August 29, 2019

Running Away

I really wish I could run away from my life. I would drop everything and disappear into nothing. I’d clean out what cash I have out of the bank, ditch my cell phone, and drive to a town I’ve never been to, as far away from “home” as possible. I’d change my name and be someone else entirely.

All of this is fun in theory but the moment I start to break it down logistically it’s almost impossible. And in the end I would ultimately miss my life, my family, and my friends. It’s just at moments where I feel so overwhelmed that it would be nice just to get a breath of fresh air away from the baggage and bullshit that consumes my every thought.

I have been described as a very cerebral person and they are not wrong in that assessment. I very much am, to my own detriment. I pick apart of every situation, word, choice and future as much as is humanly possible. Yet in doing so, I drive myself mad. I wish I could stop but nothing I do silences my inner monologue. (Podcasts or comedy albums sometimes help.)

What I find most confusing is there is nothing at this moment that is too overpowering; well at least today. This wanderlust just fell over my shoulders for no apparent reason other than it’s been awhile since I felt like garbage. So instead of leaving my life behind I’m going radio silent for awhile. I just want to be left alone.

August 28, 2019

Where Do the Details Go

There is something wrong with my mind. More precisely, my memory. I have been one who could recall names, places, faces, and facts without any trouble. It was like my mind was a rolodex and all I had to do was give it a spin and I would land on just the right information every time. Yet lately it seems likes these mundane facts have left me coming up empty.

The one that frightens me the most is facts and details of things I myself have created, yet cannot recall. For whatever reason I started recounting all of the different “lands” I’ve created while writing stories, and I could remember all except one. To this very minute I still cannot tell you what the name of it is, and for this particular series I fleshed out an entire thousand year history that culimanated into the events of my short story turned novel. At one time that was something I knew in intricate detail. Now I can’t even tell you where all of this fictional bullshit took place.

I am aware of how overdramatic I sound. This is not a real cause for concern. But dealing with my mother’s rapid slide into dementia, I have become hypser sensitive over the slightest change in my own memory recall. It leaves me asking am I too going to suffer from this disease? Or worse, is this something external that is not only fueling my mother’s memory loss but now having an affect on me?

I am sure the answer to this is a simple one. My sudden missing mental notes are due to either age or just overall stress. Lately I have come under a lot in regards to my dad’s sudden an unexpected death, and my mother’s mental collapse and unrelated health issues.  I’m sure (and hope) that once all of these things have calmed and my mind is at peace these details will return to me and I will be just as sharp with my mundane facts as I ever was.

August 6, 2019

Coming to you LIVE from the Living Room

The hardest thing to grapple with my mother’s illness is that the woman who currently resides in her body is very much not like the one who raised me. This one is more like a petulant child than anything else. She’s argumentative and obstinate, who will do the exact thing you tell her not to do. It’s irritating and upsetting.

Her “caretaker,” for lack of a better word, (babysitter is more apropos but I refuse) doesn’t start until this coming Monday. The plan was that she was going to come and stay with me until Thursday, but last night she flat out told me she wasn’t going to stay with me. So I countered by setting up camera’s in her house.

I must confess they are incredibly handy. I can see most areas of her home and what it is she is doing, which is constant shuffling. And if I so chose I could get alerts to ANY movement. However, as previously mentioned, she never sits down, so the only camera that sends me alerts is the doorbell. I want to know if she goes somewhere, especially since I told her “don’t leave the house.”

The husband and I have dubbed it “The Ginger Show” ala the movie “The Truman Show,” because we can see what she’s doing at all times. And goddamn is it fascinating. Just the mundane things she does, aren’t so mundane when you realize she is mopping the floor with a padless Swiffer. Or she is readjusting the chairs for the third time, even though they haven’t been moved since the last time she rearranged them. But in my mother’s mind she is more than capable to take of herself. In fact, she is completing every task she sets out to do. However she can’t tell you why she thinks that, but she can tell you why she doesn’t use the things she once used, like a telephone or a T.V. remote. I dub this kind of activity “raging against the dying of the light.”

I know she refuses to see herself as old or infirm.  She doesn’t even believe that she has Alzheimer’s. Whenever she talks about it, it’s always “what you say.” I want to immediately counter with “no, it’s what the doctors say.”

When I switch over to the “live view” of whatever room had the last bit of activity and I just take a moment to watch what she’s doing, I am overcome with this immense sadness. Here sits a woman who is quickly deteriorating mentally, who has no concept of what is happening to her and refuses to admit that she needs help. If I believed in any kind of god I would pray she realizes she can’t do this on her own, but there is no greater power in this universe. Maybe there is and like these Ring cameras he just enjoys watching this shit show. But unlike me, he gets off on the misery.

July 29, 2019

A Month in Review

It’s weird to think that my dad has been dead for a month now. It simultaneously feels like it’s been forever and then again no time at all. I miss him but at the same time I miss what he was for my mother, a caretaker.

My mother has Alzheimer’s. An aggressive bout of it, it would appear. Everyday it feels like she’s getting worse. Then again it could be because I am seeing all of it, in all of its cruel glory without filters.

I never truly understood how bad it was. My father would just tell me that it was getting worse but never elaborated to how or why he felt that way. Now I do.

For those keeping tally, I have bathed my mother 3 times and cleaned up her “accidents” just as much. She has so far accused my husband of bringing a woman home and fucking her in our bed and has also told us (on a separate occasion) that the power chords in her room were calling her ugly. However she also has accurately figured out who Josh is and what role he plays in my life. To that I say “clever girl” in the voice of Robert Muldoon from Jurassic Park, right before he’s devoured by a velociraptor.

My mother is adamant that she won’t be living with my husband and I. She wants to go home and me “live my life” and she “live hers.” I haven’t even broached the subject of assisted living by the advice of a woman who’s sole job is to place elders into care. That’s about the only thing I’ve listened to thus far.

I’m trying to please too many people in this situation when I have to think about what is ultimately the best choice of action. What that is I don’t know. Well, that’s a lie. A care facility would be best but when I look at the monthly cost, coupled with how much money she has and how little I make to supplement that it seems like a fools errand. Especially given that we don’t know how long she will live.

Getting old in America is genuinely a cruel joke. You work your whole life, scrimping and saving to leave your children something after you go, and instead it is bled dry by corporations who make money off of the infirm. All for the idea of safety, care, and security.

I am someone who couldn’t care less about what my mother could leave me. Her on the other hand is deeply concerned. She repeatedly tells me she wants me to have something upon her passing. Looking to the horizon that will be one other thing she won’t get.

But it’s for the best, considering her disease has already claimed one life and it wasn’t even hers.