My 96 year-old mother loves a party. Just because she is 96 doesn’t mean she’s forgotten. When we lived in Mexico, she and my father used to put on parties all the time, whether for birthday parties or for the members of the Junior League or their friends in the American community. The parties were […]
“I can’t hear you!” I was shouting because I couldn’t hear Mom over the 150 decibel television program. I was also yelling “Mute!” “Mute!” I finally went over and hit the mute button on the remote. In the blessed silence, I asked what it was she wanted. Watching television with Mom is a challenge. We’ve […]
Yesterday afternoon, I came into the trailer to find Mom bandaging up her leg with a piece of paper towel and scotch tape. Mom had been out cutting away the dead leaves of the cannas at the suggestion of the Other Caregiver (thank you VERY much!) who had mentioned the unsightly nature of the plants. […]
And here I was worrying that I wouldn’t have anything to blog about. What was I thinking? Of course, I should have known she would come through in the clutch. And she did. This evening, at nine o’clock at night, after I had just returned from an exhausting 2-hour drive back from Houston, Mom decided […]
Back from San Antonio to find that the OC (Other Caregiver) has successfully steam-cleaned the carpet. Blessings on her little pea-picking heart! It looks much better and Mom is happy. Of course Mom helped by getting down on her hands and knees to use a scrub brush to get the spots out. I knew she […]
The ‘Other Caregiver’ (hereinafter OC) and the Steam cleaner are in charge at home and I am in San Antonio. I should be feeling relaxed, relieved and headed toward refreshed. But no. I’m feeling guilty, nervous and way too concerned about how things are going back at the ranch. First of all, Mom is really […]
And some days are good days. Yesterday morning I invited Mom to a book signing at our Huntsville Public Library, one of her favorite haunts, and she agreed to go. My usual problem was back-to-back meetings. We would have to attend the Outlook Reading Club meeting at four o’clock first–before the book signing at 5, […]
Last night, I watched Mom hobble, stoop-shouldered, tottering and swaying, from her bedroom across the kitchen to her chair in front of the TV, collapsing into it. No longer straight-backed, no longer firm of step, no longer strong and confident, she reminded me of the pictures we’ve been seeing of the elderly WWII and Vietnam […]
Just finished one of Chuck Wendig’s entertaining blogs on his ‘brokern robot’ child, a pre-schooler he calls B-Dub. It occurred to me that Mom is much the same at 96, a person who is slowly regressing to childhood and wants what she wants when she wants it. Like NOW! Mom has been concerned over […]
Some of us, I’m certain, have, or had, mothers or elderly relatives that screamed and yelled and expressed their feelings at us or at their circumstances without holding back. You certainly knew how they felt. Others remained completely stoic, never showing intense emotions. Mom is the latter. As I wrote yesterday, my 96 year-old […]