calherewecome

 Okay, it’s time for an update on Mary. Generally, things have been going good for the past few months. No falls, no trips to the ER, just one trip to see her PCP for annual checkup.

This picture was taken at The “Whale and Ale” in San Pedro. The handsome man sitting next to Mary is our #2 son who was down visiting us from Salt Lake City. Excellent fish and chips plus a pint of Guiness to wash it down.

She has been keeping up with her regular activities. One of us has to be at her side whenever she is walking. We have become much more in tune with handicap accessible buildings. In fact, we try not to take her any place where we have not personally been before. (Eg. Handicap parking, elevators, etc. ) Eliminates surprises. Today was her day at the SP Republican Women’s club. Paula got her to Rose’s to get her hair done. Then down to Ports-o-call for the lunch, then Beth takes her home. I don’t go because I’m not a woman, and Paula doesn’t go because she’s not a republican.

Mary’s memory is fading more and more every day. I have started writing a post-it note for her in the morning with the day and date, plus activities for the day. It helps, but sometimes I have to tell her to look at the note.

Mary reads the daily newspaper front to back about three times during the day. She would probably read yesterday’s newspaper if I didn’t put in the recycle bin. And she watches the local and national news in the evening. Yet, she can’t tell me who is running for president or what happened in Belgium. Even her long term memory is fading. Last night. She asked me if my parents are still alive. SMDH, my father died fifty years ago and my mother about 20. So at one time or another she should have/ would have known this about me. She looks at me like I had never told her this. Sigh.

One final thought. God grant us patience in getting Mary moving. On Wednesday, I was feeling good about getting to Bible study on time. Mary was up by 8 AM and had eaten her oatmeal. But between 8 and 10 am, it’s like she went into slow motion mode. She laid down while waiting for Paula to finish he shower. Then we discover that she put on thick socks, but the shoes she was trying to wear only fit nylons. Next thing we know, the clock is at 9:50 as we (try to) head out the door.

No matter how early we get up, there will always be something to upset the best of plans.

Later,

Joe

Time for an update. Overall, Mary is doing pretty good. But her memory is failing badly. I have started writing on a post-it  note the day of the week and the day’s activities. Then I put it on the dining room table where she can see it. She seems to like my system. Don’t worry about tomorrow, just think about today.

On Saturday, Paula and I went over to our storage locker to work on cleaning it out. It seems that Harold and Mary never threw anything out. We filtered through about half a dozen boxes, trying to decide to keep or toss. I found bank statements and receipts from 1980’s and 1990’s. Don’t need to keep that. We found a box with real estate transactions covering about thirty years. Decided to keep that. Lots of old billing statements and papers were tossed. So we ended up with four boxes and two bags full of trash.

We need to take the trash back to our condo because there is no trash facility at storage facility.

Harold & Mary’s Wedding picture c. 1947

Here’s one of the treasures that we found. Paula thinks that it is Mary’s wedding picture. One thing about it is that it was colorized or tinted in some fashion, which was unusual for the time. We showed it to Mary and asked her if she recognized the two people in the picture. She said that she didn’t.

Eventually she came to realize that it was her in the picture, but had trouble remembering what Harold looked like as a young man. (He would have been in his late twenties in the picture.) I don’t remember ever seeing a picture of Harold when he didn’t have gray hair. The picture was still in its frame. It now sits in a place of honor on top of our piano.

So slowly but surely we work through the stuff. There are a boxes of dishes, paintings, throw rugs and other stuff that we haven’t quite figured out what to do with yet. Too good to throw out and no place to put it in our condo. We have boxes of books. We have two sets of golf clubs (probably men’s and woman’s). Anyone looking for a set of golf clubs?

Later,

Joe