As part of my journey in living with heart failure, I have been open to all sorts of suggestions. So far, I’ve gone back to my therapist, I’ve attended a support group, I am working out three times a week with a trainer. I am trying to eat well, thank goodness I already quit drinking, I am praying and being prayed for, I am trying to do a better job at staying in the Word, and I have dabbled in meditation. It is actually quite effective if I can just do it.

Today the meditation exercise was to envision an experience which conjures up heavenly feelings that you can go back to when you need to go to your happy place. (I’m assuming without the aid of mind altering substances.)  It gave numerous suggestions and I went through various alternatives in my mind. First, I saw myself hiking up a mountain on the coast of the Monterey Peninsula, triumphantly looking out over the coastline. Next, I sipped a glass of wine while eating new lamb in the English Lake District. Lastly, I basked in the glow of the sun, something I haven’t done since we found out about skin cancer, while listening to live music. These are all things I’ve done in the past and can no longer do. While they are incredible experiences that I miss like crazy, none quite embodies the sense of nirvana I was going for.

Then it hit me. It was two years ago.  It was more of a sensation than an experience. It was a place of comfort and safety and compassion that I’ve never felt before or since. A feeling I wish I could bottle. And it happened, of all times, on the very day my father died. And the bearer of all these heavenly feelings was a woman I barely knew….Dorothy.

She was one of Dad’s two sitters during his last ten days when we brought him home to die. These sitters are gifts from God. Angels who know what death looks like and they help not only the patient, but the family, transition from this world into the next. Rick has an expression he uses to describe pleasantly plump people – they are built for comfort, not for speed. Dorothy was built for comfort. She had the 7 am to 7 pm shift. The shift while we were all awake. Janice had the nighttime shift. It worked out well, because Janice was not a people person. She cleaned out the refrigerator and talked on the phone. Dorothy, on the other hand, instantly became part of the family. She was fat, talkative, motherly, comforting, unafraid and funny. She told hysterical stories of other families that she had worked for that made us look like the Cleavers. When we were no longer on speaking terms with Dad’s girlfriend, she ran interference for us. She’s seen it all, the obnoxious stuff that happens when a family’s fiber is stretched beyond the breaking point.

Okay, back to heaven. When I heard the guys from the funeral home ring the doorbell, I ran down the stairs to say one last good-bye to Dad. By the time I got there, they had already zipped him into a body bag. I burst into sobbing, heaving, snotty tears and collapsed into Dorothy’s arms. This woman I had known for only ten days. I don’t have much experience with fat people or with hugs, but I tell you what, being enveloped in those arms and burying my head in her hefty bosom was a feeling I will never, ever forget.  It was the safest place I’ve ever been. It was heaven.