It’s been an interesting week.
First, my beloved tomato plants that Eli started for me got leaf spot or something. I looked it up on the internet where I read to buy a certain fungicide which I did. Sprayed it on the plant. Nothing happened. I asked my gardener what to do. He said spray the leaves and stem with a combination of dishwashing soap and water and then when the sun comes out it will kill the fungus--plus it's organic. I did. The next day the whole plant died. Guess I sprayed it too much, as in full-on baptism. I mean, if a little soap’s good, a whole lot is better? I used to be able to grow things. Now I plan for their demise. What's happened to me?
Then, last Saturday mom started to collapse and moan and groan. Lei, our caregiver, was with her. She called me but the cell phone didn’t ring through. Then she called the hospice number. Then she called 911. Then she called me again. This time we connected and I came right home. However, because mom’s now under the care of hospice we weren’t supposed to call 911. Actually, it’s more complicated than that but not worth going into. I met 5 young strong paramedics and firemen at the front door and told them that we weren’t supposed to call them but they agreed to come in anyway and assess the situation. Mom was lying on the sofa in some sort of unconscious state. We couldn’t rouse her. Several more minutes passed and she came around enough to moan and groan. The 5 burley guys carried her to her bed where she proceeded to be unrousable again. It was very confusing as we were still waiting for hospice to call back. The 5 calendar boys took her vitals which, although slightly elevated, were still okay. The hospice nurse called and said she’d be at the house in an hour. I sent the 5 rescue men away and Lei and I stood on both sides of mom’s bed watching her. More time passed. And suddenly we heard a very tiny tiny voice. It was hard to make out at first what mom was saying. But then it became distinguishable. Hello! Hello! Helloooo!
Well, hello Mom! Welcome back! Mom lifted her head and asked, “What happened to me?” I told her I didn’t know and had the same question. Then she turned towards Lei and said, “Something’s wrong. Something’s wrong. I see black! I see black!” I looked at Lei and looked at mom and said, “Mom, that’s Lei’s blouse. Her blouse is black”. “Oh,” she replied with wonder. Then promptly sat up, said she was hungry, and asked what did I have for her to eat. She was cheerful, laughing and practically ready to go to a party.
Well, no one had any answers as to what had happened although there were a few guesses. But starting with the next day her agitation increased and for the next few nights she decided not to sleep. When she’s in this state it’s always pretty tough on me because she’s sedated and doped up and wants to keep getting out of bed so no one sleeps, especially me. By the 5th day of hardly no sleep, the red-headed fraulein entered the picture.
Chelsea and I went to Costco on Friday. I was dragging pretty slowly at this point on 1 or 2 hours of sleep per night. We were in the store for almost an hour and 2 heavily laden carts full later we walked back to my car that I’d parked in handicap w/ my dad’s placard. Let me say right here and now that Eli objects to my using the card without my dad or mom in the car. But I truly felt handicapped and was having a hard time shuffling from point A to point B. At any rate, by the time we got back to the car a withered up ol’ wrinkly wench with flaming dyed red hair was standing behind all the cars parked in handicap locations and was writing down license plate numbers. As we drove away Chelsea said, “Mom, she’s writing down your number, too”. That was the final straw-- don’t mess with an overtired sleep-deprived woman of 61 who deals with the possibility of death on a daily basis.
I roared around the corner and drove back next to the mean nasty harpie. “Why are you writing down my license plate?” I asked her, perhaps with a bit of a sharp tongue. “I am viting down der numbers to see who eez reely hondicapped ,” she spit out nastily in a bad Ahnold imitation (yes, I know he was Austrian, but whatever, both Austrians and Germans dye their hair red) as she continued to keep “viting”. “How dare you! It’s an invasion of my privacy. It’s an invasion of Hippa laws! My daughter is an attorney. I’ll sue your butt off!” (Mind you, I’d also helped Chelsea pack her condo and garage for 4 days in sweltering heat, the weekend before had been especially stressful in other ways and I admit I sort of lost it on her…but it felt good to yell at someone! I’m not proud of this, just admitting my mortality.) You pit two obstinate Germans against each other there's bound to be some fireworks. She jumped in her car and tried to get away. I screeched around the corner again to face her oncoming car and this time I made a big deal of letting her see that I was writing down HER license plate. Oh, did I mention that she, too had parked in a handicapped spot but did not have a special plate or placard? And yes, Chelsea, who lives in a world of drama, was asking ME to calm down. What happened to me?
What have I learned from all this?
1. John Denver had it right about homegrown tomatoes, but I'm sticking with the ones from Albertson's.
2. I'm grateful for the time I still have with Mom even when it's exhausting.
3. Crazy pent-up rage unleashed on interfering Nazis feels great!
We had a great 4th of July. Lazy, slow, balmy, and moderately peaceful. Hamburgers on the grill, potato salad, baked beans, (I later found the uncooked corn on the cob on the counter--oh well, it was that lazy). Lei, our caregiver, wanted to spend the day with us and work, too, so that was super. Most of the flags I've had in the past seem to have disappeared so Sawyer and I took a little trip to the hardware store and bought a big one for the front yard and a small plastic pool to cool off in. Chelsea and I spent a few hours in the afternoon painting pictures of sailboats. I was happy to have a paintbrush in my hand again. She'd still be erasing her original sketch this morning if I hadn't kept reinforcing that this was meant to be fun and the only thing that mattered was loading paint on to the canvas and see what develops.
