My middle-aged son, Nick, calls from his car to tell me he’s racing up the 405 from his office in Los Angeles to a hospital in Ventura, to be with his father, who is on life support.
The staff at his assisted living facility couldn’t find the “do not resuscitate” document allowing him to die from the heart attack that had deprived his brain of oxygen for 30 minutes.
Nick’s been on the phone with the E.R. doctor, urging him to remove the breathing tube his father never wanted. They remove it.
Although I haven’t lived with Eckart for 30 years, I’ve been his second health advocate for more than a year, ostensibly to help Nick, who lives 90 miles away, and also for reasons I haven’t wanted to look at.