. I don’t remember much of this, but there is a photo of all of us at thearrivals gate in Heathrow on the album – mum and I looking rather bleary eyedand tired but dad with a beaming smile on his face.
His last trips were by far the furthest – bycoming out to New Zealand to visit us twice in the past 6 years. Because dadloved planes, we managed to get him into an old Boeing Steerman biplane, wherehe donned a flight suit, goggles and helmet and flew in an open cockpit, for a scenicflight. He loved it!
Dad has always been a quiet man, and aprivate man, especially towards his later years after his retirement, you couldeven say that he became a little bit grumpy at times as he got older. He wasntparticularly an affectionate man with anyone other than mum. But he wasintelligent, honest, patient, tolerant, and most of all, he was kind. I knowthere was nothing that he wouldn’t have done for mum or myself, even in theend, agreeing to go into a care home when his dementia progressed, he knew itwas getting too hard for mum to look after him at home.
Dementia, an extremely distressingcondition for both the sufferer and their family. Some people can becomeagitated, aggressive, often losing their “sense of self” over time, I’ve seenthis all too often, being a GP. Dad’s dementia probably started many years ago,but it seemed to have progressed very quickly over the past few months. When Iwas last in the UK only a few weeks ago, I would sometime look in his eyes andthink to myself that he looks so lost. Dementia took away dads independence,his confidence, and was starting to take away his autonomy, but I thinkdementia also took away some of his unnecessary inhibitions, it allowed him tolet his guard down. His inherent qualities was obvious to see - He remainedimpeccably polite to everyone and to all the staff that cared for him, he stillhad his cheeky sense of humour, he laughed when he found things funny (even ifit was inappropriate), he was brutally honest, and ofcourse, being my dad, henever stopped teasing me. He also became much more affectionate, reaching outto hold my hand when he can, this was something he never did before. Dementiastops your ability to pretend and so when he was happy, you could tell becausehe was always smiling, even if he wasn’t saying much, his smile warms my hearteverytime.
So, even though I despise dementia as adisease, in dads last few weeks when I was here it allowed the softer parts ofhim to shine through, and I was able to connect with him in a different way, away which was no less meaningful than before. I’m glad I was able to glimpseinto this window of time before dementia fully took him away from us. Hispassing was sudden and unexpected, but I take some comfort in knowing that hehas been able to avoid the suffering that was surely to come.
There is a wonderful TED talk about griefby a very inspirational lady called Nora McInerny, on there, she says somethingwhich rings so true, and that is...getting over the loss of a loved one is notabout moving on, but moving forward. All of the moments in dads life is notsomething we can just leave behind us and move on from, he will always bepresent, in all that we do and in the life that is ahead of us, so we will notbe moving on without him, but we will move forward with him.