Fortunately I run my life like a business now..
I compartmentalize and close at the end of the evening.
Trying to find an angel to look at this -- oops, that was a typo, but I like it. I mean, trying to find an angle to look at this, to give it some meaning. But I can't seem to. My mother called yesterday and said she hadn't had time to look into a hotel room for my March visit to Reno because her husband Perry is in the hospital. When I asked how he was doing, she said "oh..not so good honey". My mother is the queen of the under-statement. Perry is hooked up to life support and doesn't even recognize her. Emphysema. The doctors talked about possibly sending him home with a big machine and bags of "food". Of course they'd have to cut a hole in his neck so he could breath too. And again, he would have no idea where he was or who the fuck he was living with.
Some people ask so little of life. My mother married Perry about ten years ago when he was 62 and she was 56. Perry had had no family since he'd been a young boy. My mother grew up as an orphan. They both seemed so surprised to have found eachother. Perry was this very skinny guy, stark white hair, Members Only jacket ... my mother, the basic Edith Bunker.. liking her smokes, Bingo, and the nickel slots, probably in that order. They moved into one of those faux new quickly-built homes in a gated Reno community.. bought a Cocker Spaniel.. (that dog is terrified of everything btw - won't even let me pet it) Perry's pension was enough for them to squeek by on and he bought my mom a cute little Cooper which she'd only drive in the daytime - she claims she can't "see" at night. But I remember sitting behind them at a traffic light immediatly after their wedding. They jumped around like two teenagers and waved while we all - all three cars of us, waited for the light, on a timer to change. it was this wide open area of turned dirt and no crops growing. Unused farmland. I remember thinking how beautiful and sad their denial was about having found eachother so late in life.
In the ensuing ten years I fell into a bottle and visited them only sporadically. I'd call on the major holidays, maybe get a card in the mail.. but my judgement was badly impaired and 2-3-and-4 years would go by without my visiting. It was always easier and more convenient for me to compare myself to my sister who hadn't spoken to her in a decade. Then I got sober last year. I started to surface again.. started to make an effort. More and more I tried to demonstrate to both of them, but particularly to Perry, that I'd be there for my mother..
Now he's lying in a hospital waiting to check out. My poor mother has to take him off life support and wait for him to go, go back to an empty house. And I never really got to put him at ease that my mother would be all right. I feel guilty about that. The truth is I don't really know if she will be all right. Too little, too late from yours truly.
And how he hell am I going to hit it off with that dog? It doesn't even like me.
Trying to find an angel to look at this -- oops, that was a typo, but I like it. I mean, trying to find an angle to look at this, to give it some meaning. But I can't seem to. My mother called yesterday and said she hadn't had time to look into a hotel room for my March visit to Reno because her husband Perry is in the hospital. When I asked how he was doing, she said "oh..not so good honey". My mother is the queen of the under-statement. Perry is hooked up to life support and doesn't even recognize her. Emphysema. The doctors talked about possibly sending him home with a big machine and bags of "food". Of course they'd have to cut a hole in his neck so he could breath too. And again, he would have no idea where he was or who the fuck he was living with.
Some people ask so little of life. My mother married Perry about ten years ago when he was 62 and she was 56. Perry had had no family since he'd been a young boy. My mother grew up as an orphan. They both seemed so surprised to have found eachother. Perry was this very skinny guy, stark white hair, Members Only jacket ... my mother, the basic Edith Bunker.. liking her smokes, Bingo, and the nickel slots, probably in that order. They moved into one of those faux new quickly-built homes in a gated Reno community.. bought a Cocker Spaniel.. (that dog is terrified of everything btw - won't even let me pet it) Perry's pension was enough for them to squeek by on and he bought my mom a cute little Cooper which she'd only drive in the daytime - she claims she can't "see" at night. But I remember sitting behind them at a traffic light immediatly after their wedding. They jumped around like two teenagers and waved while we all - all three cars of us, waited for the light, on a timer to change. it was this wide open area of turned dirt and no crops growing. Unused farmland. I remember thinking how beautiful and sad their denial was about having found eachother so late in life.
In the ensuing ten years I fell into a bottle and visited them only sporadically. I'd call on the major holidays, maybe get a card in the mail.. but my judgement was badly impaired and 2-3-and-4 years would go by without my visiting. It was always easier and more convenient for me to compare myself to my sister who hadn't spoken to her in a decade. Then I got sober last year. I started to surface again.. started to make an effort. More and more I tried to demonstrate to both of them, but particularly to Perry, that I'd be there for my mother..
Now he's lying in a hospital waiting to check out. My poor mother has to take him off life support and wait for him to go, go back to an empty house. And I never really got to put him at ease that my mother would be all right. I feel guilty about that. The truth is I don't really know if she will be all right. Too little, too late from yours truly.
And how he hell am I going to hit it off with that dog? It doesn't even like me.