What is it about a crisis, bad news, bad weather, car crashes, natural disasters and the like?
The elderly are riveted!
Perhaps it is living to a ripe old age, sidestepping any number of maladies and mishaps (not to mention facing up to one's mortality in the face of friends and family losing theirs) that makes my mother sit up and take notice (and continue taking notice) watching the same images on TV for hours on end.
This morning we were to take a drive to our new town, our new house. We wanted to show her the house, her spaces, talk about setting up the kitchen, show her the back yard where we'll be enjoying coffee on warm spring mornings in the near future. Alas, our missing winter arrived today so the conditions were not ideal--we'd be happy to go, we're equipped, we have our snow tires, but my mother would be bracing herself in the front seat the entire journey awaiting the inevitable wipeout. We'll go next week, it will be easier for all of us!
So, we are not leaving the city, yet, we have to turn on The Weather Channel every 20 minutes or so to check the road report and talk about how grim it is. We look outside and see snow blowing around and talk about how grim it is. For days now we've been tsk tsking about the snow in Japan, lo and behold in our coverage of local snow there's Japan again so we can tsk tsk yet again.
We do live in a snowbelt here, it's snowing and it's a bit windy but it's hardly a storm yet we are watching the coverage like it's the storm of the century. I think there be greater joy it if was the storm of the century, we could REALLY get into it :)
Weather, to be fair most Canadians seem transfixed, is a biggie. We've also covered car crashes, local politics, salaries of the rich and not famous (more politicians, heads of hospitals, our banks...), Native Canadians (I try to steer clear of this one not even delicately anymore, I will take advantage of my mother's wandering mind some days so I don't have to hear those comments that just make you wince).
I think we've covered virtually all bad things except environmental catastrophe.
It's 1:05pm, there's plenty of time and news channels to find that one.
Off I go, risking life and limb, 'out in the weather' as my best friend and I say. I'm going to the gym which is ten minutes away, I'll leave the TV on for my mother so she can watch the local accident report. Yes she will do this (true, in a way it is sweet...little nutty but sweet).
Saturday, February 11, 2012
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Numerology
In my first post I was moving from my beloved adopted home in Toronto to my hometown to care for my mother. I wasn't entirely sure how this would work, how long, would I stay here indefinitely, would we all leave again, would we move her to Toronto (given we prefer older areas of the city it proved impossible to find, and then afford, an appropriate house that could work for my mother).
For the past three months here I've not given up my Toronto number. I realize it's ludicrous, anyone outside (and maybe inside) Toronto will roll their eyes, but, I was reluctant to give up my number because it would denote a break from my city and I didn't want to give up my 416! You can't get those anymore! Crazy as it is I've simply been paying higher, much, phone bills......just in case.....
As of this morning I'm no longer a 416, I'm a 519
It's a 4-6 week stop gap.
Soon there will be a new adopted town, it'll be exciting to own and set up my home again, get my life out of storage!, embrace a new community, see the lift (hopefully) a new home gives my mother.
And there'll be a new area code :)
It is trivial given all the change that's come about since we decided to embark on this adventure last summer; I guess I secretly held to my 416 'cause it was one of the last vestiges of my former life.
On to more important things.....
For the past three months here I've not given up my Toronto number. I realize it's ludicrous, anyone outside (and maybe inside) Toronto will roll their eyes, but, I was reluctant to give up my number because it would denote a break from my city and I didn't want to give up my 416! You can't get those anymore! Crazy as it is I've simply been paying higher, much, phone bills......just in case.....
As of this morning I'm no longer a 416, I'm a 519
It's a 4-6 week stop gap.
Soon there will be a new adopted town, it'll be exciting to own and set up my home again, get my life out of storage!, embrace a new community, see the lift (hopefully) a new home gives my mother.
And there'll be a new area code :)
It is trivial given all the change that's come about since we decided to embark on this adventure last summer; I guess I secretly held to my 416 'cause it was one of the last vestiges of my former life.
On to more important things.....
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Stream of Consciousness
So this morning we get up, grab our respective newspapers, coffee, take our places by the fire.
It's a normal morning until my mother gets on a roll talking about the crime of the day (a truly heinous honor killing, I'll not follow suit and rant about it though I could) and attitudes toward women. Right on!
Somehow this rolls into one of her 'it's just like....' tales. This particular tale takes us back to her elementary school, a home ec project where she had to make a plaid skirt and a 'fat teacher' who was out to get her. The teacher apparently made her cut her plaid fabric too big resulting in an ill fitting skirt which of course landed her a subpar grade. My mom believes the teacher made her cut the fabric too big because the teacher herself was too big.
Yes I can see the connection....women's rights, honor killings, a subversive fat teacher out to fail a svelte fourteen year old.
And we didn't stop there. With nary a breath taken we were in a furniture factory where my mother worked with springs (at least fifteen minutes of detail on springs, fringes, upholstery buttons), the old Metropolitan department store in Stratford Ontario where she was a floor supervisor, Bill King, Doris somebody, a man whose nickname was Stewy and I don't know who else....I've heard these stories many, many times before but I go along. There is comparatively little happening in life at 83, I figure as long as we can talk in the present (so I know we aren't totally lost in the past!) then what's the harm in mom traipsing down memory lane on occasion (OK daily). At times she enjoys the reminiscing, other times it's an effort to make sense of her life (she talks a fair amount of her brother who was killed/murdered at 30, there are things in life you just don't get past).
As I say, normally I roll with this but today I thought my head was going to explode.
Yesterday we bought a house and so begins the process of packing, purging, moving, and selling another property here. Lots on my mind and on the plate. A 25 minute, 70 year old story was too much at 7:45AM. After we left the department store 'we' were talking about an even earlier job packing butter in a factory, a brief stint plucking feathers from chickens (seriously); you do see the connection between the aforementioned news of the day and all of this yes?
Suddenly the story stops, I reign in that fluttery feeling in my chest (similar to the fight or flight response I imagine) and all is calm.
For ten minutes.
I'm having an issue with a government agency which is proving extremely frustrating (they apparently have no staff so there is no one to answer a phone or a fax or an email), this unfortunately takes us back to WWII?! Mom is off ranting about income tax being a WWII measure and it should never have been allowed to continue. I point out all that income tax pays for, how life is a little improved over those times knowing full well that my words are futile--like pissing in the wind as they say.
It's first thing in the morning, I'm exhausted before I'm even fully awake.
It's a normal morning until my mother gets on a roll talking about the crime of the day (a truly heinous honor killing, I'll not follow suit and rant about it though I could) and attitudes toward women. Right on!
Somehow this rolls into one of her 'it's just like....' tales. This particular tale takes us back to her elementary school, a home ec project where she had to make a plaid skirt and a 'fat teacher' who was out to get her. The teacher apparently made her cut her plaid fabric too big resulting in an ill fitting skirt which of course landed her a subpar grade. My mom believes the teacher made her cut the fabric too big because the teacher herself was too big.
Yes I can see the connection....women's rights, honor killings, a subversive fat teacher out to fail a svelte fourteen year old.
And we didn't stop there. With nary a breath taken we were in a furniture factory where my mother worked with springs (at least fifteen minutes of detail on springs, fringes, upholstery buttons), the old Metropolitan department store in Stratford Ontario where she was a floor supervisor, Bill King, Doris somebody, a man whose nickname was Stewy and I don't know who else....I've heard these stories many, many times before but I go along. There is comparatively little happening in life at 83, I figure as long as we can talk in the present (so I know we aren't totally lost in the past!) then what's the harm in mom traipsing down memory lane on occasion (OK daily). At times she enjoys the reminiscing, other times it's an effort to make sense of her life (she talks a fair amount of her brother who was killed/murdered at 30, there are things in life you just don't get past).
As I say, normally I roll with this but today I thought my head was going to explode.
Yesterday we bought a house and so begins the process of packing, purging, moving, and selling another property here. Lots on my mind and on the plate. A 25 minute, 70 year old story was too much at 7:45AM. After we left the department store 'we' were talking about an even earlier job packing butter in a factory, a brief stint plucking feathers from chickens (seriously); you do see the connection between the aforementioned news of the day and all of this yes?
Suddenly the story stops, I reign in that fluttery feeling in my chest (similar to the fight or flight response I imagine) and all is calm.
For ten minutes.
I'm having an issue with a government agency which is proving extremely frustrating (they apparently have no staff so there is no one to answer a phone or a fax or an email), this unfortunately takes us back to WWII?! Mom is off ranting about income tax being a WWII measure and it should never have been allowed to continue. I point out all that income tax pays for, how life is a little improved over those times knowing full well that my words are futile--like pissing in the wind as they say.
It's first thing in the morning, I'm exhausted before I'm even fully awake.
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Start your day off right....
with The Littlest Hobo?
New pattern: my mother is glued to both the news and The Weather Channel each morning, for hours, the winter road reports in particular whether or not any of us will be on said roads. Of course if there's an accident, anywhere, in the world, we must express shock and dismay (we do live in a culture of accident porn with our immediate all-reporting media)
I often worry that I watch too much TV but I know that my mother watches too much TV.
Maybe it's 'too much' in my humble opinion, oftentimes there is little else to do at this age when saddled with significant mobility issues. She loves to read but can't do that 24-7.
All that said, do we really have to suffer through a daily double header of The Littlest Hobo?
At 9am! Some of you, of my vintage, will recall this dreadful Canadian TV series that ran late
70s to mid 80s. I'm a huge dog lover, I have one, yet I detest this show....and now I'm listening to it every morning....at this very moment in fact.
New pattern: my mother is glued to both the news and The Weather Channel each morning, for hours, the winter road reports in particular whether or not any of us will be on said roads. Of course if there's an accident, anywhere, in the world, we must express shock and dismay (we do live in a culture of accident porn with our immediate all-reporting media)
I often worry that I watch too much TV but I know that my mother watches too much TV.
Maybe it's 'too much' in my humble opinion, oftentimes there is little else to do at this age when saddled with significant mobility issues. She loves to read but can't do that 24-7.
All that said, do we really have to suffer through a daily double header of The Littlest Hobo?
At 9am! Some of you, of my vintage, will recall this dreadful Canadian TV series that ran late
70s to mid 80s. I'm a huge dog lover, I have one, yet I detest this show....and now I'm listening to it every morning....at this very moment in fact.
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Different Perspectives
We're about to start work on my mother's condo so we can put it on the market early next month.
Having been through this once before I know moving a parent can be a big job, they come with a lot of stuff. Some of this stuff is interesting, important, of value either personal or actual, some is useful.
And then there is the rest: bad lamps that now live beside the furnace and haven't been used at all in four years (even when new in the 70s they were 'unfortunate'), weird lawn chairs with seats made out of a nylon/yarn looking fabric (it's weird and ugly and dirty), about 60 tea cups that I know for certain have not escaped the china cabinet more than three times in forty years and a cheap 5" TV-with-built-in-radio unit ordered from a catalogue (likely Publisher's Clearing House, we love that here) for my father about ten years ago, he never turned it on (currently it sits in my mother's 'craft room' caked in dust).....and that's just the tip of the iceberg.
We're combining two households so both parties will need to purge (though we, partner and I, did a fair bit of this when we put our household into storage). In the spirit of this my mother on occasion will say 'oh I should get to work, clear out some stuff', and today she did just that.
After spending 1.5 hours in her craft/sewing/storage room she called me in for the big reveal:
Eight small sized, unused sympathy cards (inexplicably she opted to keep the uniquely sized envelopes without the matching cards) and 5 pieces of construction paper each cut into a large circle intended to be used as signage for some association several years ago.
That's it. She felt it was good progress. 'I wanted to get rid of a few things'.
Really? OK then. At this rate we should be able to clear out a few things, pack and move by 2014.
She also wondered if any of my friends are into crafts. I do in fact have one crafty friend (you know who you are, you read this) and her craft 'donation' was going to be several popsicle sticks. Originally these sticks were to be used as handles on the aforementioned construction paper signs. Note to friend: don't worry, you are not getting the popsicle sticks.
We clearly have differing perspectives on what constitutes 'getting rid of stuff', maybe we can make a little more headway in coming days. It was a start!
You can't imagine the extra space after today :)
Having been through this once before I know moving a parent can be a big job, they come with a lot of stuff. Some of this stuff is interesting, important, of value either personal or actual, some is useful.
And then there is the rest: bad lamps that now live beside the furnace and haven't been used at all in four years (even when new in the 70s they were 'unfortunate'), weird lawn chairs with seats made out of a nylon/yarn looking fabric (it's weird and ugly and dirty), about 60 tea cups that I know for certain have not escaped the china cabinet more than three times in forty years and a cheap 5" TV-with-built-in-radio unit ordered from a catalogue (likely Publisher's Clearing House, we love that here) for my father about ten years ago, he never turned it on (currently it sits in my mother's 'craft room' caked in dust).....and that's just the tip of the iceberg.
We're combining two households so both parties will need to purge (though we, partner and I, did a fair bit of this when we put our household into storage). In the spirit of this my mother on occasion will say 'oh I should get to work, clear out some stuff', and today she did just that.
After spending 1.5 hours in her craft/sewing/storage room she called me in for the big reveal:
Eight small sized, unused sympathy cards (inexplicably she opted to keep the uniquely sized envelopes without the matching cards) and 5 pieces of construction paper each cut into a large circle intended to be used as signage for some association several years ago.
That's it. She felt it was good progress. 'I wanted to get rid of a few things'.
Really? OK then. At this rate we should be able to clear out a few things, pack and move by 2014.
She also wondered if any of my friends are into crafts. I do in fact have one crafty friend (you know who you are, you read this) and her craft 'donation' was going to be several popsicle sticks. Originally these sticks were to be used as handles on the aforementioned construction paper signs. Note to friend: don't worry, you are not getting the popsicle sticks.
We clearly have differing perspectives on what constitutes 'getting rid of stuff', maybe we can make a little more headway in coming days. It was a start!
You can't imagine the extra space after today :)
 |
| Bordello Lamp: 35 years in existence, 4 years and counting unused in the furnace room |
2012: A New Year
I'm quite sure the primary ingredient in a blog is content, someone, ie me, actually writing something.
At least semi-regularly. There we go, I'm not a writer.
It's early in the new year, I'm in a new local (way back you'll recall I moved to my hometown, it was over two months ago yet curiously only what, 3 blog entries?) cafe enjoying a dark roast, some time to myself, and pondering. Not pondering deeply, I think I've done that and now just want to get on with things.
Earlier I wrote three entries, saved, never posted. I worried the tone was too negative.
This phase is rife with memories in the making, frustrations, at times a sense of having compromised too much of my own life but most of all (having been through illness and death with my father) the daily awareness (sometimes awareness comes after poking myself) that this is a pivotal time in life and these are the right changes at the right time.
Something that has stuck with me from the early days of returning home are the words my mother says almost every evening: 'OK I'll see you in the morning'. She goes to her bedroom, I go downstairs to ours. It's comforting. I'm happy knowing she can retire for the night secure in the knowledge that she is alone no longer, her next day will have company and the day will be easier to get through, the one person she's closest to in this world is here with her. It doesn't have to be that way for everyone, indeed it isn't for most, for me it's as it should be.
The Christmas season was quiet but lovely. I had plenty of time at home with my mother and spent New Year's with friends in my other home, Toronto. Humor me with a little recap that wasn't posted:
I love the hush of the holiday season. I love Christmas for many reasons: the halt of life as we know it, suddenly it's acceptable to laze about all day, eating whatever, whenever, coffee with Baileys, cookies at breakfast....a sanctioned free-for-all.
This was the first year in perhaps fifteen or more that I've been home well before The Big Day.
It's the first year I've trimmed the tree with my mother in all these years. With Christmas music playing ( I love sappy holiday music) we sorted through the years and decades of ornaments, recounting where they came from, the age, those that were bought the year my parents married (1952) and those that belonged to my grandmother making them over 100 years old. I should have taken some pictures but of course it's January now, the season is packed away....next year.
My mom pulled out ornaments I'd never seen before, these delicate ornaments belonging to her mother usually stay in storage but this year they were on the tree. With a big smile on her face she pulled out 'Sputnik', the silver spiky ornament named, of course, after the satellite launched by the Soviet Union in the 50s (there is an abstract resemblance...sort of), this was my favourite ornament in childhood. We gave my dear departed dad's Roy Rogers ornament a prominent front of tree spot (those of you who knew anything of my father are not at all surprised that there's a Roy Rogers ornament).
She busied herself with her annual baking: two types of shortbread, squares, pie; sadly these were signs of her decline, she's always been an excellent baker but this year nothing turned out as it usually does. Her shortbread recovered somewhat in round two (we tossed the first batches), the apple pie on Christmas Day wasn't quite right. Despite these new moments we had ample time by the tree and fire, old movies, lots of treats, music and (a first!) a fresh, local turkey. I insisted we should try something different and look beyond the usual frozen turkey from Walmart my parents would buy each year in Port Huron (my mom did take a stab at suggesting we drive to Port Huron to buy one, just before Black Friday, honestly....). It was a lovely season, what I really wanted I got: time at home.
It's a new year. We look forward to a slightly altered life plan that has us moving to an area west of my old home in the big city (I have to add I'm not sad about leaving my hometown, this extended visit has simply reaffirmed that it's not home anymore, doesn't fit), a new career path for me, and an adventure for my mother (she seems to be looking forward to it....now....we'll see when D-Day arrives, it's a big shift for her).
We have more property to sell, two households to sort through, we'll be very busy and no doubt we'll encounter bumps along the way (thus far two houses we had interest in have sold on us, one was a dream house) but the changes are positive. We're on the right road now. I'm grateful to be on any road frankly. Last year brought about lots of questions, hand wringing and emotion with the loss of career, sale of my beloved house and leaving my city. In retrospect it's been freeing...for the most part, some days it's freeing because I tell myself it is.
I find blogging therapeutic, I guess that's partly the point. I decided to launch into this as a way to process my own feelings, changes, challenges and wondered if it might spark something in others faced with the same. It's not easy to log the moments without it sounding harsh at times but I've been going through this for some time--first with my father's illness and death and now my mother's challenges--and I know first hand, even when you want to be present for it all, when you willingly make changes in your life to accommodate, you still have many hours and days that chafe (supremely!).
I will try to more regularly log the good and the not so; for those of you 'in it' or if you can see it coming you know there is great joy but also frustration; when my entries feel harsh it's just honesty seeping in.
Lo and behold three people have recently asked me about updates so I guess I have a small (obligated, all are friends) audience.
It's a new year, change continues, bring it on.
Happy Quite Belated New Year
At least semi-regularly. There we go, I'm not a writer.
It's early in the new year, I'm in a new local (way back you'll recall I moved to my hometown, it was over two months ago yet curiously only what, 3 blog entries?) cafe enjoying a dark roast, some time to myself, and pondering. Not pondering deeply, I think I've done that and now just want to get on with things.
Earlier I wrote three entries, saved, never posted. I worried the tone was too negative.
This phase is rife with memories in the making, frustrations, at times a sense of having compromised too much of my own life but most of all (having been through illness and death with my father) the daily awareness (sometimes awareness comes after poking myself) that this is a pivotal time in life and these are the right changes at the right time.
Something that has stuck with me from the early days of returning home are the words my mother says almost every evening: 'OK I'll see you in the morning'. She goes to her bedroom, I go downstairs to ours. It's comforting. I'm happy knowing she can retire for the night secure in the knowledge that she is alone no longer, her next day will have company and the day will be easier to get through, the one person she's closest to in this world is here with her. It doesn't have to be that way for everyone, indeed it isn't for most, for me it's as it should be.
The Christmas season was quiet but lovely. I had plenty of time at home with my mother and spent New Year's with friends in my other home, Toronto. Humor me with a little recap that wasn't posted:
I love the hush of the holiday season. I love Christmas for many reasons: the halt of life as we know it, suddenly it's acceptable to laze about all day, eating whatever, whenever, coffee with Baileys, cookies at breakfast....a sanctioned free-for-all.
This was the first year in perhaps fifteen or more that I've been home well before The Big Day.
It's the first year I've trimmed the tree with my mother in all these years. With Christmas music playing ( I love sappy holiday music) we sorted through the years and decades of ornaments, recounting where they came from, the age, those that were bought the year my parents married (1952) and those that belonged to my grandmother making them over 100 years old. I should have taken some pictures but of course it's January now, the season is packed away....next year.
My mom pulled out ornaments I'd never seen before, these delicate ornaments belonging to her mother usually stay in storage but this year they were on the tree. With a big smile on her face she pulled out 'Sputnik', the silver spiky ornament named, of course, after the satellite launched by the Soviet Union in the 50s (there is an abstract resemblance...sort of), this was my favourite ornament in childhood. We gave my dear departed dad's Roy Rogers ornament a prominent front of tree spot (those of you who knew anything of my father are not at all surprised that there's a Roy Rogers ornament).
She busied herself with her annual baking: two types of shortbread, squares, pie; sadly these were signs of her decline, she's always been an excellent baker but this year nothing turned out as it usually does. Her shortbread recovered somewhat in round two (we tossed the first batches), the apple pie on Christmas Day wasn't quite right. Despite these new moments we had ample time by the tree and fire, old movies, lots of treats, music and (a first!) a fresh, local turkey. I insisted we should try something different and look beyond the usual frozen turkey from Walmart my parents would buy each year in Port Huron (my mom did take a stab at suggesting we drive to Port Huron to buy one, just before Black Friday, honestly....). It was a lovely season, what I really wanted I got: time at home.
It's a new year. We look forward to a slightly altered life plan that has us moving to an area west of my old home in the big city (I have to add I'm not sad about leaving my hometown, this extended visit has simply reaffirmed that it's not home anymore, doesn't fit), a new career path for me, and an adventure for my mother (she seems to be looking forward to it....now....we'll see when D-Day arrives, it's a big shift for her).
We have more property to sell, two households to sort through, we'll be very busy and no doubt we'll encounter bumps along the way (thus far two houses we had interest in have sold on us, one was a dream house) but the changes are positive. We're on the right road now. I'm grateful to be on any road frankly. Last year brought about lots of questions, hand wringing and emotion with the loss of career, sale of my beloved house and leaving my city. In retrospect it's been freeing...for the most part, some days it's freeing because I tell myself it is.
I find blogging therapeutic, I guess that's partly the point. I decided to launch into this as a way to process my own feelings, changes, challenges and wondered if it might spark something in others faced with the same. It's not easy to log the moments without it sounding harsh at times but I've been going through this for some time--first with my father's illness and death and now my mother's challenges--and I know first hand, even when you want to be present for it all, when you willingly make changes in your life to accommodate, you still have many hours and days that chafe (supremely!).
I will try to more regularly log the good and the not so; for those of you 'in it' or if you can see it coming you know there is great joy but also frustration; when my entries feel harsh it's just honesty seeping in.
Lo and behold three people have recently asked me about updates so I guess I have a small (obligated, all are friends) audience.
It's a new year, change continues, bring it on.
Happy Quite Belated New Year
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