:: Mental Kudzu ::

Letter to R
#1

Okay, it is just me now. Some instant verse for you:

I hear the carwash noise of dishes coming clean,
Agitating towels,
A loose vent cover as the heat swooshes behind me on the couch.

Both dogs sigh
Roll over in their sleep
As Thisbe the brain-damaged eldercat

says “mer… mmmm… mer”

###
Your HipMama piece was extraordinary. Thank you for including our Mule in your bio. I love it when ya’ll do that. I knew it would be tough times for you then, and the best I could do was send cards while in Costa Rica. Not much, just a little — but you did know I was thinking of you, right?

I am recovering from this. Even before it is over. I dream of Momma dying – every night with scenes of how I am to cope, of how she reacts – it’s as if she’s watching herself slowly stop breathing and telling me how to manage what is next. Each time I am surrounded by laughter. The hardest part is losing, piece by piece, 91 years of her.

C4 has stepped into my place at Britthaven – in a way I did not think possible. Every day she goes and teaches Momma how to pull herself up and get into the wheelchair, how to go to the toilet. How to clean her dentures. She paints Momma’s fingernails with bright pink polish. Puts sparkly barrettes in white halo-hair. At night, she lays out Momma’s nightgown, and sets aside tomorrow’s clothing. Everything matches… she tells me button-down Oxford shirts command respect and Momma’s in a pink one today.

Emmett is entranced with Grandma’s new apartment. Assisted-living. It is Assisted-Living. Jane has created two remarkable little boys. The medivac helicopter lands in a field outside Mom’s window and he gets to stand on a chair, eating a DumDum sucker, (Ollie’s at pre-school) as he watches “the patient, Nana… see? First there is a patient who must go to a hospital… to see the doctor but this patient does not ride in Mommy’s car like FarFar did when he had an accident…” and all this is accompanied by rowdy hand gestures, facial expressions worthy of Douglas Fairbanks or Rudolph Valentino, and dripping chin sugarsyrup. Boys with stay-at-home Mommies learn how to love more easily, I think. He’s two but recently became E3 and that is…

sublime.

Oliver arrives from nearby Montessori School. As he waves to the chopper while they cross the parking lot, the helicopter flashes its lights on him. Grandma lives in the best place in the world. At four and two, all eyes are on eyes. He pats hands of wheelchair-bound residents and has learned to use the Purell by himself, squirting just enough and then getting on with the visit. He sits in my lap while Grandma sleeps and we watch TV on the Blackberry. What will his number be?

Tonight, as she opened her evening prescription pillbox, Mom knew a pill was missing. She called me “dear” and patted my face.

And her voice was …

hers.

And she wants to invite Emmett over tomorrow. They will sit in the porch swing together. Just the two of them because it’s his turn to be here alone, without “Bubba”. And she wants him to tell her all he knows. She says, “He’s two. He thinks he understands it all and he’s ready to tell us about it.”

And her voice was …

hers.

The radio is on, Vivaldi soothes out of Public Radio East as we get her ready for bed. She wears a lace-collared night gown, pink satin with ribbons and bows. Her white hair halo surrounds a peaceful face and she smiles at me. “I remember Pearl Harbor. Your father and I were so damn mad. Back then I thought there were idiots in the White House. Like now, with 9/11 and Dick Cheney. And this McCain who must think he’s going to die and that Palin woman will be his Dick Cheney. Idiots in the White House. Damn them today. I really hate that Dick Cheney.”

And her voice is …

hers.

I choose my label. “Writer” It’s rectangular. And temporary. The large blue HELLO, I AM fades with the continuous cycles of permanent press which are wrought forth with eco-friendly laundry powder my friend brings me from Costco.

Twenty years ago, my father stuck another label above my left breast. This one, “Caregiver”, won’t come off in the washing machine. It doesn’t shrink or fade. If anything, the ink brightens. It’s as colorfast as time.

I hear the clump, drag, clump of my mother’s three-pronged cane as she stutters her way across the kitchen toward the front of the house. Her destination is the front porch. She hesitates at each threshold. Dining room. Living room. Front door. Each room is unfamiliar and she must place herself, physically and mentally, in her location before moving on to the next one.

Lately we’ve been making soup. She lurches myopically through the Soup Bible, seeking recipes and searching for ingredient lists. The idea of a pantry is completely foreign to her. The pots are too heavy to lift. The new gas stove is too complex to operate. We listen for the click-click-click of the pilot light. Click-click-click-click-click-click.

What are the ingredients on hand? Should there be a trip to the store? How do we choose our recipe on this day?

The idea of soup gives our day a continuity, a purpose. We began with vichyssoise.
Potatoes from this bin, waxed cartons of broth from this shelf, carrots from the refrigerator bottom right drawer.

Each day begins a new search.

Last night I bought beets. “Mom. Look what I have.” I hold up the grocery store bag, the green and dark red leaves of the beets hang out over the top. “Beets.”

She looks up. She’s holding a cell phone in her hand. It’s turned off. “I can’t turn this on. What is that? What?”

“Beets, Mom. Remember? We’re going to make borscht.”

“Borssshhhh? Borssshhhh? Why won’t this phone work?”

I smile and say, “Just a sec. Let’s plug it in, recharge it.” Then I hand her the cookbook. “Borscht. Beet soup. Russian Borscht. Let’s make some.”

Leaving her with the book open on the illustrated guide to creating borscht, I walk into the study and wait for her to read the recipe.

But she picks up the cell phone. I hear the beep-beep-beep as she presses numbers. “Hellooooo. This is Ruthie. It’s Ruthie. Jane? Roy? Roy, why won’t you let me talk to Jane?” I wait a few minutes, walk back to her room. She has the cookbook in her lap, the phone on the table.

“I’m going to take Ollie to the movies this afternoon. When I get back, we’ll make borscht. Okay? I’ll only be gone for a little while.”

“Who?”

My mother, at age 91, suffers from boredom. It’s an onerous malady. Being 91, she’s physically limited, so she spends most of her free time having what I have termed “Opportunistic Senility“. Yup. She acts senile to get my attention. She’s sharp as a freaking tack when she needs to be. She received her BS in Engineering c.1939 from the University of Cincinnati. One thing she’s never been is stupid.

We’ve had her in training for the last month, prepping for the Costa Rican Adventure. Sister Phoebe Kate may be coming up for a few days of RuthCare, and Jane, Andy and Grandballoons will come over daily but still, Mom will need to put on her game face if she’s going to let these idiot dogs out a gabillion times a day. So she’s doing “laps” around the kitchen table with occasional sprints to the hall bathroom and back, and while we don’t have her doing any push-ups, we’ve got her on a high protein, leafy green vegetable diet with whole grains and rice. By Golly, she’s shaping up nicely. Even wearing her New Balance shoes with some spiffy Tweety Bird black and yellow socks…

Some alone time will be good for Ruth. She’s too dependent upon all of us. Now, don’t go thinking she’s going to be here alone for more than an hour or two at a time. We live in one of those neighborhoods you read about but don’t think really exists. This is a small town southern historic district with people home in all the houses along the street, front porch sitters with big old rocking chairs, sipping sweet tea and, these days, chatting on cell phones as much as to onsite family. You couldn’t ask for a better place to be 91. Just ask Velma Englehard. She’ll be stopping by for daily visits and at 94, believe me, when she parks her gargantuan F-150 half on the curb and half in my yard, the dogs pay attention!