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Eulogy for George H. Peddie
Posted on Monday, November 13 @ 21:54:56 EST by odyssey |
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coco writes "Until last Friday, I did not know for sure that angels existed. My father was in the ICU and on a ventilator when a little girl and her mother walked in. The little girl was wearing what I imagine was her confirmation dress and carrying a harp about as big as she was. Her mother explained to me that she was the daughter of one of my father’s dearest friends, that they loved my father, and she asked if it would be all right if her daughter could play for him. And with the most peaceful, loving smile on her face, unfazed by the machines and ravages of illness, that 9-year old girl played her harp at my father’s bedside. It was at that moment, as I watched this child with the face and soul of an angel, that I knew for sure that they existed because I knew Daddy and I had been visited by one.
I don’t know that my father could hear her play or feel her hug, but I did and, Dr. and Mrs. Cook, I will ever be grateful to you and your family for that.
As I watched this beautiful child give my father a gift of her hands and her heart, it occurred to me that her simple act of amazing grace provided the perfect coda to my father’s life because he had given of his hands and his heart every day of it.
He loved surgery and caring for his patients. He was of the old school, the country doctor he decided at an early age to emulate. We asked one of his friends who came to see him the night he died, whether she thought it was OK to bury him in his white coat. And she said thought it was a perfect choice because when my father and her husband went to the hospital and put on those coats, she said it was like they were at Disneyland. People used to ask him when he was going to retire. When he was 60, when he was 70: when he was 80. He never did. He worked until the day he was stricken down. He considered practicing medicine with his remarkable colleagues a singular privilege. Why would you ever retire from a privilege?
And that’s how he saw life. He felt lucky and entitled to nothing. As the result, everything, from repeated nominations for Outstanding Surgeon on the Year, to a rare Oiler win, to growing a rose, to a good meal or even a good cup of coffee was a delightful surprise, an unexpected gift. I have heard that quality called the discipline of gratitude.
In his over five decades of practicing medicine, my father set a standard for himself and for others that few could attain. And he did not suffer fools gladly. Yet he was a remarkably humble man and mentor. He always told me that you should never boast or call attention to yourself, that those whose approval was worth having would notice excellence. Matthew talks about letting your light shine before men, so that they may see your good works. And in his case, they did. Whereas other surgeons who trained under Michael Debakey brag about his throwing them out of the operating room, Dr. Debakey welcomed my father in when he created a special residency at Methodist Hospital just for him. At his retirement dinner, which he considered perhaps a hint, his colleagues all said the same thing: he was the best and there was no man whose respect they wanted more. Even so, for many years my father seemed frustrated that he could not meet the high standard he set for himself, and he pushed himself so hard. His work ethic was amazing. He never complained about late night calls or early surgeries. His drive, however, was not borne of ego or hubris in thinking himself even capable of perfection. He was far too modest for that. Instead, he firmly believed those to whom much is given, much is expected and he always said his cup runneth over.
And help he did. Many of you bear the scars of my father. Put another way, many of you were his patients? You were very, very special to him. I don’t know how many times I was in a store or a restaurant and I gave someone a credit card and they asked if I was related to George Peddie. When I told them “yes,” their faces would light up and the stories of how he had saved their lives, or those of a treasured mother or father would flow. Over the years, I have wondered how many daughters have been walked down the aisle that might not have been had it not been for my father’s help. How many anniversaries and birthdays have been celebrated, how many grandchildren’s baseball games and graduations have been attended by people who are alive or healthier or pain or worry free because of my father’s work. Many of you have asked what you could do for my family now. It is this: you, his patients, can be his legacy. Your lives and health are what he leaves behind. So we ask that you use them well and, when you celebrate a wedding or a birthday, you think of him and tell your children and grandchildren about who he was and what he did for you. In that way, he will live on.
But I can hear him now. Collyn, you’ve got these people thinking I used to walk across the swimming pool every morning. Wanda June, you know I don’t like this. Tough.
My father had a devilish sense of humor. He loved a good joke or story. You might not know that if you just encountered him. He might have seemed stern or aloof but he wasn’t. Instead, he was really quite shy. But if you scratched beneath the surface only a little, you’d see it and he’d let you in on the joke. He was not a demonstrative man like most men of his generation but you knew how much he cared. He never talked much about feelings with us but on many a Saturday morning I would walk out the back door to find my car freshly washed and waxed and filled with gas, my father no where in sight. When I was little, I would crawl on his lap while he read the newspaper. Actually, I later learned that, with me on his lap, it wasn’t possible for him to read the newspaper, but he never complained. And, throughout my life, he always looked at me the way only fathers of daughters do, the look I learned when I saw my brothers and friends become fathers. It is a look that says they just can’t quite believe that someone so miraculous belongs to them or that they could love any creature on this earth more. To all the fathers here, rest assured, we, your daughters, know that look and it means everything to us.
My father always wanted to keep growing, to learn new things. When he was in his 70's as others were retiring, he found a second career. I remember my mother, who is claustrophic, describing in horror how he had spent an hour or more that day in a hyperbaric chamber set at 2 atmospheres so he could experience what his wound care patients would. And much to the chagrin of his staunchly Republican colleagues, he even changed political parties late in life. With my mother and me, he really never stood a chance anyway. And I was never more proud than when I took him as my date to a dinner I co-chaired for President Clinton. Even in his late 60's, he was still the best-looking, best-dressed gentleman I knew.
Until last Friday, I did not know for sure that angels existed only because I was looking for the wrong thing. I thought angels had wings and wore flowing robes. Last Friday, I learned what I must have suspected all my life: that they sometimes wear little confirmation dresses or Brioni ties, or scrub suits or white coats. The Greek poet Aeschylus once wrote that: "Even in our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart, until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God." Until last Friday, I did not know for sure that angels existed but I know now that my father, with all his very human failings and frailties, walked as an angel on this good earth.
So I do not worry about him now. He had a firm belief in God because he saw His handiwork every day but he questioned whether heaven exists. If it does, then I know he is in it, but not among the select at the right hand of God. My father was far too modest to accept such a seat even if offered, although he did really did like sitting on the 50-yard line. Instead, my father is striding the long hallways of heaven, whole again, strong again, dispensing stories and jokes like aspirin and unquestionably critiquing the food. For eternity, he will seek out the more traditional angels who have been having a little trouble with a wing, no doubt an occupational hazard from lifting too many heavy hearts.
And if no heaven exists, then I’d like to think that in his final days my father reviewed his life and was satisfied. John Kennedy said that good conscience is our only sure reward and I think that, at the end, my father’s conscience was clear. For he knew, as Kennedy did, that, while we may ask God’s blessing and help for our endeavors, here on earth God's work must truly be our own. And, in my father’s case, it was.
During his 81 years, George Henry Peddie loved his friends, his country, and his fellow man. He adored his grandchildren Jacob, Gordon, Emma and Daniel and believed with all his heart that they could and would be the best people they possibly could be. He worshiped my mother, his best friend and life companion for more than 75 years and always lit up when she entered the room. And he loved my brothers and me beyond measure.
In turn, we loved him and he was loved and respected by hundreds of people. Late on the night he died, as he left the hospital he helped to build for the last time, the nurses he so respected and cherished silently emerged from their stations and rooms to watch him go by.
He left them and each person whose life he touched better for the experience. His life was an inspiration and call to excellence, and his memory a benediction. I know of no more profound definition of a well-lived life nor a more meaningful epitaph. Let it be his.
— Collyn Ann Peddie"
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