it's just like cards.

There's nothing like feeling closer to a person when their health is compromised, how quickly we put aside all the old hurts and bad feelings. I'm thinking of when my Dad was sick last year. He had to have heart surgery and I flew back East for it. I was glad I was there but it's an unsettling thing to see one of your parents sick and weak in a hospital bed. I'll be fine if I never see one of my parents like that again. I hated it. Hated the dirty hospital and the nurses that couldn't find my Dad's veins, leaving him with bruises up and down his arm. One thing I did like was playing cards with my Dad. His girlfriend had told me he was recently obsessed with Texas Hold'em and so one day I brought along a deck of cards and my dad taught me how to play. We played for hours. Because when you are sick in a hospital and there's no where to go, and you've read all the bad magazines and done all the crosswords in every paper you can find, nothing eats up time like playing cards. And it was nice, sitting there with my dad, listening to his stories. I even beat him at a few hands. I'm thinking of this because I'm feeling like I'm all in these days. It feels sort of good. It's kind of how I want to be living at this age and place I'm at. Maybe I've always lived like this. But I sort of feel like I just pushed all my chips to the center of the table -- at least this week I feel that way. And I can't really tell you why. Well I could, but I don't want to. Just know I'm all in, and I have no idea what card is coming next and I'm totally alright with that and it's not a bad place to be at all.

The fantastic photo above is from Saltygrease's flickr page.