I’d planned on doing another ‘issues’ post, maybe about feminism or intersectionality, but then, Thursday evening, I heard from my mom that my dad was in hospital. It seems he had a mini-stroke and couldn’t use his left arm anymore. My heart just about stopped. The past year has been absolutely crazy, health-wise, for my father. It seems that after 73 years of being pretty much healthy like a horse it was just one thing after another. Obviously this has taken its toll on him, and he’s thoroughly sick and tired of doctor’s appointments, so we all worry that he’s not taking care of himself the way he should.

I was pretty useless at work yesterday, and left early to go to the hospital and keep my dad company as he waited for the results of all the tests they’d been doing. Once again he’s been blessed (seriously, the stroke could have been SO much worse!) and was allowed to go home (where I spent the night) with some new meds and instructions for some additional tests.

But yeah, this once again brought home to me how close a family we are. We might all live our separate lives by now (my parents in a village half an hour from Zurich, my brother with his girlfriend in Basel, and myself in Zurich) but the connection, the love has not lessened one bit. Therefore in the past two days, there were a LOT of phone calls between the four of us, and my brother was really devastated at having to work Friday and Saturday (and will come up tomorrow). It’s not as if we were able to do anything, really, except some fetch-and-carry and making the endless hours of waiting pass a bit faster.

Still, the years of being a family unit, with all other relatives living hours away, have deeply embedded the sense that, ultimately, the four of us belong together. We might no longer share a flat (or even a city), but our parents have always made it clear that we’ll always have a home with them, supporting both my brother and myself in everything we do – and it feels only natural that in return, we want to be with them, especially when things are tough.