For Fathers Day In Loving Memory of Our Dad James Charles Hazeltine, Sr.
A son, a brother, an uncle, a friend, a teacher, but Best of All Our Father!
Love is felt in so many different ways. Sometimes it gives us butterflies and makes us happy. Sometimes you don’t know how much you love someone or something until it's gone. Gone completely, except for your memories. Only then do you feel a love you never realized existed.
You become so grateful for those memories that you pray they won't fade as time goes on just so you can feel that rush of love. You begin to regret not seeing this love before it was too late and wonder how you didn’t feel it before. You become thankful that this love exists so you don’t feel complete agony and sorrow.
This month for Father's Day, in memory of our superhero dad, James C. Hazeltine Sr., I want to share some of our journey with our dad through the eyes of his kids and how we are learning this new way to love.
You see, life is all about perspective, and no two individuals are the same and no two perspectives are the same. Therefore, knowingly or unknowingly, the world sees many “versions” of everyone.
The final “version” we had of our father was a man who was very sick. Suddenly deathly sick from maybe cancer. The doctors needed to biopsy the mass to confirm it. For 12 days he was put on IV fluids for the procedure all while trying to keep his heart and other organs stable. His hands began a slow twitch again as they always did every time he went into the hospital. Becoming sober from the outside world this was part of what happened every time he would go in to the hospital. In a time of Covid where no one can come and go from a hospital, no matter the circumstances, he began to have trouble using his cellphone. His hands began twitching so bad he could no longer answer it, text or even plug it in to charge. All while there, alone.
Unimaginably, we were asked what we would do if he needed to be put on a ventilator. It became like something you would see on the news. The next day our dad was intubated. Little did we know that we would never ever hear his voice again. Meaning we would never get to hear him say “I LOVE YOU” to us again. NEVER EVER!!!!! More days went on and then he was quarantined for “possible exposure” six days earlier. Even with two negative Covid tests seven days apart, no biopsy, no visitors, and now no voice, my dad had to fight on his own.
Throughout our lives we hit many bumps and potholes along our journey with our dad, but no matter what we love him and always did with every bit of our souls. We lived with feeling a desperate, kind of worried love, constantly. We worried that we didn’t love him hard enough along the way to save him now. The last time my phone rang and said “Dad” on the screen was November 14, 2020. He was saying sorry for not being able to answer the phone because of his hands twitching. I didn’t care, it just was relieving to finally be able to talk with him. The last thing me and my sister said to him was when we asked him if he knew who we were. He screamed “YES! YOUR MY DAUGHTER AND YOUR MY OLDEST GET ME SOMETHING to f%^&*# DRINK”!
Fast forward a few days...by this time, he's been intubated and his organs are slowly shutting down. Still no biopsy to find out why. We were supposed to be able to see him finally for Thanksgiving. We had been counting down the days of quarantine to be over and then, we got the news that we still couldn’t see him.
The next day, November 28, 2020, I got dressed to finally go see my handsome dad!! I sat in the parking lot for a little bit and called everyone. I was terrified but sooooo excited! I held my head high and walked through the hospital doors. Throughout our lives we have a couple sayings we live by; adapt and overcome and Chin up ALWAYS, but the dad that I saw I just wanted to rescue.
I rubbed his hands to find the moles and beauty marks and tattoos. I felt his hair as I rubbed his head so he could finally feel a real comforting touch. I whispered something I always promised to him, I always told him I would always come back.
As many of you may know, we are a divorced family. We've fought through many versions of ourselves as well as watched our dad fight through many versions of himself. Sometimes it was hard and hurtful and seemed unforgivable. Sometimes we pulled back because it hurt us too much to watch. But the love we have and have always had never changed. He always knew that we loved him and we always knew he loved us back.
Since we are his children, not many understand or see our dad through our eyes. That is because WE were picked for that journey. People don't understand our pain or our perspective because it is NOT theirs and no two are the same. WE saw him leave at night to fix a furnace for free because he had the ability and the love to do it. Many saw “Big Jim” run down the beach at camp and dive into the water, but they didn’t see it through the eyes of his kids. No one but us saw him leave our home knowing we were never going to wake up to both of our parents together again but us. That never took away our love. A love that was tried more times than most but tough enough to last through any storm.
No matter what “versions” we got or he got, our love never shattered and our strength and faith evolved. James Charles Hazeltine Sr, is the proud father of 3 incredibly strong, humorously humble, and sincerely genuine kids. Growing up we may not have had much but we always had us. Something we are grateful for every day. Thank you, God, for picking him, we couldn’t become ourselves without him being him!!
In loving memory of a courageously simple man!
written by Jayme Hazeltine