Muscle Memory

I dialed my dad’s defunct cell number. He passed away in June of 2020. I’ve really been doing ok lately. It hasn’t been easy, but I feel I’m in a healthy place. The other day, I was calling lab results to my patients and dialed the patient’s area code (same as my dad’s, of course), next three digits (same as my dad), and my fingers automatically just banged out 5028. When it rang and I realized half a second later what I had done, I slammed the phone down. My mom “returned” his number to AT&T or whatever it is in 2020. Anyway, it set me back a few notches. I used to dial that number daily or more, and I realized after the fact that, had I let it ring, someone else would have likely picked up. Grief really does hit in the strangest ways.