Losses and gains

My dad has a serious woodworking accident this morning, cutting his hand so badly that three fingers were amputated. I, living thousands of miles from home, came home to this message on the machine, "Hi Dawn, this is Mom, I need you to call me. Things are O.K. but they are not O.K". Why the odd message? Well, my family does not normally leave messages unless there has been a death, it was my mom's way of letting me know no one died, but that something had happened.
They have spent the entire day at the hospital, with consultations and surgeries. Family members have tried to be supportive, with one comment that almost sent my mom over the edge "it's not so bad, at least it's only his fingers". Luckily, mom held her tongue, and did not lash out with the response that she really wanted to say, which was "oh yeah, lets chop off your fingers and see how you feel".
My poor dad, he is a woodworker at heart; every room in the house has some piece of furniture that he has built. Either that or he has built the actual room (one "family bonding" project we had as children was building the addition on the house). To take away his ability to hold a hammer and nail is devastating.
Do you know what worried him more? It was that they had to cut off his wedding ring. In the 40 years he has been married, he has never removed it. I think that action really brought home the seriousness of the injury more than anything else.
My mom, well, she was forced to face the fact that she may lose my dad some day, and it may be sooner than later. It scared her, a lot.
Dad, in his attempt to make us feel better, told us to tell the grand kids that he would not play rock, paper, scissors any more since he'll only be able to throw rock. I told this to Jman early in the day, in the evening he asked me if Papa had cut off both hands, I said no. Jman responded, "well, then he can play with his other hand". He's trying to process it too.