Living with Father 6: Sutras in the ICU

A story I remembered while writing yesterday's post.

Seven years ago, my father had to take an ambulance due to an aortic dissection. Those few days in the ICU, where he couldn't move his body or eat, must have been incredibly stressful. When I went to visit, he would look at me with just his eyes and say,
"Call the police."
"This hospital is strange. They don't listen to what I say and are being forceful."

Just then, a doctor appeared and ushered me into a different room.

"He is showing signs of delirium. When we examine him at night, he chants sutras as if to harass us."
Ah, that must have been an expression of his anxiety, something that came out because he couldn't put it into words.
"My father chants sutras every morning, so I don't think it's meant to be harassment."
"It's strange enough that he's chanting sutras in a hospital. When I told him to stop, he started chanting some other strange words."

I understand. That was surely the names of the successive emperors. Jinmu, Suizei, Annei, Itoku... he made us memorize them by heart when we were in elementary school, and our family has heard them hundreds of times. Even when we told him that was enough, he wouldn't stop at all, and we were always at a loss.

I think he recited the names of the emperors to prove he wasn't suffering from dementia, since the doctor was treating him like he was. I understand it well because I've known him for a long time, but to the medical staff in the ICU hearing such things, it must have seemed like nothing other than delirium.

After he was discharged, my father told me this.

"I had a dream that my ancestors were gathered for a meeting. Just as it was decided that my life was to end there, one of them intervened, saying, 'He always chants sutras for us, so let him live a little longer,' and so I was able to live a little longer."

In that case, he probably put a lot of effort into his chanting, making it quite loud. To the medical team from that time, I apologize for the trouble. Thanks to you, he is still doing well today.