I will find you

When I was in college, every break when I was home, I kept a white board on my bedroom wall filled with ideas for inventions. I was searching for the thing that I would invent that would simultaneously help humanity and, in so doing, make me wealthy. I would pick my mother’s brain daily for weeks on end asking, what do people need? One of my more humanitarian ideas was an inexpensive pill that when placed in water would make it clean enough to drink. My favorite plan was for a transport system that would decrease ground traffic…with flying vehicles. I’ve always liked the idea of flying. So has my dad.

I don’t think I’m any different than most when I say, I didn’t realize my parents were old until reality punched me in the face with an illness only other people’s grandparents might get. Only thing is, they weren’t really old. They still almost looked like we could be siblings rather than parents and child. The illness, however, was real.

I researched it to death. I went to all the doctor’s appointments with them. I brought questions. I was consistently frustrated by the doctor’s answers…or non-answers. I shared with my dad the possible dietary adjustments I discovered. His responses also consistently frustrated me. I don’t understand not doing everything in your power to stave off illness – even if that means not eating your favorite foods for the next 30 or 40 years – if it might allow you to have another 30 or 40 years.

He did make some efforts, though. We played ping pong every work day to help maintain some semblance of the incredible reflexes he’d always had. And he ran every day of the week regardless of the weather since the “well, we don’t really know” doctor said that exercise is the only thing that has been shown to slow the progression of his disease.

He used to tell people that the disease had been a blessing in a way. That it made him a better person. It helped to teach him patience and acceptance – qualities that perhaps he didn’t always have. Although for a while he lost his contagious love of life, with acceptance of his illness, it returned ten-fold.

Unfortunately, unbeknownst to him, the illness began to steal more of him from us every day.

He started to forget things. We all do, it’s true, but he also started to remember things that never happened; argue false details to the point that my mother and I just agreed and let it go. Six months ago, he walked home from the barber forgetting that he had driven the car there. As he walked with my panicked mother to the police department (right behind our home) to report the car stolen, she asked when was the last time he saw the car (so that they would have a time frame to offer to the police). At that point, he stopped walking and said, when I went to the barbershop. He smiled sheepishly and said, I left the car there and walked home.

As a once in a lifetime thing, not so bad, kind of funny even, but similar (and worse) incidents began to occur. It took him 6 hours to get home from work about four months ago. It’s a half hour drive. My mother was frantic. Calling me (to find out if we worked late or if there was some work-related dinner with a client he had neglected to tell her about – not unusual), calling him (phone going straight to voicemail), watching the news for accidents in the local area... When he finally strolled in the house at 11 pm, he said he went for a drive. My mother very quickly got the truth out of him, however: He had driven to Philadelphia where they lived when they first got married. Twenty-eight years ago. He had forgotten where home was.

Two months ago, when he got to work he looked at me for a moment as if baffled, then he smiled an “aha” kind of smile and said my name, pulling me in for a hug so tight you would think we had not seen each other the day before in the office.

And, for him, perhaps we had not.

We have not seen him since that day.

We put out a silver alert for him. We called every hospital between New York and Pennsylvania. We tried tracking his phone, but it appears the battery had died before we thought of it. The police have all but given up. We have not. I have not. I took out my old white board.

I’ve started working on one of my inventions. It’s a mechanism to track individuals in time and space using a variety of technologies – DNA, GPS, neuroscience, artificial intelligence, robotics and nanotechnology. The idea is that using old nail clippings, hair from a comb or brush, even spit on a toothbrush, the user will be able to find a missing person (via DNA, GPS, robotics and nanotechnology), in particular a person with dementia, wherever he or she might be, insert itself into the body via the ear, find the neurological problem and fix it; or, that being impossible, provide the person with enough information via the AI technology in the mechanism that they will be able find their way back (via GPS technology) to those awaiting them. It will also send out a notification (smart phone) once the person is found. Eventually, I will be able to find him…but what I really would like is to find him before the illness struck so I am also working on a version that incorporates time travel. I would like to spend a little more time with him before…to appreciate him as he was before… If I am lucky, a cure for his illness will precede mine and I can bring it back with me… Of course, that might be a little complicated judging from all the time travel movies I’ve ever seen. But, I have to try.

Last night, I dreamed I was able to travel 30 years into the future. Looking around, I realized I was on the street where I grew up. My house was bigger than before, taller with more floors, but dilapidated. The police station that used to be behind it was closed, and the fence and trees that used to shield our backyard were gone. The house looked abandoned, but I could see a big Bernese Mountain dog looking my way from the back porch. A second dog was looking outside through a half-boarded window that I knew used to be my room.

I felt a pang of sorrow, thinking my parents were gone from my childhood home… but then I saw a figure walk towards my old window. My sorrow turned to great excitement as ran toward the house, using my full body to wave at my mom. She smiled back.

“I knew you would return.” She mustn’t have spoken louder than a whisper, but I could understand the words as if she were speaking in my ear.

A moment later, she said, “Is Baba with you?”

My heart sank. I shook my head and then woke up crying for the first time since I was child but with this firm conviction:

I will find him.