Writers know better than anyone that sometimes words don’t cut it. Sometimes the more important it is to get those words right, the more they fail you.
Those are the times I don’t even try to be eloquent.
This was my mom’s room and now it’s mine as I take care of my dad. And today is my mother’s birthday. She had a stroke on my anniversary, Sept. 18, 1994– in this bed I now sleep in. It doesn’t bother me, but it bothers my dad some, I think.
I wanted to take her in to the hospital that night, the night I got here, Sept. 18th, after he called me and said he was worried Mom was in some kind of depression, having a breakdown. But he wouldn’t take her in, didn’t want her to sit in an emergency room all night, and decided we would wait until morning. She didn’t display any of the usual stroke issues–I checked. She was just behaving out of character, watching car racing and things. So I relented.
Had I gotten my way, we might have saved her life, but she would have been someone else most likely, if not severely handicapped or in a vegetative state. So perhaps it was meant to be.
I find comfort here in her room. She loved this room. I worked here all winter in front of her wood stove and I’ll be able to look outside to the deck and gardens this summer, from here. She had a green thumb I can’t come close to, so I’ll do my gardening best and think of her square foot method, her garden growing skyward seven feet tall.
Yesterday was my son’s birthday; today my mother’s. She wanted me to pick her birthday since I had a choice of days as John was born by c-section. I told her I thought everyone should have his/her own day. She said, “I’ll be gone soon enough and it’ll be his then.” She was gone way too soon; he was only six years old so he wouldn’t have had to share long. I regret not picking it for her; I’m not sure what John thinks about it either way.
Happy Friday. I’m having my hair done and maybe heading to Cellar 152 for a burger (bunless) with my family.
Do you have a room that’s special? How are your dreams? I had them, but haven’t been using my journal and that’s a problem I have to remedy.
L.E.K. 