We’ll be at the hospital bright and early tomorrow so Mom can have a more permanent dialysis site “input” into her body. This is a routine procedure, but at age 90, nothing is completely routine. Any good thoughts, prayers, or whatever positives you feel like directing our way would be greatly appreciated.

I asked her if she was nervous about it. She said no. “I’ll be nervous for both of us, then,” I said. And that’s what I’m doing, being nervous enough for two people, or five or ten.

In other news, Mom had me download several more games and books to her Kindle Fire. She’s having a lot of fun with it.

It all started when my mother said, “Carol called today. Her kids bought her a Candle.”

Skkkiiiiiiiiirrrrrrrrrruppppppp! The needle skips backwards across the record.

Actually, it started earlier that morning when I thought, “You know, maybe Mom would be able to read the large type on my Nook.”

Skkkiiiiiiiiirrrrrrrrrruppppppp!

All right, I confess it actually started much earlier than that when I became intrigued with the Kindle Fire, and before that when I lusted for an iPad—okay! Don’t scratch that record again!

It goes back to September when my mother had a mild stroke which left her reason, speech, and mobility intact but imposed upon her a visual impairment which made reading very, very difficult. Even large type books were hard for her to read, the lines of the text running together and jumping around because her stereoscopic vision has gotten messed up. This is a woman who read voraciously, sometimes a book every day or two. She’s been so lost and forlorn without her books. I suggested audiobooks, but she shot that one down really fast. She doesn’t like audiobooks, she said most definitively.

She can’t drive anymore, either. Time weighs heavy on her. She started making up household projects to fill the time. Sometimes that worked out, sometimes they just got her into trouble and wore her out. I haven’t known what to do for her. Then one day last week while driving to work, the notion of letting her use my Nook popped into my head. And then, as if the Universe had decided to take us in hand and get us pointed in the right direction, my mother’s friend, Carol, called to tell her about this wonderful new “Candle” her children bought her for Christmas and how much she loved reading on it and playing games and being on the web. I couldn’t wait to mention the Nook to Mom, but she couldn’t wait to tell me about the “Candle.”

“It’s actually called a Kindle,” I told her. “It sounds like she has a Kindle Fire.”

“Whatever. It sounds really great.”

“Well, I have a Nook. Would you like to see if you like it?”

“Yes!”

So I pulled out the Nook, ran it through its paces, increased the text to Extra Extra Large and showed it to her. I thought we could make do with this and maybe somewhere down the line get a Kindle Fire.

“I can read this!” Mom said with such a look of wonder on her face. Just about scrambled my heart strings, I tell you. “So what’s the difference between a Nook and a Kindle?”

I’d played with a friend’s Kindle Fire so I could tell her right off the bat it was easier to use than my elderly Nook, and more comprehensive. Not just about reading, but about All Groovy Web Things. I started to do the ol’ compare/contrast thing…and it really didn’t take long before I’d talked myself into buying a Kindle Fire. Forget about waiting. I may have purchased one this weekend. It may be arriving today. I may be giving it to my mother and showing her how to use it.

I called Mom earlier today and she told me she talked to Carol again. “Did you tell her you’re now part of the Kindle club?” I asked.

“Sure did. We’ve set up a Scrabble game for when I learn how to use it.”

I love living in the future. Mom is starting to feel that way again, too.

Remembrance

Every new thing she see reminds her of the past,
or loved ones long gone, she the last of her line:
the way things used to be, how we did things then,
the funny thing her brother did, the tricks they played.

How much has changed.

A different world, consumed by history, lost
except in a few pale memories locked in spirits
headed away from Now and into the past tense.
The days wind down, grow fewer—whether
short or long we cannot say—
but not miles, not miles left to travel.

I listen for as long as I can,
stories told again and again,
trying to bear witness,
trying to let her know
someone still cares.

I try, but memories don’t get the laundry done,
the dishes put away, the dinner cooked.
The Now is relentless, unsentimental, unforgiving.

Someday you will regret not having these conversations.

Yes. Someday, someday, someday.

But for Now
I have many duties in my way
and steps or miles before that day.
Steps or miles before that day.

1. Under the heading of “No Good Deed Goes Unpunished” I was asked to do a favor for someone I don’t work for. I agreed and set about the proofreading, formatting, etc., of a long document. I spent five hours at this task and sent it back to the author only to discover that I had been given the wrong version. I was unhappy, but not so unhappy as the author who had to do a compare/contrast of my changes/his changes over the weekend. Then I got it back to finish cleaning up.

2. I got a robo-call last week to remind me that I had an appointment at UCLA Med for Monday, October 31. I knew I did—it was my semi-annual thyroid check up. Yet somehow, between now and then, I dropped off the computer. They had no record of my appointment and the doctor was booked solid with other people. I’m glad I took a half vacation day to go to this appointment and that I made special arrangements for a friend to take my mom to dialysis so I didn’t have to reschedule and wait and additional 2-3 months for a new appointment. I’ll be seeing the doctor in mid-December. At least I got to go home for a couple of hours and put my sore knee up with a heating pad (crone!) before picking Mom up at dialysis.

3. Since we usually get home from dialysis between 7-7:30 p.m. (sometimes later), I knew that I would miss most of the cute little trick or treaters that I love giving out candy to. Plus, after a dialysis day, we’re usually trashed and I was so not in the mood this year. So I left the porch light out when I drove to pick up Mom. They had a Haunted House at Westchester Park, about a block from our house, right where Georgetown deadends. As I made the turn from Manchester to Georgetown, I saw hordes and hordes and hordes of older thugs pouring out of the Haunted House, and more parents driving onto our street and disgorging their vans and cars of screaming invaders. I knew we were in trouble. So Mom and I sneaked like felons into our house to avoid the hordes. Even so, as we were letting ourselves into our darkened front door some particularly ambitious candy extortionists followed us up the driveway. “We don’t have any candy here!” I yelled. “Sorry!” and quickly slammed the door. Later, as I was making dinner I was forced to turn on the kitchen light (though the porch light was still out) and as soon as I did kids streamed to our front door yelling, “Trick or treat!” I quickly turned the light out, ignored them, and they departed. Thankfully, it was a school night and everyone had pretty much departed the neighborhood by 10 p.m. Or so I think. I fell asleep in my chair by 8:30. When I woke at 9 they were still traipsing about, and when I awoke again around 10 things had quieted considerably. So I went to bed.

4. This morning while I was showering I noticed the water lapping around my ankles. Sure enough, it was refusing to go down the drain. Simultaneous to this, my mother’s toilet refused to flush and threatened to o’er top its containment vessel. I thought fleetingly, “This must be the trick for refusing to give the treats.” Eventually they both drained, but it took close to a half hour and there was much gurgling and scary sewer sounds. You may remember that we had the entire sewer pipe replaced about a year ago? The plumber who came out today (a different plumber) said that pipe was just fine…but there was this other pipe underneath the house…He’s coming tomorrow morning to replace it. The good news is, we must be getting close to having all new plumbing for this old place. It’s gotten so absurd at this point I just have to laugh. What the hell else am I going to do?

5. Mom seems to be doing better and we have no new doctor’s appointments until Thursday the 10th. I’m hoping we continue in this undramatic fashion for awhile.

6. One more than five! I continue to poke at research for The Numberless Stars, and even did some creative thinking about the plot. There still remains little to no time for actual writing, but you can’t have everything. Some day, however, I may write the Great Crone Epic. I’m wondering if anyone in this youth-obsessed market will even want to read about kick-ass crones?

1. When I heard that WFC would be in San Diego in 2011 I thought, “Oh hell, for sure I can go, even if it’s just to drive down for a day.” Life had other plans, unfortunately. And, truth told, I might not have gone, despite my optimism. Every year I plan to go to Loscon, which takes place about 10 miles from my house on Thanksgiving weekend, aaaaaaaand…I don’t go. I should never underestimate the power of my own sloth.

2. Mom had some scary issues this week, but the doctors think they were due to water retention (always a hazard with dialysis). Since they’ve up the Lasix, the problems have improved.

3. I have injured my knee. My good knee. I pulled a muscle along the side of the knee, which has happened before, but now the joint is stiff and swollen as well. The bad knee, ironically, is doing much, much better. *sigh*

4. I’ve been studying Native American gender identity issues for some time now, but my interest has revived over the last couple of weeks as I’ve worked on the research for The Numberless Stars. I’ve been poking at the cultural mores of different tribes regarding attitudes towards the third sex, the berdache, as anthropologists have labeled them. In the kind of synchronicity that often occurs when I start seriously poking at some research, this popped up on LJ’s little_details. Very helpful indeed. I’ve already ordered the Williams book and one other. Both cheap used copies, of course.

5. TGIF. Putting a hundred extra miles (or more) on the car per week is rather draining, but today all that is required of me is to be at work. Tomorrow I actually get three hours to myself while Mom is at dialysis, and Sunday, the blessed day, I don’t have to go anywhere at all. Chores, sure, but I don’t have to drive anywhere. I try to keep that sacrosanct about Sundays.

1. There has not been much to report except the same old same old so I haven’t reported.

2. I continue to poke at The Numberless Stars, my Old California fantasy. Not really writing. I’m poking online research, specifically about the El Camino Real and the Los Angeles River and stuff. I’m obsessed with learning as much as I can. Considering that the bulk of the novel has nothing to do with these things, it seems a bit excessive, BUT I maintain that knowing that stuff, whether I use it or not, enriches the story.

3. I’m the girl who once read three books and countless partials on Robert Clive’s India for what wound up being one paragraph in my novel, Blood Geek. BUT, I do think all that informed the character of Jeremy Jones, the hero, so it wasn’t a waste.

4. I did a trip count Monday on the miles I drive on Monday and Wednesday when I come to work, go home at lunch, pick up Mom, take her to dialysis, come back to work, finish my shift, go home to feed the cat, go to pick Mom up at dialysis and thence back home. 52.4 miles on these days. I knew it had to be significant because I really notice the difference in my gas tank. Thank the gods it’s only twice a week.

5. I really must stop waking up at 4 a.m. and not being able to get back to sleep. I’m usually a champion sleeper, but things have been screwy this week.

1. “Stupid is not to be underestimated,” I told my friend J. “Stupid things can save your sanity when life is out of your control.” And it’s true. An hour or two of doing something silly and mundane and all yours is a precious thing. My most fervent hope for this evening is that I get to spend an hour alone in my sitting room watching a new episode of Ghost Hunters. If that happens, I will not think the day a total loss. If it doesn’t happen, then I will watch the tape during some other precious hour, and having DVR’d it, the day will not be a total loss. One has to stay flexible.

2. And speaking of flexible, I’ve lost roughly 30 pounds in the last month. (My God, has it only been a month? Feels like several weeks more than that.) I say roughly 30 pounds because I made a decision some time back to live without a scale, so that’s based on the last time I stepped on a doctor’s scale. I may have lost a bit of that before the current month, but I’ve definitely dropped a lot of weight since September 14. What do you know? Eating less and running around a lot do help you lose weight. Fewer aches and pains, too. I haven’t got time for them, so they’ve been banished to the aethyr.

3. I poked at my novel, The Numberless Stars yesterday. I don’t know if I have the energy/time to write new prose again, though. I thought of revising something already written, but I didn’t have the stomach for that. Sustained focus is difficult these days.

4. My mother decided to make mini cheese cakes because a friend is coming to dinner tomorrow. Mom has always been someone who loved feeding people—and overfeeding people. I encourage her to do things like this because it makes her feel better about herself, and stronger. I thought she’d make her usual dozen, but when I got home from work last night, she’d made three dozen and was in the process of making another two. “What??” I asked. “I decided to make some for the girls at the dialysis center, and some to send home with L. and some to send with you to work.” We didn’t finish up until about 9:30 last night. I’m glad she’s feeling better. It was not how I’d planned my evening, however. Flexible!

5. J. and I were just discussing the strange culture of tipping. I am usually a 20% straight across the board tipper. Service is hard work and I want people who do work for me/serve me to know that I appreciate that. (Plus, 20% is so much easier to calculate than, say, 18%.) I realize not everyone feels this way and some are scandalized at tipping over 15%, but these days that seems a little on the low side to me. I say this even though I am feeling something of an economic pinch these days myself. If I can’t afford the tip, I should not expect the service.

J. was saying how the first time he went to his barber it was Thanksgiving, so he gave him a larger tip than he otherwise would. The second time was Christmas, so again he gave a larger tip. Now he feels like he’s always got to give that same tip or risk insulting/hurting the man’s feelings. “If you’ve got a barber you like,” I said, “best not to make him mad.” J. concurred.

1. I finally got around to watching the taped season finale of Castle and the fourth season premiere. This is what I hate about episodic TV and why I stopped watching it: every season, no matter how dramatic or world-changing the finale, by the end of the premiere episode everything has been reset to square one. There’s no regard for character growth, the hard left turns in the script give you whiplash, but everything goes back to the way things have always been. Even on Castle, which is a better written show than most episodic TV. Yeah, there are hints that things will continue in a slightly altered vein, but the premiere really had to do some unlikely contortions to achieve their reset.

2. We’ve got summer weather this October, as often happens in L.A. in October. I wore short sleeves today, forgetting the fall/stress rash on my forearm which is now on display for all to see. Oh well. It had mostly simmered down so it isn’t too humiliating. Driving back from taking Mom to the clinic, everything was sunny and bright until I got to Santa Monica. Then the fog seeped down the highway and I wished that I’d brought my sweater.

3. Driving to the clinic, my mother and I discussed the weird perception of waking up and not knowing where you are, thinking maybe you’re in some place you lived in two or three moves ago, or whatever. These days that sensation has gone a step further for Mom: she wakes up and although she knows where everything is and everything looks the same, the neighborhood is familiar, she feels as if the house isn’t where it’s supposed to be. Somehow it’s moved, she knows not where. I said, “Maybe we’ve slipped into an alternate reality and you’re the only one who realizes it.” She laughed. “Maybe so.”

4. I sometimes have moments of hope these days—and that scares me. So much is beyond my control. I can concentrate only on the here and now. I have to let go of the rest. Whenever I get caught up in anger or frustration or trying to will my will in situations where my will has no effect, I tell myself, “You haven’t got time for this. Let it go. Save your energy for fights you can win.” This is a very difficult lesson to learn, not just for me, but it’s one the Universe has been trying to teach me for many long years: live this moment, and this moment, and this moment, and this . . .

5. My creative life is stretching taut over my bones, but it’s swimming in my blood. I thought it was dead for a time, but it isn’t dead. It is not dead.

I haven’t read LJ in over a week, so if anyone has posted something I need to know about, let me know.

What’s been going on?

The first part of the week was just mundane busyness, but Tuesday night Mom wound up in the emergency room again. Fortunately, she was home again the next day, but things have been busy since. I haven’t been back to work since Tuesday, taking her to various doctors and clinic appointments, but I will be going back to work tomorrow. Mom’s doing really well again. This morning she decided to vacuum the house. Try stopping her when she’s got a notion to do something…

So what happened?

She got sick over the weekend with (from all appearances) the same crud I had last week, but what sent her to the ER was essentially a mix up in her medications for blood pressure. Her BP crashed precipitously (68/42). It stabilized fairly quickly, fortunately, and she was in pretty good spirits by Wednesday. Exhausted, you know, because being in the hospital does tend to be an experience, but her BP has been more normal since.

In the ER room, the guy in the bed next to hers went into full cardiac arrest. Crash carts, paddles, the entire thing as seen on TV. Terrifying. He was stabilized by the time she was moved into a room in the hospital for overnight observation. God bless him. He was a young guy. Hope he is/he’ll be okay.

But Mom…she didn’t call me or her doctor when she started to have BP issues because she didn’t want to bother anyone, being a very independent lady, so no one knew it had crashed until I came home from work Tuesday night. She got a nice but stern lecture from her doctor: “Let me be the one to decide if you’re bugging me. I’d rather deal with this in the middle of the day when we can avoid a trip to the emergency room. Otherwise, I might get really sulky.” He’s a good guy. I like him a lot. He told me, “I don’t want your mother’s dialysis experience to become a series of misadventures like this.” Something we can all agree on. I think Mom took his lecture seriously this time.

Once she has the peritoneal dialysis machine at home (hopefully, Monday or Tuesday) she will have to make fewer trips to the dialysis center for training/monitoring and we’re hoping we can settle into a new normal that will be less exhausting for everyone. She’ll be able to do her treatment overnight as she sleeps rather than four times a day and she will only have to go into the dialysis center for monthly check ins/check ups. For the last 4-6 weeks she’s been going 2-3 times a week on top of other appointments, and that’s just too much time on the road for her. So, I think that’s been contributing to everything.

Onward. Love holds you hostage every minute of every day, but I wouldn’t want to live without it.

90 years beautiful!

Love you, Mom.