Although it has been rather uneven, I would have to say after some deep reflection that by and large my life has been pretty good.
It may not have been the one the almighty planned for me, and it may have been made of a quite a few roads not taken because of good and bad decisions, but at the end of it I should be able to say that it went pretty well.
I have made mistakes, but I have also accomplished things that have made the lives of others better.
So, when the final days are approaching, keep that in mind.
Wherever I spend my last days, please do not speak to me in one of those up-swing high and slow patronizing voices that are usually reserved for puppies and small children. Speak to me as if I am the adult I am.
Don’t use the imperial we. I appreciate that you want to know if we had a BM today, but really, I will be more concerned if I had one, and probably not all that interested in whether or not your bowels moved.
And, please, do not assign me busy work to do so that it becomes obvious you want to keep me busy until I die with no desire that I just might accomplish something meaningful.
My grandfather was a tinkerer. He could disassemble and reassemble just about anything so long as he stayed methodical.
After my again asking why the cuckoo clock in my grandparents’ hall never made a sound when the bird popped out, one day while I as visiting, my grandfather decided we would find out why.
The hall in their house went from the front door back to the kitchen, and one day my grandfather took the clock down, and, laying it by the front door, took the clock apart piece by piece lining the parts in order from the front door to the kitchen. Once this was done we looked carefully at every piece until we saw that there was a small tear in the small bellows that was supposed to give voice to the bird.
After applying a small piece of packing tape to the tear, we reassembled the clock piece by piece from the kitchen to the front door, and, after re-hanging the clock on the wall, moved the hands until they reached 12:00, and the bird came out and spoke.
My grandfather was no clock maker, and he had never worked on a cuckoo clock before, but his being methodical paid off.
Years later when Alzheimers was still a bit of mystery, my grandfather went to the hospital because he was acting odd and had injured himself. I went to visit him with my mother, and when we arrived, he was sitting in a wheelchair that had an attached tray, and he was untying a knot in a wash rag. As the nurse was talking to my mother, my grandfather finished untying the knot, and after he handed it the nurse she retied the knot and handed it back to him. He shot her a quizzical look, shrugged his shoulders, and untied the knot a second time.
Again he handed it to the nurse who, while still explaining things to my mother, retied the knot and handed the wash rag back to my grandfather. I had never heard my grandfather curse, but when he was handed the knotted cloth he looked at the nurse and said, “What the hell? If you want a knot in it then don’t hand it to me to untie it. I you don’t want a knot, stop tying it into one.”
And with that he laid the cloth on his little table. H was done with this.
Not long after this he told the nurse he had to use the bathroom, and she walked him to the one that was nearby. He entered, closed the door, and we heard him throw the lock. He was in there long enough to start us worrying, and then we became a little alarmed when we heard the sound of small pieces of metal hitting the floor. Alarmed, the nurse called for security who arrived with a maintenance man who proceeded to remove the hinge pins from the door. When the door was removed, there was my grandfather sitting on the floor by the sink hand tightening the bolt on one of the pipes. He turned and proudly announce, “There, that should do it. The dripping was driving me crazy.”
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The maintenance man noted that there was now no drip.
Years later, when Alzheimer was more widely understood, my grandmother had to be placed in an assisted living setting. This was a place where moneyed people got private rooms while people like my grandmother shared a large room with three other people, each of whom had their own corner area, and where each person was allowed to set up their space with familiar objects and pieces of furniture.
Besides communal meals, the residents had daily group activities like bingo and some of those other patronizing activities that for some had to have a built in degree of humiliation.
Once a week they would all get on a mini-bus and go to the the Council on Aging center for activities with people from other similar settings.
One day my mother got a call to come to “the home” because my grandmother was out of control.
Fearing the medical worst my mother and I rushed to the place, and upon arrival and heading for my grandmother’s room, we were told the problem wasn’t inside the building, but inside the bus outside.
After weeks of the Wednesday trips to the COA center, my grandmother had apparently gotten upset that they were merely going to another location to do something just as useless as what they had been doing at their residence. Why were they going to some building to make knit potholders when they had no kitchen privileges?
My grandmother had suggested they all go to the nearest mall so they could walk around and see the people and see what was in the stores. Many of the other inmates agreed with her. So, when all but one of them was on the bus, and the driver went to assist the last person on, my grandmother had apparently closed the door, and having seen the driver do it, looped the piece of rope with the hook on it around the door opener so the door could not be opened from the outside no matter how strongly you pulled on it. She was refusing to unlatch the door until it was agreed they would go to the mall.
They apparently expected my mother to talk her out of the rebellion, but my mother asked why they couldn’t go to the mall and walk around if that is what all the ladies in the bus wanted, and from their encouraging cheers to my grandmother’s rebellion, they obviously wanted to.
They lied to my grandmother, who upon opening the door was escorted off the bus and walked into the building.
She was kept back, while the bus went off to a day of potholder making.
When my time comes remember this, and sit me in front of a computer. I may not accomplish anything, but I might. But please don’t give me knots to untie, or potholders to make. The latter would be the height of irony as in my pre-dotage years I generally use the microwave or call for take-out.
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