THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, April 13, 1996 TAG: 9604130343
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Anne Saita
LENGTH: Medium: 54 lines
The past two weeks have been difficult for me and my family, particularly my husband.
My father-in-law ended his long battle with heart disease by refusing the medical treatment that had extended his life for a number of years.
My husband and his four grown sisters saw this coming for quite a while, but, despite having plenty of time to prepare, I've only recently realized all that I'll miss.
My own family left Virginia more than a decade ago, years after I'd moved away. Since then my only link to that part of my past has been my husband's childhood home, which I've visited for 17 years now.
In the days preceding my father-in-law's passing, I spent a lot of time alone with my own children in the big house in Newport News.
I noticed how huge the mulberry tree in the front yard had gotten, and how bad the bushes out back looked. The house needed another coat of paint.
While my husband and his sisters kept a vigil by their father's hospital bedside, I labored in the yard or found some fixture inside the house to clean.
On Easter Sunday, I walked along a long-familiar road to watch the horses in a nearby pasture and to talk to neighborhood natives, who agreed with me that the city was changing.
Folks seemed to be less trusting; strangers more sinister. Crime was a major problem now, and it seemed to constantly hit closer to home, I said.
It was about an hour later that my husband and sisters-in-law watched as their father's eyes suddenly widened and he drew in his last breath.
And it was probably about an hour earlier that someone, in broad daylight, jacked up our car, parked at a Catholic hospital, and swiped a rear wheel.
``I couldn't believe it. The last thing I expected to see when I walked out of the hospital was my car missing its wheel,'' my husband said.
Then he added, ``If there was a time for someone to steal it, that was probably it. It just made everything seem all the more ridiculous.''
The car part was replaced a couple of days later, but the bold criminal act - and its timing - just heightened my sense of loss.
I lost a main member of the family. I lost any hope of ever calling this place home again. And I momentarily lost faith in my fellow man.
But despite the setback that cost us time, money and even more grief, we did find some comfort, perhaps divinely inspired.
My father-in-law left us his well-maintained car in his will. And of all the wheels that could have been stolen, the thief took the one that had a tire with a slow leak. by CNB