Hope It Wasn't a Mistake

The latest addition to our household is a refrigerator.

It's a shiny great black beast, a Samsung. They arguably make the prettiest appliances. This model is so new that Consumer Reports hasn't even rated it yet. Whoops. We never buy stuff we don't know anything about. Right?

When we went to look -- just look, mind you -- at fridges, Bernie reminded me we weren't going to buy a refrigerator that day. We were going to take our time. "Yes," I agreed, "and we're not even going to look at the Samsungs."

Half an hour later we were owners of this Samsung. I didn't even have to ask Bernie, "It followed me home, can I keep it?"

It has the ice-maker/water-dispenser in the door that we wanted. The french doors open to a wide, wide storage area. At the bottom is a goodly sized freezer drawer. It has glitzy blue lights and you can set the temperature for both the freezer and the regular fridge. You can rearrange the shelves in a cute way.

Gosh, I hope we didn't blow this year's budget on a lemon.

Dog Days of Summer

It's been hotter than the proverbial scorched bat from hell the last couple days.

My parents used to tell me not to trouble the animals in August. "Dog days," they called them, days when it was so hot and miserable that a dog just wanted to lie in the dirt in the shade and be left alone. But these two dogs have an air-conditioned house, so I didn't mind pestering them for a photoshoot.

Before swimming season is over, I want to get a picture of Sebastian in the pool. He swims like a chicken in an agitator-washer, splashing madly and getting nowhere, but unlike a chicken, he loves it. But it was actually too hot (106+ degrees) the last couple days to let the dogs expend that much energy. Sebastian splashes while he treads water and bites at the droplets in the air, but Howie swims with speed and determination -- to chase a tennis ball, and then run around the pool for victory laps afterwards. Too crazy, boys, you gotta wait until it's only 95 or so.

This young man is 10 months old now, and has a riveting stare. Sebastian has discovered that People DO things. Interesting things, like throw tennis balls or feed goodies, or go for walks, or tickle his puppy sides, or play bite-fight.

He chases swallows at the park as they swoop for insects (ignoring the gallumphing pup, of course) and feels compelled to try to herd Howie, who gets fed up and comes to sit by my heel.

When Sebastian gets excited, his ears mostly stand up straight -- kind of like you'd expect a drunken fruit bat to look. And if you return after a trip outside the house without him, or in the morning to greet you, he emits (involuntarily, it seems) a deep, loud "Bow-wooooooo-0h-oohhh!"

He's bigger than Howie now. You can really feel the substance of him if you push him. But his build is still puppyish, and when Howie gives him his morning beating, he can still knock Sebastian onto the floor, the better to pretend bite Seb's ears and throat and legs. However, Sebastian has all the energy of a puppy to bring to the tussle, so he wants to keep playing long after Howie has had enough. Again, Howie retreats to my heels, knowing I'll deal with it, and tell Sebastian to settle down and behave.


A veteran of many photos, Howie knows that I can give the order "OKAY!" and he will be released from holding still. In this shot, you can really tell he was begging me to be allowed to leave the side of that insolent pup and the face of the mysterious clicking machine.

While I write this, Howie is sprawled on my bed. He opens his eyes now and then to make sure I'm still here, then dozes off again.

And now and then, I turn from my desk to look at him, to make sure he's still there. Best dog I ever had.

The Pet Laptop

My laptop is home, safe and fixed, ready for 10k for Labor Day.

That's the annual Piker Press bums' challenge: To write ten thousand words from Friday morning to midnight Labor Day. Any words. Poems, stories, opinion -- whatever.

It's kind of a warm up for NaNoWriMo, when we write a novel in a month. Sort of gets you remembering what a gas it is to sit down and hammer out a bunch of words ... primes the pump, so to speak.

I've never managed to hit the 10k over Labor Day weekend, but I did have one day (the last writing day for me) last November when I pounded out an amazing rush of over four thousand words. They just poured out -- and were coherent, too, which astounds me.

This past week I managed to cough up a story and a poem. Woo.

I'm looking forward to sitting with my laptop on Friday and just leaping, word-wise, into a fresh new blank document.

In family news, my sister is reasonably comfortably ensconced in a nursing home. I've been in contact with people from the home and from the Agency who are Jan's legal guardians. She's receiving decent care, and she's alive. I wish she could survive at least through Christmas; our mother didn't bother with Christmas the last couple years. Wouldn't a Christmas concert be nice?

My mother's neighbor thinks it's time for me to start calling my mother again. I wondered if that was true, but then today was so shaky and dippy about having to go out into the world by myself to pick up the laptop and go to the store --- no, I'm still a wreck, and there's no getting around that. One does what one can.

This one did what she could today, and now is done until tomorrow.

Fish, Drama, and Who Knows What?

It's not often that I obsess about food.

Today was an exception.

Well, I think. Are there are a lot of other days that I obsess about food, and I just don't remember them?

Anyway, today, from the time I got moving until I got back from the ranch, I was thinking about fish sandwiches. McD's. And then I admitted I really didn't need the fries, so I was going to make fish stick sandwiches: four fish sticks on a hamburger bun with white american cheese and a hint of tartar sauce. I picked up buns at the store, piled into the kitchen -- and discovered we had not one damn fish stick in the house.

I was too tired to make another foray to the store, so I made do with pre-cooked shrimp, tortilla chips and mild salsa, and a pile of strawberries. Well, that took care of my late breakfast, but what about the main meal of the day?

Close on to late afternoon, I wheedled my son-in-law to go to Mc Donald's and pick up a fish fix. With fries. Truly, I want to nominate him for sainthood. The two fish sandwiches and fries have done great things for my mental attitude and my mysteriously thinning midsection.

Maybe it was the late evening drama yesterday, when Dink started to colic and we had to rush to the ranch to walk him and get the vet to him ... until about 11:30 pm. So tiring.

Maybe it was going out to see Dink this morning, finding him feisty and fine, and hopping on him for a gentle 45-minute ride ... which I haven't done for what, months? Energy expended = fish sandwich passion.

Or maybe it was because my sister was being transferred today from the hospital to a nursing home, and one of her last utterances when I was back east was a vehement comment about getting a fish sandwich. "A fish sandwich," she said to no one in particular. "And some fudge. Fish, and fudge. Yeah."

I don't do fudge, Jan, but I thought of you with every bite of fish sandwich. You're alive, and some day you'll know how much I miss you.

A Rose for My Sister

One of the finest pinks I've been able to photograph with my digital camera, and this one is for my sister.

She hasn't died, although no one is offering a lot of hope for her. "She's a little better," they told me today. She's trying to cough the gunk out of her lungs from the pneumonia she developed, which is an improvement, I guess.

The hospital is ready to release her to a nursing home now, and the one they've located seems to be decent.

I wish she could go someplace nice, where the air conditioning keeps things cool and people have gentle voices, and might even listen when she feels the need to talk. She really is entertaining when she wants to talk -- the fabrications she comes up with are incredible. And even her snippets of muttering make you wonder what she sees in her mind. She was talking about it being over 200 years since (she?) was in the Holy Land the last day I was there with her. She won't be drawn into conversation often, though. You'd have to be content with what Jan wants to be heard.

If only there was a way for me to be back there during visiting hours, and then home again to be with my husband and daughter and son-in-law and granddaughter.

So it was a day of good news, for a change. Not only of Jan, but also I got a call that my laptop can -- CAN! -- be fixed, for a pricey but Not-The-Price-Of-A-New-One cost. "Do it!" I nearly shouted. And then did mental backward handsprings around the room. (They're safer than trying the stunt in real life)

Can't wait for the beast to be back in my hands. I've set up the new studio/bedroom with a queen-sized mattress and a heap of pillows to lean against, and it just itches for a woman with a laptop to lounge back and write stuff.

Enter the Harpy

Quiet, peaceful day.

Well, until about 4pm, when Lonz called me to let me know how things were back east. He told me that Ma had told him that Jan was not doing well, and might die soon. (Wow, she was actually able to retain that information??? And convey it??? Good day for Ma!) I confirmed that sad information, and Lonz was sympathetic, as well as resigned to God's will. He's seen a sister and a couple of his brothers die from cancers. Lonz knows well how iffy our life in this world is.

But Lonz's surprise news was that he stopped to visit Ma, and happened to arrive just as Ma's caseworker was leaving. Lonz told me that as soon as the woman was out the door, my mother flipped her off. He was shocked; I was not. I've heard her venom poured out about the people who are trying to help her; all he's heard is the venom poured out about me.

Ma told him she was going to get the station wagon (which still sits in her garage -- I THINK I was able to snag all the keys to it) started again. "No, you can't," Lonz told her. "There's something wrong with it. And besides, you don't have a license any more."

"That's right," she said to him, "Sand had the sheriff take my license from me."

"No, it was the State," he reminded her. "The State took it away."

"Oh, no, my friend Mona told me that Sand[y] went down there and told them to take away my license."

Yep, good old Mona (pronounced "MONNA" for whatever reason -- I've always pronounced her name correctly out of the barest shred of respect I've ever hand for her as a person, though she could never get it through her stupid duck brain that I'm not 'Sandy' but Sand) has been coaching Ma and helping her revise her perceptions of reality.

I was in the room when Mona (who is a friend because she is married to the man who was Dad's best friend when he was growing up) called my mother to tell her that Ma didn't have Alzheimer's (Mona being a medical specialist, of course), that no one had a right to sell her truck (Ma should call the Sheriff, the State Police, the dealership, et al), and that 'Sandy' was behind it all because I was after Ma's money. I heard this because the harridan was screaming it into the phone so loudly that my mother held the receiver away from her ear. "Don't you trust her!"

My mother put the phone to her ear again and said, "I'm sorry. Who is this again?"

That was actually funny, in a Joke About Alzheimer's kind of way, but Mona didn't bat an eye (or if she batted, there was no indication of it in the levels of her screeching voice), just went on with her diatribe.

Well, darling Mona (visualize a harpy on acid) has been visiting with Ma and filling her head with all kinds of poison about me. Lovely. Just what we all needed.

Bernie has given me permission to use any and all foul language if that old nutso skag calls my cell phone. She began berating me when I answered my mother's phone one morning (so that my mother would finish her breakfast and not be distracted from eating) and my response was to hang up on her. That memory still gives me a warm and fuzzy feeling.

I have loathed this woman from my earliest memory, when I was still a toddler. She was shrill, and stupid, and annoying, unable to grasp that I understood every word she was saying and despised them all.

Nothing has changed, and apparently, the antipathy was mutual.

Mona Jury, for the record, is a total nutcase asshole, and is fucking with my mother's last times.

May God judge her justly.

Which is not to say that I'm upset about her poisoning Ma's mind -- she is at least one more pair of gimlet eyes on Ma to make sure she's okay. But that care does NOT offset the damage she is doing. I wish that she and I were the same age. I think I'd beat the shit out of her.

Hmm. She reminds me of the guy with the stainless steel teeth in that old James Bond movie, only not so coherent or good-looking.

As of Today

As of today, my sister, Jan is still alive.

As of today, the Agency on Aging may have found a solution to caring for my mother in her home for as long as that is possible, until her Alzheimer's renders her incapable of living outside a nursing facility.

As of today, I feel better. I had a scary bout of panic at about 4 am, but it subsided with prayer. The rest of the day I felt well enough to do laundry and clean up the kitchen -- especially after my son-in-law, the saintly John, went with me to administer my horse's medicines.

Hell, he didn't "go with me" -- he was the one who smoothly took the horse's head in hand and gave him the two antibiotic salves in the affected eye and the oral paste anti-inflammatory. He did it quicker than the vet did. Far frickin' quicker than it took me and Kathy the Mad Horsewoman to give the horse first aid on Tuesday, when we found that Dink the Stink had rubbed his irritated "fly-eye" into a full-blown crisis.

Oh, yeah, I needed more stress.

Yesterday, Mad Kathy called and told me that the ranch manager had strongly suggested I call a vet to look at Dink's eye. I did so, and Pioneer Equine Hospital amazingly sent a vet to see Dink within two hours!

Dr. Luke Bass examined Dink thoroughly, for all that he (the vet) seemed to be only about 12 years old (perspective, perspective) and prescribed two antibiotics and an anti-inflammatory for the old pony.

Last evening, Dink tossed me around while Alex held his head as best she could to administer the medicines. This morning, and this evening, my son-in-law (may his name be engraved in gilt forever) did the administering, and made it look like magic. Dink didn't toss him around, and the procedures took only seconds.

At one point, and I am not exaggerating, Dink was flinging his head about, refusing to let the second course of antibiotic salves be put in his eye. John calmly tucked Dink's nose into his armpit, and then proceeded to apply the salve. Presto, hey, it was done!

Maybe John needs a new deodorant.

Or maybe I need to nominate my son-in-law for sainthood.

I do know that Dink's eye looked better this evening than it did this morning, and better this morning than it did last evening.

There is no reward great enough to pay John back for the stress reduction of today. God is going to have to pile that one on him, and may He do it speedily and sumptuously.

As of today, I felt like I might be able to function normally again one of these days.

Slow Going

Probably I have used this photo before, but I like it, and I was gone when the Turk's Cap lilies bloomed this summer.

My emotional fragility (and the accompanying physical weakness) has really surprised me. I suppose that I should look on this time as a valuable learning experience ... and maybe I will, someday. But in the present, it just feels sad and vulnerable.

I had a heartening email from the Agency on Aging who are Jan's guardians: they said the nurses called them from the hospital and asked if there was anyone who could come read to Jan. They were sending out a call for volunteers to do that. I hope they find some folks willing to just go to her and let her hear their voices.

I find myself wondering if I will recognize her on the other side of this life. I hope she does, and I hope that she will remember that I love her.

Times of Redemption

The Area Agency on Aging -- which is my sister's legal guardian -- emailed me today to tell me that her doctor and her specialist were asking for a DNR order.

Do Not Resuscitate.

Jan's breathing, and subsequently, her heart, have failed three times. The last time occurred less than two days after I returned home. She's been on a ventilator to keep her breathing since.

The Agency asked me for my opinion, as a family member. They will make the ultimate decision, and if they decide that the DNR is appropriate, they'll take the request to court next week, maybe Monday or Tuesday. At that point, the breathing tube would be removed, and Jan would be left to go to sleep, and let her heart stop ... again.

I've been sliding up and down the scales of Grief: shocked, then angry, then weeping, then accepting, then thinking, "But what if they actually followed through long enough with This treatment ..." Then I cry some more.

Hell, maybe she'll rally over the weekend, and the order will become moot. It could happen. It could.

When I called my pastor and told him about the situation, he said, "She should not have a DNR order until she has a chance to receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation and Communion." Then I told him that Jan had never been allowed to be instructed for that. He questioned me about what her spiritual life has been like, and has she an understanding of right and wrong? I told him that Jan (in my opinion) has never been capable of "sin" -- not in the strict sense of the wrong, which would require serious matter, knowledge of sinfulness, and deliberate choice of the sinful action. "Oh," he said, "then let her go home!"

Once she's "home," you see, she won't be blind anymore, and she'll be able to "get" jokes, and talk to anyone at all without the cloud of her brain damage between her and others. She'll be strong and able to run and play and dance. She'll be so beautiful, you can hardly believe it.

Through the days of sitting with her in the hospital, I saw her beauty so clearly, without our mother jumping in between us like some frenetic yapping demon, as she did throughout our lives. I got to hold Jan's hand in silence, praying for her, had the glory of her sitting up to listen to me read to her, had the joy of Jan taking my hand and putting it to her head and holding it there, felt her hug me as she hadn't been allowed to do since I was little-little. I combed her hair, and stroked her face, and loved her so much -- up close, personal, unabashed. Heart-breaking to think that we had such a short time to love ... but at least we had that. I told her how much I loved her, and there was no "Mom" there to tell me to stop acting like a fool being mushy. At least we had that.

My mother-in-law called, and though a mere two months ago I might have thought, "Now what does that woman want?" now I answered the phone gladly, for Regina has been simply stunningly supportive as I face these end-of-life issues. I told her about Jan, and she (amazingly) echoed my pastor's thoughts. And when I told her that I had no idea how to tell my mother about what was going on, she told me not to worry about it, as my mother is in her own little world now, and doesn't understand what's going on day to day. She seconded (well, actually, it's like fifthed or sixthed) my doctor's orders to stay away from Mom. (By this I know my mother is still ranting about how I've wickedly short-circuited her lifestyle.)

After 30 years of edgy contact, my mother-in-law has become a beloved friend. I would be a fool not to marvel and be grateful for the forgiveness, the acceptance, and the love.

In these end times, there is still beauty, and wonder, and redemption.

I'm Home

California does something for me.

The sweet breeze in the evening, the wash of cool air in the morning ... the warmth of Bernie, snuggled up tight against me as I wake, the enthusiastic welcome of my granddaughter Lillian when she hears my voice...

I had a brief but virulent panic attack this morning, heart hammering, breath short, vision spinning. Alex drove us to church, where I only broke down into tears twice. Fr. Peter Carota hugged me after church, (that would be the second time I broke down) and gave me a blessing for healing.

He told me to give my hurts up to God to handle, to let them go, and told me that letting go was an act of prayer.

Okay. I'm letting go. I'm praying.

Still Mad, All of Us, But I'm On My Way Home

August 4, 2007

Well, I made it to the airport without getting lost.

They said to be at the airport at least two hours before my flight was due to leave. I was worried about an accident holding up traffic on the way to University Park airport, so I allowed another hour for travel, with leeway for getting myself turned around and ending up on the far side of State College.

As a result, this sweet little airport is going to have to occupy my time for the next two hours. They don't expect one to go through security more than about a half hour before the flight leaves. (!)

I must say that so far this airport is lovely. Unhurried, staffed by pleasant, happy people -- what is this? The land that rush hour forgot?

There is even a wireless network here. The only drawback is that its subscriber page doesn't work. I wasted some cell phone minutes calling their technical support, and the fellah on the other end just said to try it again. Wow. That's profound, especially when the damn page doesn't work.

Oh, well, I didn't need to read the daily funnies that badly anyway.

Last night my friend Lonz called to tell me that he'd been to see my mother, and had taken her to see Jan. He told me that Jan would have nothing to do with her, and wouldn't even let her touch her arm. That's sad. I don't know if it was because Jan was grumpy, having been moved to a different room, or if it was because Jan has been enjoying not being shouted at or bullied. Hard to say. Mom didn't want to "waste time" just sitting with Jan (or reading to her) so Lonz took Ma home. Mom told him what the names of all the trees were that they passed on the little mountain road he took, but spent most of her time complaining about how I was trying to steal all her money, and how I cared about nothing but her money. And she also complained that I hadn't come to visit her, even though she knew I was in town.

In point of fact, I missed running into her and Lonz at the hospital by about ten blessed minutes.

No, I didn't go see her after she flew into a rage about her truck being sold. Neighbors and friends told me the horrible things she was saying about me, and I had no desire to subject myself to the ravings of an angry dementia patient whose past decisions were responsible for my sister's battered psyche and physical illness.

Guess I'm still furious, too.

Homecoming Eve

I love this picture of Howie.

It's been a long time since I dressed him up. I must do more of that in the near future. He didn't mind when I dressed him in the shirt, or in my old sweatshirt -- it was the camera that bugged him.

I'm done here in Pennsylvania. I've done what I could, and now it's time to go home and heal up emotionally, and regain my strength physically.

I wanted to sit with my sister through her crises, be there for her if she was dying -- not that I think the poor isolated woman needs specifically ME, but she did need someone to keep her company in the darkness of her blindness and fear. I read to her, whether she was asleep or awake, my voice droning on, stopping only to get a drink to wet my throat. She listened, and seemed calmed by the reading. Three days ago she began to assert herself, muttering the sentences of her thoughts, often talking over my voice. She was taking care of herself.

Jan is very independent-minded. She wants to take care of herself -- when she's ready to care at all, now -- and trying to do for her is likely to get a very negative reaction. The one time we got her to drink, we did it by letting (and helping) her raise the cup to her lips; she's wanted to help with her bathing, taking the washcloth from the nurse; today she even swabbed out her own mouth rather than let the nurse mess with her.

For my mother, I managed to sell her truck and her extra property, giving her a few more $$$ in her trust fund. I fought for her right to live independently as long as she can, and let enough people know about her condition that the whole town will be looking out for her. She appreciated my actions far less than Jan did, and the hateful things she said in her dementia still pain me, even though I know that she's saying them out of paranoia and a lack of understanding.

The rest of their stories is up to them. Jan will have to keep learning how to cooperate with her caregivers, and my mother is in the hands of God. I don't know if either one of them will survive the year, frankly. There just isn't anything more I can do.

Except pray. God grant them both peace and joy in their seasons, however that is to pan out.

Jibbering in the Shadows

I was looking through my pictures on this computer, trying to find one that came even close to how I felt today.

This was a Paint program rendition of a dream image I had some years ago. The oil painting of it is still hanging unfinished on the studio wall. Well, was, I remember now that in my absence from home, Alex has taken over my old studio -- the painting must be stacked against a wall in the new venue.

In the image, a distant someone stands alone in a shadowy field, and though the sky is blue and has clouds, the dark background is not illuminated. The field in which the figure stands is a-jitter with color.

I've done this image first in dreams, then in Paint (a couple times, trying to nail down the shapes) and then in pastels as a preliminary to the oil painting. I no longer recall the flavor of the dream that generated it, but it will do as a symbol of today's trial.

I woke at a good time, about six. And then I didn't want to get out of bed. I huddled with the pillows and tried to sleep, but any time I saw a shadow pass by the window of my hotel room, I jerked with a sensation of an electric shock, wincing. I told myself I had nowhere I had to be until visiting hours at the hospital, but I couldn't fall asleep again. I got up and turned on my computer, looked at my usual lineup of sites, and then fell into a full-blown panic attack.

Heart hammering, stomach roiling, hands shaking -- hell, not just the hands, trembling all over -- and a terror at having to walk out the door. Every time I stood up I felt dizzy; every time I thought about having to talk to someone my vision blurred with tears. I bargained: after Bernie calls at his break time, I'll get moving. But he didn't call (problems at work) and when I knew I couldn't talk to him, I wept.

By 1 pm, I got myself timidly out the door, and went to see Jan. And though she was interacting with the nurses to a greater degree (some progress, anyway) my voice was shaking as I read to her, and the dizziness was increasing. The nurse who came in to check Jan's medications looked at me and said, "Are you all right? You don't look too good."

She took my blood pressure, which, for a wonder, was fine. And recommended I go back to my hotel and rest. Jan had fallen asleep, so I agreed.

The rest of the afternoon I spent in my darkened hotel room, twitching and trying not to think. I looked up "dizziness" on the web, and the Mayo Clinic site listed panic attacks as a possible cause. Duh.

Bernie called on his lunch break, and sympathetically reminded me that I haven't taken a day off since I got here. Well, then, I guess today was the day.

Shall we call it an "accumulation of stress?" Then, shall we add in that I know I will be going home in just a couple days, and want that travel so desperately that I cry when I think of it?

In the evening, my good friend Barb stopped over to the hotel to talk with me, and her eloquent, uproarious way of describing drama took me out of my dumps to laughter; she helped me realize again that I've done all I can do, and that if I have a friend like Barb, by God, that's one hell of a life's work.

The dizziness has subsided with the passing of the panic. Tomorrow I have one more meeting to attend; I'll spend the afternoon with my sister (she's getting the Aser stories, as we've finished "The Crystal Cave") and the evening with my sister-in-law. Friday will be for a last visit with Jan, and packing.

And then home.

Down, and Up, Hoping For a Steady Rise

Saturday, Jan was back on a ventilator in ICU.

Her blood-oxygen levels weren't doing well. She was uninterested in my reading, her eyelids only flickering when I told her I was there. Most of the time I sat with her, I was wiping away tears with one hand while I held her hand with the other. She didn't "fire" me, she didn't snatch her head away in anger. She seemed not to care.

She went to sleep soundly at about 5 pm, so I left, and went to sit and chat with my sister-in-law and sip wine for a while, then returned to my hotel, and after talking with Bernie, took a sleeping pill and settled in to read for a few minutes and try to rest, try not to stress out about going to visit my increasingly combative mother and take her to church.

At 11 pm or so, the phone rang, startling me out of my doze. It was the hospital; Jan had taken a plunging turn for the worse. They were taking her for a CT-scan to see if they could figure out why she was ... dying. "It's very serious," they told me, "but we'll call you if the situation worsens."

I fell asleep and woke again at 4 am. The phone had not rung, so presumably she hadn't died. I fitfully dozed and had panic attacks until 6, then got up and paced and wanted to puke until 8 am, when I called the hospital and asked them how she was.

Better, they said, but not good. I asked if I should try to rally our Alzheimer-impaired mother to visit her, and the nurse said, "Yes." In other words, it's time to say goodbye.

Since my mother had gone on a rampage about the disappearance of her truck, and was currently in the mode of "Hate My Daughter Sand With a Passion," I called her closest neighbor and told her the news. To my surprise, she told me that Tere wasn't even remembering that Jan had been ill, she was totally obsessed with her vehicles, and for everyone's sake and sanity, would I please stay away.

I was a bit stunned, but they are actually closer to Tere than I am, so I agreed. I went to church, and then, at noon, went to see Jan. When I walked into ICU, I approached Jan's room, and saw that her bed -- was empty. My heart froze, my eyes welled up -- would she have been taken to the morgue so soon?

A few steps more, and I was stunned -- Jan was there, sitting up in a chair beside the bed. Sitting up straight, her face serene.

The nurse, who was putting a blanket on Jan's legs, turned to me with a huge grin and said, "Can you believe this????"

She rallied, she did, and she was simply, simply beautiful to me. I couldn't keep my eyes off her. After about 3 hours, she began to nod off to my reading, and they put her back into her bed.

Monday she was stronger, and wanted me to stay later than usual -- how unusual! And today, she was moved out of ICU, and she was talking -- talking! She used (with help) the potty (and she was annoyed that the nurses took so long to understand what she was wanting) and later, she was talking aloud, in her 'normal' patter, about the "Holy Land" and it having been "200 years" as well as telling the nurses who were moving her, "Wait a minute. I have something to tell you. I have my own Home Showcase."

She was congratulated on that accomplishment by all.

God grant the improvement holds through the night.

Rain and Tears

Sunrise over the ocean?

No, instead it is a streetlight lit automatically over a parking lot during a dark midafternoon thundershower.

They have those things here; at least this week they do. The weather has been very dry for weeks, but this area (can't bring myself to say "we") has had a spate of thundershowers rolling through the area. The sun comes up, the sun is overshadowed by lumpy clouds, the dark gray shreds blow in, and with a light and sound show, rain buckets down like the scenes in the beginning of "The Matrix" or movie scenes of a storm at sea.

I savor the storms when they arrive; we don't have them in the Central Valley, not very often, anyway -- maybe five or six in a decade. While this storm was going on, I was completely countercultural and opened the drapes of the window-wall of my hotel room all the way, turned the chairs to face out and watched the storm play across the hills.

My mother always told me that I was born during a thunderstorm; I've often wondered if there is some connection between that and my overwhelming sleepiness when I start to hear the peals of noise following lightning. I relax, I'm filled with a sense of well-being, I want to curl up and smile, and drift into dreams.

But not like the dreams I had last night, that were the most horrible and ugly and heart-breaking that I have ever had in my life. The emotions of the dream bled over into my waking, so that my chest hurt with the sadness, and just pondering the images of the nightmare turned me to bitter, hopeless tears. I wept through my morning shower, and though I felt less pain after the tears, I was periodically moist-eyed throughout the day.

No thunder-dreams that one. I know the well-spring of that dream: all the emotions that rage and chase each other through my days here. Fury, frustration, guilt, fear, regret, the fleeting wisps of hope, the deep piteous gratitude for passing words of kindness, the disappointment of the low moments -- God, I feel like a war zone, a black and white movie image of the trenches of World War I. Weren't they always in the rain, too? As if the soldiers dug into their deep, gravelike earthen protections in fear and misery needed downpours to drown their wounded as they lay beside them?

I don't mind the rain on my journey here. I wish it would thunder at night loud enough to penetrate this nearly sound-proof hotel room and send me uplifting dreams. Maybe I'd wake in the morning rested and ready to attack the day, instead of going from sadness to horror to awake to the promise of more misery in the daylight.

The update today: Mom's caseworker and I hammered out a "plan" that will allow my mother to stay in her home until she screws up royally enough to unequivocally be sent to a care facility. And Jan had a stomach-feeding tube installed surgically, so that they can get that damned tube out of her poor nose. She was too groggy for me to visit her longer than necessary to find out she was doing all right, so I didn't stick around and read today.

Mom didn't answer her phone when I called her. Oh well.

Day to Day, Remembering

That was my mom and dad, just a couple months after they were married.

Mom has always said that they sat for this photograph because she was feeling sick and faint as they climbed to the top of a lookout tower above the Juniata River, I think just before that river joins the Susquehanna as they make their way to the sea. I used to know the name of it, but I can't recall any more.

Mom was already pregnant with my sister, Jan, when this picture was taken. Dad was handsome, Mom was a hottie. They both still enjoyed dressing snappy for an outing.

I called Mom this evening, rather than go visit her, because I needed a mental health day for myself. Not mentioning that I was in a hotel 12 miles away, I had a nice conversation with her. She knows I visited, but she does not at all realize that it was only yesterday I took her to church. She knows Jan went to the hospital (at least for that moment) but said she was glad she'd heard nothing, as "no news is good news."

Indeed, I had no news for her. Jan is still in the hospital, though out of intensive care, still refusing to eat or drink. Sustained by a tube through her nose to her stomach, Jan is indomitable, fractious, in command, whacking the poor nurses every time they touch her. She is damn mad, and letting us all know it.

I read from Mary Stewart's The Crystal Cave today for over five hours, stopping after each chapter for a water break to soothe my throat. Through some of it, Jan dozed, and when she would awake, startled, my voice was going on and on. Jan is -- although I know she's pissed -- listening to me read. I like to think that hearing me read eases the transition from her dreams to waking. In her dreams, I'll bet she can see and walk and jump and and have great adventures; waking to blindness and weakness must be a horrid experience. "I'm a vegetable," she moaned today after one such waking.

She didn't bop any nurses today, but she still won't so much as taste food or drink. Every touch aggravates the shit out of her, and she is as hostile as a wounded porcupine. Jan wouldn't let me hold her hand or stroke her arm today. But she didn't tell me to "Shut up" or "Get out" or fire me ... I can only take that as a good sign.

A Season to Mourn

This bird is named a "Boat-Tailed Grackle."

In the truncated language of my local dialect, we (at least those of us who didn't just call them blackbirds -- grouping them with red winged blackbirds, blackbirds, starlings, and cowbirds) called them "bow-tails." I always thought it was because their long fanned tails looked like the ends of a big bow tie. But as I learned the real name, I had no idea what boats had to do with the tails of these birds, nor do I at this present time.

What I do know about them is that when they arrive in the spring, you know that winter is finally broken, and hearing their characteristic 'click' and 'buzz' call in the mornings of March or late February mean that violets and troutlilies will soon be blooming, promising another season of new life.

This one was prowling in my mother's yard in Pennsylvania a couple weeks ago. The grass was still green, though a bit parched at that time.

The green of my mother's yard is brown now. They have had no appreciable rainfall in an area where rain is supposed to happen every three days or so at least. Flying in to Central Pennsylvania on a little commuter plane, I looked down and saw not verdant fields and lawns and forests, but ugly brown expanses. Not good.

For a while the weather services were predicting rain for tomorrow, but they've backed off that again. "Well, maybe, but not likely," is the forecast.

Another season of new life. How I wish that there was some bow-tail to herald such for my mother and my sister! But as my mother's lawn has withered, so has her grasp on reality. It's funny, she can still dress herself and keep herself clean, but she can't remember that she's not allowed to drive anymore, or that Jan is in the hospital recovering from two heart attacks. She knows she can't find the keys to her little truck (I removed them all after her license was suspended) but Sunday morning I caught her trying to use the car keys (from the monster station wagon that is inoperable in her garage) to open the truck and drive herself to church. She knows, at least at some level, that she is no longer allowed to drive, but the "core personality" that Alzheimer's is exposing believes that rules are made for "other people." Mother will do what she will, as she has always done.

I took her to church, but it was nerve wracking. She is having a hard time understanding what I say to her. She can't figure out how to do what she needs to do, but she won't admit that she's having problems. After we went to church, I cleaned her kitchen table and her sink, which were filthy. Watching me wipe down her table with paper towelling, she said, "Here, this is what I use," and tried to hand me a disgustingly dirty, many-times-used wad of paper towel. I tried to tell her it was too dirty to use, but she didn't understand. Finally I just took it from her and threw it in the trash, and then scoured her sink with cleanser, trying not to gag.

Each room in the house is in some sort of disarray, with dozens -- maybe hundreds -- of plastic grocery bags filled with unknown contents in every conceivable corner.

Everyone who knows her is scared of what she will do next, because inevitably, her stubbornness and denial are going to run headlong into some sort of disaster.

Sorting Through Feelings

I spent a goodly portion of this day with my mother.

Or rather, with her disease and what little is left of my mother. She repeats the same four conversations over and over, which is understandable, given the traits of Alzheimers. What is hard to take -- as it always was, in sickness or in health with Ma -- is that she cannot shut up. Any silence is for her a mandate to fill the quietude with her own voice.

As I was growing up, she could never understand why I would go to my room and spend hours there, or take off for the woods and spend the whole day puttering about the creek and the honeysuckle thickets. As a visiting adult, I would go to bed early or go sit out on the cool back porch by myself, and she couldn't understand that, either. Now she has given up on understanding anything, and a visit with her is a nonstop barrage of her trying to place blame on someone for Jan's illness, spouting angrily complete fantasies about how good Jan had it at home, how having close friends is not a good idea because they will always betray you, or warped tellings of family history of how everyone wronged her all her life.

Today, sitting at her kitchen table, listening to her rattle on and on, I began to wonder if I had actually neglected my duty to the world by refusing to fight with her when I was young. It took her a full hour and a half to eat a small McDonald's cheeseburger, because she could not shut up long enough to swallow. An hour and a half of the same diatribes, over and over, her mouth half-full of chewed food. I knew that the disease has taken her over, and the simulacrum across from me is not really the person I knew from my birth, but I really wondered if things would be different now if I had stopped hiding from her wrath as a teen and gone head-to-head with her, screaming, "Shut up! Shut up! Shut up! All you do is yap constantly about yourself! You can't shut up for one damn day, or one damn hour unless you're using silence to punish someone! Stop thinking about yourself and shut up and listen to someone else -- or just shut up and let the world rest in quiet for one damn minute!!!!"

Well, I probably would have ended up in a girls' school in Cresson, PA for the outburst, but I still wonder: if I had "taught" her that her self-centered constant rattle was unacceptable 40 years ago, might she not have learned to be still, and so be less of a nightmare for all and sundry now? 'Cause sure as shit, more people than me are being driven batty by her endless filibuster of fantasied wrongs now.

I don't know. I can't go back and change the past. But for the first time in my life, I can see a good reason for interpersonal conflicts. Maybe it's not a good idea to pussyfoot around and not tell people what their faults can do to others.

Visiting Jan in the hospital today, I read her two articles from National Geographic Magazine. She was alert (though unspeaking) through an article about the "Iceman" archeological find; the article on "Swarm Theory" only held her interest about halfway through. I could understand that -- she was awake almost all night resisting attempts to have an oxygen feed mask on her face. She was tired out.

The aversion to the oxygen feed mask I could also understand. I can't even accustom myself to a snorkeling mask. Drives me into a state of near panic. Maybe it's genetic. Okay, let's blame Mom.

Addendum: Not Sleeping

The Old Girl gets up at 3:30 am, having slept all of what, five hours maybe, puffing with adrenaline and regret and trepidation about what is to come.

She gets on a plane by 8 am, arrives at her destination by 8:30 pm, Eastern Time, dog ass tired and ready to die. Can't sleep. Too many questions. Too much adrenaline. Too many uncertainties.

She dozes off at 12:30, but is awakened by 1:15 by a phone ringing.

Adrenaline, adrenaline, adrenaline!!!!!! Who could be calling with what dire news at this time of night??? I leap from the bed, juggle the phone ... and it's a wrong number.

Adrenaline poisoning ruins the rest of the night.

No sleep.

Hoping and praying that all the adrenaline and weariness don't make me have a heart attack myself.

I hate traveling without Bernie.

Reading, That's All

Snow-On-The-Mountain is what I grew up calling this plant.

Looking through the pictures of our summer trip by road Back East this evening, wondering if any of the ones that are on this computer would "do" for this entry, I saw this and thought about my sister's hair, which I remember best as being simply chocolate colored with highlights of copper.

Now, at 60, her hair is mostly gray, though her brows and eyelashes are still chocolate. It's unflatteringly and unevenly cut, because Jan, in our mother's opinion, did not need, ever, to go to a hairdresser to have her hair cut (and so get used to such a process). And in the past 10 years, for whatever reason, Jan decided that having her hair cut was one pain in the ass she didn't want to cooperate with.

So our mother would wait until Jan was deep in an apneac sleep, sneak up on her and cut chunks off before Jan could completely wake up.

I spent much of my day with Jan today, just talking to her, and reading pointless magazine articles to her. Just making sure that she wasn't alone in the hospital noises. She turned her face toward me at first, and though she didn't speak much, she was peaceful until my soporific reading put her to sleep. (Actually, I used to read aloud to my first roommate in college when she asked me to -- when she had insomnia. I was a cure.)

When Jan slept, I took off to run errands or feed myself. When I would return, I'd resume reading. After a tech article in the newspaper about state of the art mini camcorders that are YouTube-friendly, Jan, her hands folded demurely in her lap and staring straight ahead, muttered, "Didn't understand a word of it."

I didn't either, but rejoiced ... she had been listening.

I was also a bratty little sister and read some tasty recipes from the magazines, as well as told her what I had for my lunch (luscious Laskaris Hotdogs). Jan is still refusing to take anything by mouth -- possibly because it's the one thing she still has CONTROL over (and unfortunately, "control" is what our female lineage seems to be all about), but she was salivating as I was talking food.

She's been pattering with her bare feet on the textured cool plastic of the foot of her bed, and making purposeful gestures with her hands that shape something of what she's thinking. She mutters things, makes up things, and talks more than I ever knew her to in the past 15 years ... and she's fixated on three phrases that are like magic words to make people react: 1) "I'm scared." 2) "I'm going to cry myself to sleep." and 3) "I'm so lonely."

Don't get too sympathetic ... Jan is a lifelong drama queen and will play to her audience. Those statements are left behind like dust kitties if we ask her, "What scares you?" or "Why are you going to cry?" or "But we're here, who are you lonely for?"

And then I see that sideways glance from her eyes (even though she can't see) that looks exactly, exactly like the one our Dad had when he thought he had gotten away with something but wasn't quite sure.

It was a good day, and by the time I was wilting (from having no sleep last night, but that's another story), Jan had about had enough of obscure pointless articles for the evening. "Tomorrow," I told Jan, "I'm going to pick up a People magazine. That's got to be more interesting than this stuff."

Thank God, I can say "tomorrow."