A Quiet Friday

It's quiet right now in the apartment.

Ardis the hospice day nurse sits at the dining room table, Buddha-like, where he can keep an eye on Mom. Mary is working on her latop. Ever the journalist, I think she's drafting an obituary. Adrian is sitting in Mom's spot on the sofa, in the captain's chair, working on his laptop. I am without laptop, so I'm using Dad's PC, just back from the computer emergency room with a new motherboard.

Dad just walked down to the apartment office and walked in with a beautiful bouquet of flowers from June Bishop, an old friend (going back to grade school) of Mom and Dad's sister Marybelle. Helen and Will walked in at the same time as Dad. Susan just called, she's out of school for the day and so she's headed over. Travis called before that and he's going to be on the road up from San Antonio either late tonight or first thing in the morning.

It's quiet now, but it's going to get noisier.

I doubt it will get as noisy as it did last weekeend when EVERYBODY was here, laughing, telling stories and drinking champagne. It put a smile on Mom's face to hear the music of her family. Her grandchildren were thrilled to see one another and their energy was contagious and continuous.

Her response has lessened during the week. She did not turn her head to me when I visited on Tuesday. Today is the first day Ardis has officially confirmed that she is non-responsive. But her heart keeps beating. She continues to breathe.

It's hard to imagine that her body can continue, that she can get any weaker, but she does. Living proof of Zeno's paradox of Achilles and the tortoise.

But ultimately the paradox will be proved wrong.

It's just a small matter of time.



Bleak and Joyful

It was a true celebration of Mom.

As the family gathered for the weekend, we were concerned that we would be too loud for Mom. Turned out, she liked the noise. It was her family enjoying being together and that made her happy.
As a matter of fact, she wanted more of the party in her room. We obliged.

People trickled in all day on Friday and each had their time with Mom. On Friday she could still converse, if slowly.

On Saturday, Mary and I got Mom to tell us stories. I will type them later. It was her last sustained vocal conversation. I say vocal because she can have a whole conversation with her eyes.

Saturday evening the whole family gathered at the apartment to toast Mom. We passed the champagne and Dave gave a toast. Mom took a sip of champagne.

Funerals can be joyous because everyone comes to a funeral and you see loved ones you haven't seen in ages. The reason for the funeral is always there with you, surrounding the gathering. The future without the deceased is final and bleak.

So in true Polly fashion, we planned ahead and had a funeral-ish gathering before her death. Best of both worlds. Always thinking ahead. It seemed much more important to have a gathering to say goodbye than a gathering after the fact.

Stressed? Yes. Complicated? Yes. Exhausted? Yes. Wonderfully at peace? Absolutely.

So thank you all for coming so far. And for those who were only with us in spirit, we love you.

More Gifts

I spent about an hour sitting with Mom on Monday afternoon. Not talking or touching, just sitting. My thoughts wandered to our lives together. The past. Forgiveness.

I remembered during the worst of our relationship when I was 16 probably and I sat on her bed and told her that I hated her. I remember looking straight in her eyes and mustering all the emotion I could into my eyes, shot the hatred at her like a bullet. I don’t remember her expression except that it was blank. A poker face, I realize now. The reason that I know is that I had similar experiences with my children during those same bad years. I’m sure that I had the same poker face. Now I know the emotion behind the face. It hurts.

I thought of times that she had wronged me. Not one specific incidence but many over the years. Times when she wasn’t there for me because she was drunk. I didn’t know that she was an alcoholic. I just knew that she wasn’t there.  It hurt. Now I know that I did the same to my children. I was severely depressed (with no meds) at times and I know that I wasn’t there like I should have been. Or wanted to be.

So the gift? Forgiveness. I worked all this out on Monday and talked to her about it on Tuesday afternoon. I asked her forgiveness and gave her mine. I talked about the light and letting it in. I told her I love her. I know she loves me. A gift.

Some poems

Helen and I were sifting through all the lovely letters and pictures Mother has received from the apparently millions of people who love her. In a stack of papers I found a list of Robert Frost's poems. Mother had put check marks besides those she particularly loved. These are the poems. They sound just like her:
The Pasture
The Telephone
The Birches
The Rose Family
A Time to Talk
The Last Word of a Bluebird
A Minor Bird
What Fifty Said

Waiting

A joyous weekend in the face of profound grief: I'm proud and grateful I'm part of a family that can muster that kind of karmically perfect response. I believe Mother could feel the love as much as Daddy did.

She had a new nurse last night. Mother seemed a little huffy about that at first, but she got over it.

The hospice has okayed continuous care for the foreseeable future–great news. Although Mother sleeps most of the time, and hasn't had anything to eat or drink since Saturday, she is not comatose and all her systems have not shut down. Her blood pressure is low but stable, her respiration is within normal range. She purses her lips to give me a kiss and opened both eyes wide when Louise and Bob King came by today. They brought some split pea soup; like everyone, they are concerned about Daddy as well as Mother.

I postponed my flight back to SLC indefinitely.

And to all a good night

Mother finally drank a half-inch of Coca Cola this afternoon.

I fixed pork chops, squash and tomatoes and salad for dinner for Daddy and me. And we ate a few of Beverly's grape leaves.

Ardis left at 8 and after some discussion, Daddy decided he was more comfortable having a night nurse, too, so Diana is here again. Glen may sleep with Daddy.

She gave Mother the hydromorphone (Dilaudin) and some lorazapam before she went to bed, after she watched about half of Obama's speech and greeted Glen, who arrived about 8: 15. Just mustering the energy to be the happy hostess for a few minutes wore her out. Visits will have to be brief, all right.

Although she did have the energy to tell me to get a bev nap for his Sam Adams. And which drawer they were in.

First things first, Mom!

She received a pile of letters today: another from her "secret angel," and others from Doris, Helen Mary, Jim Frensley and Judy Shackleford, who sent a copy of a picture of Mother serving punch at Judy and Leon's wedding in 1946.

Wow.

Arrival and beyond...

Mother liked her night nurse very much; she left this morning when the new day nurse, Ardis, came, but she will probably be back when Glen and I leave.

The swelling in Mother's face has subsided, and her lips are a not as puffed up, though they are still red and she's had a little bleeding today.

Sharah came today. And so did Isabel. So Mother and the house are clean.

Mom had a little anxiety attack this morning, so Ardis gave her some lorazopam to calm her.  She is also taking dilaudid instead of morphine; Ardis calls it the "Mercedes" of painkillers. Well, of course.

But Mother has been extremely lethargic today. She rallied a bit this morning to talk to Betsy on the phone, but most of the day she has been sleeping. Really sleeping, not just dozing. We had to wake her up to take her shower and wash her hair. Then she was awake long enough for me to read her some of her fan mail, but not all of it.

She is weaker, Daddy says, but the main change he sees is how sleepy Mother is. And, he says, "I don't like it."

Ardis says she will probably continue to sleep more and more until she slips into unconsciousness.  He, of course, has seen this before. She hasn't eaten or drunk anything all day.

It does not seem like a good sign. Maybe we should toast on Friday night.