“I have calmed and quieted my soul”

I arrived in the middle of the consultation, just in time to hear the doctor say that hospitals are not healthy places. “You really don’t want to hang around here very long,” he told my dad. True enough, but what are the alternatives?

The scene took place in Calgary, where I recently spent a couple of days with my dad, who is recovering slowly from double bypass heart surgery. It’s been a long, hard haul and the question of ongoing care is a big one right now—especially for mom.

The doctor was right. It’s actually hard to get better in a hospital. There tends to be a lot of sickness there (go figure). And interruptions! Convalescence requires rest, and hospitals are not particularly restful. They’re noisy and active places. Busy professionals come and go. Equipment rattles through hallways. Nurses wake patients at all hours to “take a little blood.” Lights come on at surprising times. Personal privacy is a foreign concept. The travails of other patients intrude.

But hospitals are necessary. They are battlegrounds against illness and other ravages of the flesh. The people who staff them know how to deal with all kinds of acute situations. They’re very good at what they do. Amazing cures occur in these places. But you really don’t want to be there unless you have to.

Dad has to be there, at least for now. “I can pretty well guarantee that you won’t be in this place in a week,” the doctor was saying. But he couldn’t say for sure what the next step would be. Rehab? Home? Everyone wants dad to be home, but not before he’s ready; not before his caretakers are ready.

Two days flew by in a hurry. For me, at any rate, the hours passed quickly. Precious time. Time steeped in psalms, prayer and physical care. Time spent cheering the hard effort required to simply stand. Joyful time spent with a man who matters so much to me, who throughout his long life has been a model of steady good nature. Gentle. Kind. Hospitable. Now hospitalized. “Thanks so much for coming to visit me,” he said.

Psalm 131:2. “I have calmed and quieted my soul, like a weaned child with its mother; my soul is like the weaned child that is with me.” Amen.

—Doug Koop