My Father Is Dying

He has been for a while. I mean that more in the fatalistic long-term kind of way, the way we're all dying, except not. I mean, he's had some serious problems and, at times, it seems as though he's going to be checking out at any moment. He calls to tell me how much he cost the insurance company that month, and rattles off maladies and treatments I can barely pronounce, never mind identify or explain. His identical twin brother - his genetic match - checked out almost two years ago, but the ol' dads is still ticking away. So when I say he's dying, he really is. But at the same time we have no idea (12 days? 10 years?) when he's really gonna fall asleep for keeps.

I wanted to shoot an interview with him, but not until we were sitting on my couch bullshitting, and it was already too late to get a camera before he went back home.

I want to get this killer interview of him, something so spectacular and complete that it can be some kind of weak proxy of him, so when I miss him I can watch and listen, he can fill me in on everything I forgot or never thought to ask. But that's the catch. There will never be anything more than what I capture on tape, and I have to ask all the questions myself. There are things about my father that I'll never know or understand, and the thing that drives me crazy about it is that it is impossible for me to know what to ask him to get at the things I don't know I'm missing.

I wasn't able to get a movie camera together while he was here so instead we went outside and I took some pictures of him. This is the best one.