Friday, October 27, 2017

The Noises in the Hall*
I went to Texas to celebrate with my mother on her 90th birthday.

     Ninety years, now that is quite the milestone and she is quite the woman.  MaryBeth was raised in Texas.  Hard poverty was padded by the love of a very large family.  There were seven kids in all (and I grew up with 16 cousins!!!).  My mom met my dad, an Indiana boy who interrupted college at Purdue to join the Army Air Force during the war, when she was 17.  They married and after the war she went north with him, far from family, as he finished his time at Purdue.  His first, and only job after college, Kellogg's of Battle Creek, took her further north.  My sister and I were born there in Michigan. After our father died in 1983, mom moved back to Texas.  She met Dick and together they have laughed and loved into their 90s.
     MaryBeth has dementia.  Everything is truly new to her.  As I visited she asked again and again about my wife and our daughters---sometimes again and again in the space of 5 minutes.  She sometimes knows she forgets, sometimes she doesn't know.  She is happy most all of the time.  I've asked her what she has been doing and she replies, "I don't know, but I'm sure it was fun."  Not bad for a nonagenarian eh?  Not bad for the rest of us if we could manage that good grace.
     When I visit, I sleep on the pull out couch in the study.  It is at the end of the hallway that leads from the bedrooms out to the living and dining room.  Every morning, at around 6:30 or 7:00, I heard noises in the hall, muffled voices, and the sound of my mom's walker.  My sister tells me that frequently, MaryBeth comes out of her room, goes to my sister's door and wants to make sure she is "up for school".  While I was there she was heading to the kitchen to make sure my lunch was ready in time for the bus.  Every morning, there were noises in the hall---it was our mother.  In the newness of each day, still she comes to take care of us and make sure we are ready for the day.  Buen Camino.

*We took Mom out to dinner--husband Dick, Tammie and I, cousins Jerry and Jim with spouses Jane and Brian, granddaughter Megan, her husband Pat, great grand kids Alex and Jordan and Jordan's partner, Sabrina.  Glasses were lifted, stories were told, and the doorway to 90 was opened with style.