I come from a 4th generation farming family in central Alberta, Canada. My father's pride and joy was his farm. He always joked "The only way I am leaving this house is feet first!" Little did I know that that statement would not come true!
In the last few months of his life, he had been hospitalized. As soon as the doctor told him that he would not be able to return to his home, he went downhill quickly and passed away in March 2008. This is where my story begins.
The day before he died, I received a phone call from my brother, telling me I had better come and visit him. I did, and after a day of visiting I decided that I would stay at the farm since it was close to the hospital and I was pretty sure that he did not have much time left.
In the early morning of his death, he told the nurse that he was visiting his farm. She gave him his medication, and he fell to sleep, only to pass away a couple of hours later. Shortly after 6:00AM, I awoke as my dogs were making the strangest noises.
I got up and let them out for about 10 minutes. After they had settled down, I went back to bed. I had just closed my eyes, when I sensed something strange (I smelled dad's cologne and cigarette smoke). I opened my eyes and turned my head, only to see my father looking into the room! He did not look directly at me, it was more of a checking the place out look.
He looked into the room, turned, and walked down the hall. I was stunned, but knew what had happened. The phone rang a few minutes later. It was my stepmother calling to say that Dad had passed away. The only thing that came out of my mouth was" I KNEW IT! I KNEW IT... HE WAS HERE!" Obviously this resulted in complete silence on the other end of the line.
This incident was only to be the beginning of the story. There was much activity during the week of planning the funeral, and quite a bit afterwards. I will submit these later this evening, as I need to get my wits together...
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