TATANKA

Editor's Note: My father has had dementia for years. I've mourned his passing over time as he's ebbed. Dad no longer knows anyone except Mom, to whom he clings as his last, immovable memory after 67 years of marriage. He no longer remembers the home he built for us in Chicago, which is being cleared and sold soon. I don't have the heart to be there for that, so it is best I am not as ghosts would surely haunt me. Yes, it is difficult, especially with each call to Dad as I repeatedly tell him who I am, where I live, what I do for a living, that I have a son, in short introducing us. He seems to like his new friend. But I can only imagine how difficult it is for him. He once was so strong, the Alpha Male of the clan. I wish I could absorb his struggle. Here is a personal, precious video that a relative just digitized and yeah, that's a 20-year-old me. Dad was ON FIRE as my brothers and I constantly pecked at him, out of love, and the golden opportunity to actually get