This past March, as those of you following my blog already know, my partner Karyn and I took my 86-year-old mother, who is frail and suffers from dementia, on a trip from California to Florida so she could see her last surviving sibling one final time. The two sisters hadn’t seen each other in seven …
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It’s our last morning in Florida. I booked a late afternoon plane so we could get a direct flight home—and not have to rouse Temme for an early morning flight. This morning, Uncle Ben had to go to dialysis and I knew he’d be there for five hours, so I knew I had to say …
By the time we were up and had eaten breakfast and Mom had finished her two morning naps, it was 1:00 PM and I was really needing an outing. Lucy was working again today, so she agreed to drive Esther and Mom and I to one of the many pools gracing this complex. I put …
Before we left on this trip, Karyn and I were slowly making our way through the Showtime series, Masters of Sex. Every night here, I’ve been sneaking an episode after the house is still. I brought a tiny set of headphones and am watching in secret on my laptop. It helps me unwind after the …
Mom woke up disoriented today, certain we were party-crashing her sister’s house, that we shouldn’t be there, that we were imposing, and that she was ready to go home. I wondered if I should give her a dose of the Ativan I’d brought along, but by the time my cousins Judi and Stuart showed up …
The morning went smoothly. Mom was disoriented when she woke up and had taken all her clothes off in the night, but I dressed her easily and helped her into the bathroom. When it came time to help her into her Depends and lift her off the toilet, I felt nothing but tenderness—and then my …
The afternoon before our departure, I went over to pick up Mom’s walker, her medications, and her suitcase. I’d put a few things in it, and Rosa had packed the rest—her Depends, her toiletries, the container for her teeth and the tablets to clean them. A pretty black skirt and some shorts. A few tops. …
Over the next few weeks, I brought up our trip occasionally. Some days Mom thought her sister was coming to see her at Sunshine Villa. Other times she repeated the story about sharing the good news with Esther. “She was so delighted and surprised,” my mother informed me, every time. Esther had learned a thing …
I debated whether to blog this trip and once I decided to, I wondered whether or not I could possibly call it a Virtual Vacation. This is clearly not going to be an exotic armchair adventure in Bali or a Scottish adventure or a travelogue through Mexico. It’s going to be a journey into old …
We slowly made our way down the flowered hallways, flowered wallpaper lining our pathway, flowers edging the muted carpet on the floor. I deliberately shortened my stride, moving so slowly it felt like the walking meditation I’d done 20 minutes at a time at Spirit Rock Meditation Center on 10 day Vipassana retreats. My mother was teetering nearby, floating with an expression on her face that looked sweet and empty at the same time. I’d taken her on a walk around the second floor of the building, up the elevator, circling three hallways, and back again. We passed the front desk, the music room, the library, and around the corner past the activity room, the place with the large looseleaf notebook out front where you can sign up for outings on the first day of the month—the scenic drives, a monthly movie, outings to Walgreens or Rite Aid to stock up on shampoo or Depends.
The first time I saw the Sunshine Villa bus, six months ago, I looked at the huge letters across the side of the bus on both sides, shouting out for all to see: Sunshine Villa Assisted Living and Memory Care. I remember thinking at the time, there was no way Mom would ever live here, ride in a bus like that. It would be way too humiliating. I felt the same way when I visited on Saint Patrick’s day and the halls were full of little cardboard shamrocks and leprechauns or at Halloween when black cats and orange pumpkins lined the halls. For the entire month of December, canned Christmas carols blared from speakers in the hall. That would be hell on earth for my proud Jewish mother, to be in such a goyisha place. It was like a holiday curriculum at a preschool on steroids. Is this what they think old people want?
Now, six months after my first visit, Mom was living here, being helped up into the van with the letters screaming Memory Care on the side, enjoying the scenic drives to nowhere.
