Farewell to a member trouble

 

Ami, if you are looking at us from above, surely a sheepish smile is spread across your face, and maybe  even a tear is  shining in the corner of your eye and you feel embarrassed since we all here are talking very highly of you, but believe me when I say you deserve it.

My first day at the rehab hospital was traumatic. Meeting such a great batch of pain and suffering was not easy. The exposure to so many people with different disabilities and severe problems, creates an incontrollable tremor and skepticism whether the situation will improve, will it be possible to have a significant life in the new frame created.

You were there for me.

My family arrived every day, but on hours they were absent, you made me smile, the first one to join me and share my company. I was sitting with you in the cafeteria, telling jokes while each of us contributes his\ her own dark, morbid humor.

You introduced me to people who proved it is possible to have a meaningful life in spite of our disabilities. When my scars bothered me, you were the one who brought me special moist wipes and cream and said: “it will relieve your pain”  and it really did.

When you intended to leave the hospital, the social worker gathered us in the dining room for a farewell, describing your personality emphasizing what we all knew, your generosity; your desire to help others and the way you encouraged people.  My eyes and yours, glistened with tears. I was glad you were going home but I knew I’d miss you. I knew I’d miss sitting together, laughing although the situation was not simple. After that we met when you arrived for physical therapy.

 

A few days before your last hospitalization I called you, in the background I heard your grandsons voices and as usual to my question “how are you?” you answered that everything was alright,  although it wasn’t.  I didn’t know this was going to be our last conversation. A few days later your wife called me and said you were in the hospital fighting for your life. I couldn’t get it. I still believed that you would overcome and I would see you laughing, but unfortunately it didn’t happen. Later, your wife contacted me and told me that it was over. You were not alive anymore. It’s difficult for me to talk about you in past tense, I imagine that soon the phone will ring and I’ll hear your voice.

Ami, although you are not alive, you are with us, we can’t forget you and it’s a pity that the time we knew one another was short. You were picked up to another world, which some say is a good one, but from there you will never return.