Prologue

My pocketbook chirped.

Well, actually it was the cellphone inside the pocketbook. The day began like any other, a warm sunny Georgia spring day. I had arrived at work and spent a few minutes in my boss' doorway chatting, and had just walked to my own desk and set the pocketbook down when the cellphone rang - a rare occurrence in itself. I pulled the phone out and noticed that the caller ID said "Dad's cellphone." That was cause for alarm - my father never calls me at work.

I answered the phone. "Hello?" "Brenda, this is your daddy. I'm at my crossing [Dad worked as a school crossing guard], and the paramedics are here and, well, they want to take me to the hospital." Paramedics? Hospital? Had a car hit him? Was he having another heart attack? WHAT was going on???? He seemed to be flustered as he tried to explain, "Here, let me let you talk to these guys with me."

One of the paramedics explained to me that Dad was having some dizziness but did not appear to be having a stroke or heart attack, and they didn't really know what was causing the dizziness. So they wanted to take him to the emergency room for further evaluation and had asked him if there was someone who could meet him there. That someone, of course, would be me. Dad and I had always been there for each other. We were always close, and had grown closer in the years since my mother died, and even closer still since my husband died a few years ago.

I disconnected the call to find my boss looking at me over my cubicle wall - she'd overheard my conversation and realized there was a problem. I told her, "It's Dad. I have to go."

That was the first real inkling we had that Dad was ill.