Sometimes the bottom falls out all at once. . .

Sometimes you are sitting at work and the phone rings.

Sometimes your mother is on the line.

Sometimes your mother is a cardiologist.

Sometimes your mother is with your father at a stress echo test.

Sometimes your father just went to Columbia Presbyterian in an ambulance.

Sometimes you haul ass to the ER.

Sometimes, you spend a long day learning not much, but trying to keep your old man calm by talking about shadowcasting.

Sometimes you then learn he has serious heart disease and diabetes.

Sometimes you go home and try to get it together and figure out how to make it easier for him.

Sometimes, you are just at a loss and feel mighty, mighty small.