Monthly Archives: June 2014

Friday letter to My Kids: Going, Going, Gone?

Posted on June 6, 2014 by Kami

Dear J, J, L and L,

About a year from now all four of you will live in a different state from each other. Already I’m in mourning.

I’d like to think that life will coöperate with my plans to visit one of you at least every other month. I promise I’d keep them short visits, if they’re frequent.

We all know how that plan will work out.

There’s so very little anyone can do to prepare for the experience of parenting. And then after eighteen or more years of figuring it out there’s also nothing that prepares anyone for when those kids leave home, or when they leave the state, or the country.

I need to get me one of these bikes.

You know that scene in the movie ET? Oh yeah, I forget, some of you haven’t even seen ET. (I truly have failed in your cultural development. We won’t even mention that one of you didn’t recognize a Beatles song when you were old enough to date.)

Here’s my condensed version of the movie, skipping all the exciting but less essential parts and getting to the heart of the matter of whatever this is I’m trying to understand and/or explain.

Forget what anyone tells you about Reese’s Pieces, or frogs, or getting drunk vicariously.

The important scene is the one when ET has phoned home and they send a megaship from the home galaxy to pick him up. He’s way past curfew by, I don’t know, a few weeks. He’ll be grounded for light-years. Anyway, he and Elliott, the main character, have bonded in a Spock mind meld kind of way, ish, and now they are best buddies. Elliot doesn’t want ET to go home. ET wants Elliott to go with him. Elliott wants ET to stay.

Now, pay attention, this is the point of this rambling story.

ET has this glowing heart that he points to and says, “Ouch” as he points to Elliott. Then Elliott points to his heart and says, “Ouch.” Of course, everyone except the dog is crying. And then ET gets that magical glowing fingertip and points to Elliott’s forehead and says, “I’ll be right here.”

I don’t know if I’m ET or if I’m Elliott, but either way, tears and “Ouch” and “I’ll be right here” seem to say what I feel about any one of you being farther away than a twenty-minute drive. A two-hour flight is about all I can tolerate. Don’t even consider space travel.

How will I manage?

You all will be just fine. Your lives will go on. Mine will feel like a train leaving the tracks.

Of course it sounds like you’re all leaving en masse, when the truth of the matter is one of you has been out-of-state for a few years now and somehow I keep breathing. And you’ve all left for a while, and come back and left and come back, ish.

I might have to book a cruise, or an Antarctic expedition, followed by a trip to anywhere that doesn’t involve reality or getting on with my life without all or most of you nearby. Or just as real a possibility as any of those, maybe I can get a flying bicycle…

Let me try a different medium.

We’ll leave science fiction and fantasy and try music.

The Phillip Phillips song “Gone, Gone, Gone” seems to capture some of what I feel about the future and the now.

Sure, it’s a love song, but then, so is being a mother.

I already miss you.

Love forever,

Mom

Have a listen, the lyrics follow:

“Gone, Gone, Gone”

When life leaves you high and dry

I’ll be at your door tonight

If you need help, if you need help.

I’ll shut down the city lights,

I’ll lie, cheat, I’ll beg and bribe

To make you well, to make you well.

When enemies are at your door

I’ll carry you away from war

If you need help, if you need help.

Your hope dangling by a string

I’ll share in your suffering

To make you well, to make you well.

Give me reasons to believe

That you would do the same for me.

And I would do it for you, for you.

Baby, I’m not moving on

I’ll love you long after you’re gone.

For you, for you.

You will never sleep alone.

I’ll love you long after you’re gone

And long after you’re gone, gone, gone.

When you fall like a statue

I’m gon’ be there to catch you

Put you on your feet, you on your feet.

And if your well is empty

Not a thing will prevent me.

Tell me what you need, what do you need?

I surrender honestly.

You’ve always done the same for me.

So I would do it for you, for you.

Baby, I’m not moving on,

I’ll love you long after you’re gone.

For you, for you.

You will never sleep alone.

I’ll love you long after you’re gone

And long after you’re gone, gone, gone.

You’re my back bone.

You’re my cornerstone.

You’re my crutch when my legs stop moving.

You’re my head start.

You’re my rugged heart.

You’re the pulse that I’ve always needed.

Like a drum, baby, don’t stop beating.

Like a drum my heart never stops beating…

For you, for you.

Baby, I’m not moving on.

I’ll love you long after you’re gone.

For you, for you.

You will never sleep alone.

I’ll love you long after you’re gone.

For you, for you.

Baby, I’m not moving on,

I’ll love you long after you’re gone.

For you, for you.

You will never sleep alone.

I’ll love you long, long after you’re gone.

Like a drum, baby, don’t stop beating.

Like a drum my heart never stops beating for you.

And long after you’re gone, gone, gone.

I’ll love you long after you’re gone, gone, gone.

~ This song was co-written by Derek Fuhrmann, Todd Clark and Gregg Wattenberg.

Categories: Family, Friday Letters, Love, parenting | Tags: ET, Friday letter, Friday Letters to my Kids, going, Letter to My Kids, Phillip Phillips | 2 Comments

A Cat Tuner Changes his Tune

Posted on June 5, 2014 by Kami

I didn’t plan this, but a year ago today I wrote this post about my Dad, the cat tuner extraordinaire. Strange, sometimes, how life circles back around.

Dad brought their cat inside the house (it’s definitely an outdoor cat) shortly after I arrived here and told me a story.

A week or two ago Dad says their cat went missing. When Lulu finally showed up her back right leg was dragging behind her and she acted out of sorts. Dad looked for obvious injuries and found none. No bleeding, no cuts, no scrapes, no missing fur. After a bit of thinking it over and talking with Mom, he decided to take the cat to the a local vet. The estimated wait time seemed too long, so Dad headed to another vet in the next town or two over who could see the cat right away.

After an exam and some tests and X-rays the vet determined the cat’s ligaments and tendons in that back leg had torn somehow. He could repair it with some surgery. After talking it over with Mom, (who is not a cat person, nor a pet person of any kind) Dad agreed to the surgery.

What?

Who are you and what did you do with my real Dad?

So for the past week he’s been giving doses of antibiotic to Lulu and babying her like I’ve never seen before. Even Mom has let the cat sit on her lap and rubs its soft gray head until the purring vibrates some inner chord of contentment. That purr soothes Mom in return. And voila, a calmer Mom makes for a calmer Dad.

The stitches came out yesterday. The vet’s assistant commented that she’d never worked with a calmer, more well-behaved cat. No hissing, no scratching, no meowing, just Dad and Mom holding the trembling mass of fur while the stitches got snipped.

Not happy about the car ride.

The three of them make an interesting group.

Long haired Lulu with her back leg shaved, limps along like every movement hurts beyond contemplation, and yet she can carefully jump up on a chair or climb the stairs.
Mom who’s got the usual aches and pains of her age along with the effects of her stroke and seizures, sitting on the porch swing with Dad.
And Dad who last year didn’t like the porch swing swinging, but now doesn’t seem to mind it, who used to hobble about like an old man just for laughs, now hobbling about like an old man, but taking on some of Mom’s tasks, and keeping up with his own.

It’s almost as if the cat’s injury endeared them to it and made them all feel more connected. They’ve had to slow down and become content to stay put a bit more.

I asked Dad if his cat-tuning ways had changed tune. He denied it. He said something akin to, I’ve still got plenty of other cats to tune, or something like that. He’s just a mischievous twelve-year old at heart. But he’s also become more tender-hearted this past year, more attentive to Mom, more in tune with her and what she needs. It’s as if her injuries, and consequently her dependence on him, have endeared her to him more.

And Dad’s ministrations and attention to Mom have made her more affectionate and appreciative toward him.

Interesting turn of events, wouldn’t you say?

I think so.

None of them are the same as they were a year ago. In big, drastic ways. Mostly for the better in spite of, or maybe because of, the tough road. Who would have thought?

Sounds like a harmonious song to me.

(For Twitch, who went to kitty heaven yesterday.)

Categories: Family, Relationships | Tags: affection, cat injury, cats, change, Family, parents, relationships, stroke | 4 Comments

More Vocabulary Lessons for Me

Posted on June 3, 2014 by Kami

It’s Gratituesday! I’m thankful today for a chance to visit my parents. The need to get here nagged at me for nearly two months. Now I’m finally standing in their home and seeing their faces, giving hugs, talking, basking. My heart can relax a little.

At last, I can put experience together with all the information I’ve gotten by phone, text and messaging about Mom’s latest medical adventures and get a full picture. Part of me feels relieved and part of me feels more worry.

Mostly, I find I’m becoming better acquainted with another medical phrase I thought I could put behind us.

Expressive aphasia – you know what you want to say, but you have trouble saying or writing what you mean

For a writer that would be called a massive writer’s block.

For someone who’s had a stroke it means not being able to communicate as well as you’d like, if at all. It can lead to frustration and depression and anxiety. But it can also be a source of laughter and bonding. I suppose it depends on the attitude of all involved as well as the medication cocktail the patient taking.

My mother manages to laugh about most of her verbal roadblocks. But frustration and perseverance work themselves into the picture as well. She’s human, after all. (Even though I’ve often thought she was wonder woman.)

A few days ago one of my sisters and I decided that carrying on a conversation with Mom, sometimes, is like playing the game of “Catchphrase” or “Charades.” Lots of gesturing, guessing, backtracking and logic leaps. When communication becomes clear and we all understand what’s been said I feel like cheering, or ringing a bell, or declaring a winner.

Violas growing in a sidewalk crack. Amazing what nature can do when obstacles are in the way.

But when words won’t materialize in spite of how much her brain knows what it wants to say you can cry or you can laugh or you can hope the words show up eventually. My sister and I still aren’t sure what the flowers in the front yard have to do with the piano in the living room, but in Mom’s mind they are somehow connected.

The thing is, those connections got rerouted, detoured, and dead-ended last summer with her first stroke. Then a couple of months ago, with her seizure that occurred in the same area as the stroke, all those connections experienced even more deconstruction and rerouting. All the repairs and healing that happened over the past nine months took a sideways step or two, if not a step backwards as well.

Post-stroke seizures – When stroke injures part of the brain, it leaves a scar, which can then trigger abnormal electrical activity that can start a seizure. Up to twenty-two percent of stroke patients experience these types of seizures.

Reminds me of a pothole repaired over and over again. Extra bumpy and almost as bad as the pothole itself.

Sometimes it’s not merely communication that takes a hit. In Mom’s case there’s also some memory loss. All sorts of traffic jams happen just within her own brain. Fixing lunch can take a long time because each step of the process requires incredible focus and follow-through. Her mind gets sidetracked between the silverware drawer and the refrigerator two feet away from each other.

Breakfast this morning, cereal and some fruit, ended up involving six or seven spoons of various sizes. I think my presence in the room threw off her routine, or made her nervous.

I suppose it’s like watching a young child learn to walk. Part of you wants to take their hand, catch every fall, help every step, even though you know the process of figuring it out builds neural pathways and muscles that make real walking possible. Letting Mom thrash through some of the mental tangle helps connections reform, gives her a sense of accomplishment and courage to try again, and develops new pathways for logic and sequencing. Eventually the communication will improve more. At least, that’s the hope.

But oh, my heart hurts watching this woman who once took care of me, and all my siblings, struggle so much with basic tasks. Tasks she already relearned last year.

And yet today, between the two of us, she sewed two simple aprons. Mostly I watched, threaded the machine, made a few suggestions, pointed out where the scissors were hiding. It took much longer for her to do it herself. I could have whipped them out in fifteen minutes. But the sense of satisfaction she gained from the effort did us both good.

There’s a house for sale next door to them. I would buy it up and move in if resources made it possible. But, as usual, real life intervenes with wishes and dreams. They have good neighbors and friends who check in often. And I have a brother and his wife who live in town, thank goodness! But part of my heart will now always hang out here, worrying and wondering.

I’m afraid I’d be a “helicopter daughter,” hovering and not letting her do for herself.

Mostly, I’m simply grateful and I’m enjoying the few days I have to hang out here. It’s a peaceful, calming, mountain view spot. But best of all it’s where Mom and Dad continue learn and love.