Beds

I can't really remember the beginning of this story. There have been so many versions of the beginning that I can't quite place the proximate cause. And the initial what really isn't important.

Where my memory--and this story--starts is driving up to Henry Ford Macomb Hospital on 19 Mile Road. It was dark, but that doesn't mean too much in mid-December Michigan. If it was dark it could have been 5 pm, but I think it was closer to eight.

I don't know if I checked into the hotel first, but I must have so I wouldn't be distracted by that personal logistical detail of where I would sleep.

Although she'd been at Henry Ford Macomb before, I hadn't. She had been abulanced to the ER the day before. There was confusion about whether she was getting admitted so I flew in to see what was happening.

I walked into the hospital to find her room. She didn't have one. Somehow she was still in the ER and had been for 36 hours. The nice lady at the desk told me to get back in my car and drive around the hospital to the ER entrance. I asked if I could walk and she looked at me like I didn't realize that I was in the Motor City where people do NOT walk when they could drive.

She was in an observation bay at the far end of the ER, a little bitty lump underneath a bunch of blankets that doubled her silhouette. She was asleep so I brushed a kiss on her wisps of white hair. Her skin was gray. I followed the IV to see that she was getting blood. To counteract that gray, I supposed.

There was a bunch of untouched food on the tray next to her and some empty blood bags.

This joint was a disaster. Patients in ER limbo for days. Improper biohazard handling. An impotent patient advocacy process. (Why would an organization create multiple ineffective avenues for remediation? You only need one ineffective procedure.)

She was surprised to see me when she woke up, except she really wasn't. Waking up in a hospital bed is accompanied by a through-the-looking-glass haze, and, while I didn't belong in this scene neither did she.

Her smile was weak, but it was sunny and I was so happy to be there: to advocate for her; to make the nurses really see her; to argue about a room with the moronic patient advocate; to steamroller through to the hospital president; and to get what she needed.

I was there to watch the miracle blood bring back the color in her cheeks and watch her lose her wilt. I sat with her for a few days. I held her hand. I made sure she ordered food and that she ate it. I positioned her poinsettia so she could remark again and again on how beautiful it was. I held her hand again, and rubbed her back. And she melted at the touch. I sat next to her with my computer on my lap so she would wake up and see me. We chit chatted about pretty much nothing.

I did this, I thought, for her. But when she peacefully died in her sleep in her own bed a short few weeks later, I knew that I had done it for me and that it was my hand melting when I touched hers.

How fortunate that the hospital was such a shit-show. I am grateful for a last intimate connection. I am happy that I was present with her and she with me. It was a good-bye that I didn't recognize in that moment. But it was good.

Thinking about you, Mom, especially today, the anniversary of that last time you snuggled up in your bed and went to sleep. Sweet dreams.

---

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Lavender's Thursday Dilly Dilly

Standing over the sink, washing the dinner dishes, I couldn't think of what day it is. I knew what day I wanted it to be.

I switched to lavender scented dish soap two or three months back. It started with lavender candles, went to lavender counter cleaner and settled in with lavender dish soap.

The dish soap is my least favorite of my lavender infatuation, mostly because it smells like soapy lavender, and I have an irrational fear that it tastes like it smells and that the smell won't rinse off. Irrational because I still think that thought after months of zero evidence that there is any residual taste or even smell of lavender. It rinses off just fine.

I made an amalgamation of leftovers in a bowl for dinner, so the dishes were primarily containers from the leftovers and some dishes and silverware. There were two round containers with screw on blue tops, one large cube with a snap blue top, and a glass rectangle with a clear top that you need to slap the edges hard to seal. The glass rectangle is heavy. My plan was to switch from the eventually disposable plastic containers to all glass, but the size options don't meet my food storage needs. Also, they don't stack as well.

I don't know why I was so confused about the day, but I definitely struggled to tease it out. At first I thought that it was Thursday, but quickly realized I was a victim of wishful thinking. Yes, I wanted tomorrow to be Friday. Nope, today had to be Wednesday. I was pretty sure. I looked at the container lid in my hand and smelled the lavender smell. I counted the days I remembered this week and Wednesday seemed mostly right. I rinsed the lid. I volunteered to wash the dishes tonight because I wanted to have my hands in the warm water.

I took a step back and leaned toward the calendar. I looked and saw that Wednesday was the 13th. It seemed like today was the 13th. Was that right? Maybe it was the 14th?

I put the next well-rinsed container in the dish drainer. I picked up the plastic encased sponge and the next dish and strained my brain for a clue of what day it is. There was nothing--absolutely not one thing--that I could come up with that was routine, that was a marker for this day, whatever day it is. The water ran from the faucet as I put more soap on my sponge.

What day is it today?

My brain turned to my Mom's trips to the hospital over the past few years. The nurse would lean in on her and say [loudly because my elderly Mom was hard of hearing and didn't listen anyway], "HONEY, DO YOU KNOW WHAT DAY IT IS TODAY? WHAT YEAR?"

I used to think that was a dumb and unfair question. In the hospital one day is like another. There weren't markers of time other than when meals are brought. If they wanted to know if she was confused, there would be fairer questions. Of course she'd get it wrong.

I stood there over the sink, sponge hanging off of my hand, brain starting to smoke as I turned my day over and inside out searching for an elusive cue. I looked into the running water and pushed fog away. I remembered that I cancelled our regular Thursday meeting today. A marker! It's Thursday.

Which means tomorrow is, indeed, Friday.

I finished the dishes and wiped down the counter, grateful that there wasn't a test today on today.

---

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Bam Ba Lam

"Oh, God!" said my high-school boyfriend.

Me: What?
HSBF: You know that song, 'bam ba lam'?
Me: Yeah?
HSBF: It came on the radio today and MY MOM WAS SINGING IT!!!

Oh. The, Horror.

It was a little funny, except that I never met his mom. So I didn't have much perspective. Come to think about it, I never met his dad. Or his brothers. In 30ish months of "going together," with our ancestral homes separated by about a mile, I never met his people.

My mom introduced me to the Beatles. She would play Meet the Beatles and Introducing The Beatles. She had a bunch of old records we'd listen to, like Limbo Rock. I grew up with people listening to music. People had records and also listened to music on the radio. And sang along.

My folks gave me my first AM radio when I was about seven. I used to listen to CKLW [the motor ciiitttttyyy] like church. Detroit radio introduced me to the Stones, Supremes, Little Stevie, Smokey, Aretha, Clapton/Cream/Stevie W/Traffic, Zeppelin, The Who, Kiss, Prince, George Clinton and GrandMaster Flash.

When I was ten, I got my first turntable. It also had a radio that included FM! I bought my first LP--Elton John's Greatest Hits. In high school I had a job in a record store. I always had music on--in the house, in the car, via my portable FM radio and eventually on my boombox.

On school mornings, I'd get up, pad into the kitchen and turn on the radio to eat breakfast. We'd listen to the AOR station (I'll be the roundabout). I guess my Mom listened. She didn't turn it off or tell us to turn it down. She'd be in the room, so I guess she listened or at least heard.

So, like who cares that your mom knows your song?

Maybe that's why I didn't know his mom and family. He cared that his mom knew his song. As if only we teens owned the public airwaves. As if it was unacceptable that his mom was part of that public. What if he was embarassed of his family? I didn't know them so maybe they were embarrassing. That said, they couldn't be much worse than mine, and he was over our house all the time. What if WE were the embarrassing ones--lacking even the most basic self-awareness that we were embarrassing?

I know that I resemble an embarrassment to my spawn. Rolling into the Boys and Girls Club after summer camp with Get Low blasting from the minivan is certainly cringe-worthy. Or when a millennial colleague caught me on my headphones and asked me what I was listening to. Don't judge an old book by it's cover, I say.

So I'm thinking about HSBF's mom, enjoying music. And hope that she looked like this:



And for the record, these Black Betty induced memories were triggered as the Big Guy blared it from his phone, followed by some Creedence. He ain't no fortunate son. He came by it honest.

---

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Mother's Day Anew

I got one of those gifts with purchase. That special bag filled with makeup goodies from the department store that makes you feel like you got something all the while pretending you didn't get taken by them because you spent $17 on mascara and had to find something else to bring you up to the minimum purchase requirement. As an aside, the good news is, when you get old and are trying to hold visible age at bay, the products are much more expensive so you only need to buy one item. And you feel like you BETTER get something with that purchase.

The bag is pretty and a good size. The lipstick is in a shade I can wear (the only thing slightly worse than getting a shade that is hideous is getting a perfect shade that becomes your favorite and when you run out you don't want to spend $22 on a tube of lipstick that they gave you for free). The eyeshadow kit is always the most fun. I play with the different combos of colors. I do one eye using a light hand and then do the other eye super dramatic. Then I usually wash it off and put the kit away and later wonder why I have so much junk.

I put the bag, eyeshadow, lipstick, cleanser and moisturizer in the bathroom. It will be out on the counter for a few weeks and then I'll hide it.

I was clearing off the table to set it for dinner and found the fragrance that came in the kit. I didn't put it in the bag. I'm weird about scent. I've been wearing the same fragrance for pretty much my entire adult life. And when I tried other perfumes, I'd go mad smelling myself all day. So back to the familiar.

I picked up the pretty, miniature bottle and thought that I'd bring it to my mother. I have been bringing her these "foo-foo" samples--especially on her too many trips to the hospital or rehab. Fancy eau de toilette is always a lift and a laugh.

As I fingered the bottle and briefly traversed that thought, I remembered that Mom is gone. Just like that. Boom. Jarred into reality.

I heard an ad on the radio about getting a gift for Mothers' Day, and felt another tug. I don't have a mom to give anything to anymore. Not since January.

Ugh. Ugh. Ugh. I didn't know Mothers' Day was a holiday of pain. I guess that's what happens. Crappy circle of life.

And Happy Mothers' day, Mom. Miss you.