If I Ever Say Ticker
In the early ’90s, I got a phone call from my brother George that Dad was having chest pain and going in for further tests. As is always the case, there was great concern and hope covered in prayer that it was nothing serious and everything would be fine.
Within a short time, I received another call that he was being rushed to the hospital in Albuquerque, 90 miles north of the small town of Española, where he lived.
We knew it was severe and would soon find out Dad would be having open heart surgery, a quadruple bypass. While such surgeries had become commonplace, any time they are cutting your chest open and sawing your sternum in half to get to your heart, it’s a serious thing.
Fortunately, the surgery went well, and all of us kids were there to encourage him in his recovery.
One particular morning it was just Dad and me in his hospital room. We were playing cards. The game was a momentary distraction from the discomfort of his recovery.
Before long, an older gentleman walked into Dad’s room with an obligatory knock, tho’ every intention of entering the room whether or not Dad wanted additional company.
“Hello, my name’s Tom, and I am a part of a group of people who visit heart patients just to see how they are doing.”
The visit seemed benign, but then Tom said something he should never have.
“So, when did you have the old ‘ticker’ worked on.”
The average person wouldn’t have been able to tell that dad was agitated, and if they had, they would have likely chalked it up to the pain he was in rather than the words of the uninvited guest who was part of a support group for heart patients.
Dad marched to the beat of his own unique drum. I knew Tom’s visit wasn’t appreciated and how distasteful a “heart patient support group” would be to Dad. But, I didn’t know to what extent his displeasure took.
He endured the visit with gritted teeth, and no sooner had Tom left the room than Dad turned to me with a severe look on his face and said.
“If I ever use the word ‘ticker’ (in reference to his heart). I want you to haul off and ‘cold-cock’ me!”
I wasn’t familiar with the word ‘cold-cock,’ and I knew Dad was serious. But I fully understood the gravity of what he suggested when I looked up the word.
To cold-cock someone is to punch that person hard enough that he or she passes out. Cold-cocking someone is more serious than a regular punch because it implies that someone has passed out from the punch.
Till the day of his death, I never heard the word “ticker” come out of his mouth.
