WEIGHT AND WAIT
It is now Thursday, the day I take Mom to get her hair teased and stiffened.  I think she looks better when her hair covers her head, but teasing her hair is an old lady in the 1950s thing.  This is her day out of the apartment.  Right now it is raining but I don't think that will deter Mom.

  My worry is that she is losing weight.  I know sooner or later her immune system will weaken with the loss of weight.  So I wait without telling her what I think her losing weight means.  I don't think she has the mental presence to realize any explanation I might give.  I don't think she has the fear of losing weight to want to change.  And I don't know if eating more will even enable her to gain weight.
   This just might be being 92 years old and aging.
 
  So we will live another day, doing what we do every week.  Fortunately I think I have talked my mother into letting me write checks for her.  I have been wanting to for the last few months.  She miswrote two checks and that has bothered her enough to bring this up to me.

  I expect that after Mom gets her hair teased, she will want to drive around to shops and malls so she doesn't have to go back to the apartment, and merely lying there as she does all day.  Maybe today will be different, but I'm prepared to spend the day bored--for me bored not for her.

  Our life is so different than people younger, working, trying to get to some place they think will make them happy.  I don't know that I ever found that place, or ever will.  I'm not saying I'm better off or smarter, just that I have a different viewpoint on life than they do.  I saw the speeding traffic go by our apartment, flying for the Tollroad, for office buildings and sales and spending.
  There's a hurricane in Florida, where my sister Nancy lives.  Got to send her an email to see how she's doing.  Family has become more and more of my life.

COMING TOGETHER--74

Now it is Sunday night, late. I have had a good Sunday going to church and taking Mom to the Galleria to get her toe nails clipped. She has a deformedd toe, the middle toe so the nail has grown too long, causing her much discomfort. It also can get infected easily. So we go to get her toenails clipped every two weeks.

Everythihg went well. We came back so I could get some sleep before my night job. Mom slept well, then I read to her from a WWII novel which she likes.

Really, there is nothing to say about today worth reading.

+++

Here it is Monday. I delivered laundry, then went to a softball field to get some exercise. When I came back, Mom had her sights set on the Egg and I, our favorite place to eat. This has become an imitation date for her. I wish we didn't go so often, but familiar places are what old people like. We're going to see The Great Gatsby this afternoon, around 7pm. Mom needs to get away from the apartment and so do I.

Being here so much makes her lazy and uninterested in anything. Maybe the movie will be good for her, but taking her there won't be anything I want to do. I just have to pay for the priviledge of her paying the rent. So this is it.

Well, it is late Monday. Mom has forgoteen the movies. I bought a movie of Dial M For Murder, an old intricate murder mystery with Ray Milland. Mom stayed interested in it all the way. She didn't like The Big Sleep with Bogart and Bacall. It's too slow for her, but Dial M seems to have been just right.

We have had a good afternoon and evening. Right now I am playing Michael Buble'. He is the modern Frank Sinatra, so Mom is here with me listening without speaking. Things are going well.

COMING TOGETHER--73

Mom wants to go to her hairdresser by cab, 16 miles one way on her own. This bothers me. She can't see, she can't take care of herself, she gets lost in places she knows. I am wondering if I should call my brother about this. I fear the worst, that some cab driver or someone seeing her on her own will beat her up, steal all her money. This would not be hard to do.

I wonder if this is the beginning of a confrontation about the way she lives. I believe she belongs in a retirement home. She refuses to go. We are going to have it out over this, one way or another. In a way, I wish some circumstance would hurt her enough to make her realize how defenseless she is. But then even if it did, she'd want to forget it the next day.

I think things are coming to a head. I need to spend money to buy tires for the car, I need to decide about selling the car. I might need it if my living with my mother changes or ends suddenly. If she goes into a retirement home, I will have to find an apartment and get more hours at work. This little mini-retirement life I'm living might be ending soon.

If Mom goes to a retirement home, I will end this blog. My other blog on science and technology might be ending soon. The editor and I have failed to attract an audience outside our own circle. So things might be coming to a halt here, soon.

It is around 130pm at night, Saturday morning, June 1. It's almost too cute, having thiings change on the first--a new month, the 6th month of the year, half-over.

How long will things continue as they are? I don't know, but I fear change will drop upon us suddenly.

COMING TOGETHER--72

Now Wednesday has come. I took Mom to get her hair done. This is a lot of trouble for me but it gives her the feeling of independence. However, some things happened.

Mom got lost in the store in which the salon is located. This upset her, as she likes to think she can get around on her own. It cut into her independence and pride.

Then she wanted to spend the day running around stores, but I couldn't do that. I had to get back to the apartment to get some sleep to work tonight. So I said she should get my brother's wife to take her around so they could spend all day doing whatever they wanted. Mom tried to exaggerate that by saying she could take a taxi, why I didn't even have to know when she takes the taxi and when she gets home. She was trying to get her independence back by separating herself from me.

I took her to the Cheesecake Factory, a good restaurant. Mom goes there because of the huge desserts. She eats a few bites of real food, then says she can't eat anymore. That's a lie. She just wants sweets, so she ordered a huge strawberry shortcake and after saying she can't eat any more, she downed the entire shortcake in easy fashion.

She said she depends on me too much. That is true, but not because she can be independent.

When we got back to the apartment, one of her lady friends called about the fact that Mom had completely forgotten a lunch she was supposed to lead and host today. This upset her.

She admitted she was losing her memory and that frightened her. I took that as the first time in a long time she admitted the truth about her age and her condition. I liked what she said. I told her eating all the sweets she does just takes any nutrition out of her blood, so it affects her mind and body. I think she got the point, but it doesn't matter. It's too late to matter. I expect her to forget what happened today.

This makes me wonder what is going on with her body and why she coughs so much. I wonder how much longer this situation with Mom is going to last.

COMING TOGETHER--71

It is Tuesday afternoon. As I am typing this, Mom is pretending to be asleep on the sofa next to me. I think she is lonely, and is there to be where I am.

I don't always want to be with her, I get tired of having to worry about her eating and health every day, every moment. I like getting away from her, but she has no one else. She is a dependant type who often uses arrogance to mask her dependency.

She badgers me with questions, as a way of talking to me since she really doesn't know how to communicate with me otherwise. I get mad at her constant questions, so I have to remind myself this is her only way to hear a voice in a world she is leaving.

She is like the image of the only person in the universe, standing on the earth shouting out to heaven hoping a voice would only come back. Without me to badger with questions, she is that person hearing nothing coming back.

If you don't believe in God, old age can be frightening to your memories.

So she lies there, just behind me at my right. It imposes on me. I wish she weren't there, I wish she were in her tv room, watching some stupid show. I've never enjoyed being around her, even as a small boy. I think I always knew we were as distant as strangers can be.

I always wished I could live with someone who did understand me, who could communicate with me, and I have known two women like that. They married someone else, so here I am.

COMING TOGETHER--70

Now it is Memorial Day Weekend. We have had a good time. No conflicts, Mom and I have been eating well, doing our duties and relating much better. I have been reading to Mom, she likes that because it is so hard for her to read herself.

I've been reading a novel called Princess Elizabeth's Spy, a spy novel set in WWII, about a young female spy. I've started reading to Mom, The Big Sleep, by Raymond Chandler. He used to live in LaJolla CA where Mom and Dad lived 30 years ago. I even read her part of my novel about Dad's life in WWII. She didn't know I wrote that. I think she was favorably impressed.

This is a sign that she is able and willing to do less than before, but it also means she has accepted she can do less than 6 months ago. I have to accept that, too. I can't push her beyond the limits of a 92 year old woman who can barely walk. I'm grateful she can feed herself and dress herself, so I have to remember to not be too impatient about how slow she is.

Mom's daughter Nancy and her husband Lamar have grandchildren. They sent me a video through the email, which I showed Mom. She smiled through the whole 4 minute video, in fact, she wanted to see it 3 times.

I am working more than I have in two months, maybe that's good but my job of working all night--8pm to 4am--is boring and drudgery. I'd like to do something better but the job fits my life with Mom so well I won't give up the job just for money.

Anyway, we go on. We don't have any answers to life, they are not coming. We just go on living, more out of default than anything else. The alternative to living is just a nothing. Not a black hole sucking us in, not a destination out there, not a fear scaring us into retreating into the past, just a nothing.

COMING TOGETHER--69

Today Mom and I went to our favorite place, The Egg and I. Mom stuffed herself so much I asked the waitress for a wheelbarrow to get her into the car. The waitress laughed, Mom did, too.

Now we are home. She is in her chair, about to hit dreamland full of food. I told her she is at the point that her taste exceeds her body. She wants to taste more than she can handle. She agreed, which was gratifying. She knows what I have to tell her, that it's better to eat good food than food that just tastes good.

I once heard a nutritional doctor say, If it tastes good, it's not good for you. Maybe an exaggeration but still it's true.

So I called my brother to ask him to call Mom, 'Tubby.' I hope he does!

I have to go to work overnight for the next 5 days. This is a first step toward spending less time with Mom than I have. We may be heading toward a different arrangement than the dependency she's had toward me. I hope this is the case, as I'd like to have a girlfriend.

Now it is Thursday morning, Mom is still asleep. She has had to sleep in her easy chair because she has little bladder control. This may be a bad sign, or it may not. I'll just have to ask the doctor or his head nurse, Amanda.