Tell Magazine June 2018 5778

{FIGHTING FOR LIFE}
Donna Jacobs-Sife
Years ago, doctors opened my father’s chest and breast bone,
reached into his body and held his heart in their hands.
There it lay beating before them,
as they gazed upon the ungazable.
They cut his heart open and removed
the valve that was blocking his flow
of blood, and replaced it with the
valve of a pig. We made many jokes
about his unkosher heart in the build
up before the Big Day.
We went to see him, having
prepared ourselves for what
we would see. "There will be
lots of tubes" we told each
other, "and he will be very
pale". But nothing quite
prepares you for the sight
of your beloved in a state
of coma, on life support.
He looked so vulnerable,
so unfamiliar. We held his
hand, and whispered that
we loved him in his ear,
and left. We walked across
the park to the car silently,
holding each other’s hands
tightly, four abreast, marching against
the cold wind, an army - linked by
common blood and full hearts.
Across the road, I noticed that
my car door was open. "Look," I
said to my sister, "mum must have
forgotten to close the door." But as
my eyes began to focus I thought I
saw someone sitting in the passenger
seat. Disengaging from the others
I ran across the road, and saw that
indeed, a man was sitting in my car.
"Hey!" I shouted, crisp and sharp.
He jumped out, like a wild foraging
animal, disturbed by the sudden
appearance of man. "Sorry, sorry,
sorry" he babbled. "I was so desperate.
Here," he said, taking my hand, "take
it back". Two five-cent pieces and a
ten-cent piece rolled into my hand.
He was quite beautiful really, my
age, with a torn thin checked shirt
and tight black jeans. His immediate
contrition touched me. Instinctively
my fingers tightened on his and I
felt the trembling and knew that
it was more than cold, it was also
the disease of withdrawal. "Its ok,"
I said to him, "I understand." I
understood that he was cold and in
pain. I understood that he was so
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sorry that life had brought him to
this moment. His eyes, hooded with
shame, held mine. So vulnerable, so
familiar. For a moment, the world
stopped spinning and all that existed
were two pairs of human eyes holding
each other. Gazing upon what is so
often ungazable, in these
cold streets of Sydney. For
a moment he let me hold
his heart in my hands, and I
knew that nothing separated
us. His pain was mine. His
shame was mine. My fingers
loosened their soft grip
and as he slipped away, we
smiled. Turning back, rather
tenderly, almost fatherly he
said "lock your car in future."
That night they gave my
father morphine to numb the
pain. The man from the street
was probably was in some
seedy place, administering
to himself to numb his own pain.
My father was fighting to regain life,
to mend his heart; not so different
from that man. Both were soldiers on
the front line. The doctors removed
the blockage in my father’s heart,
and somehow I can’t help but feel
that this man and I did something
similar for each other. Something
that dwells in the mystery of a
moment, when two people allow
themselves to be seen by the other.
As I drove away, I saw that man
standing at the lights. I noticed he was
standing tall with his head up against
the lightpole, looking at the stars.
I knew how he felt, my heart was
hopeful too. I beeped. We waved.
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