California Grandma?

Wifey, D2, and I visited ancient Mom the other day. It was clear her dementia had increased, as her physical mobility had decreased.

She is such a good faker -- her pleasant conversational technique belies that she rarely understands what one says to her, but 91 years of amiability and pleasantness and one of the highest EQ numbers of all time taught her wonderful facial and conversational cues...you think she enjoys and undersands what you say, but if you listen closely, you hear a line of non sequiters...

And she masks her physical infirmity by pretending to pause for conversation rather than get out of a chair. We brought lunch for her, and it took her a solid 10 minutes to traverse the distance from her Florida room to kitchen --all of about 25 feet.

She launched her usual pre emptive strike against going to the ALF, but then Wifey mentioned something we had kicked around for awhile --maybe an extended visit to my sister Sue in California. For once, Mom didn't immediately reject the idea, and now it's in play.

Sue just closed a business, and has plenty of time. She has a lovely one story house. She loves my mother, of course. As Wifey points out, the added income to her (we'd send Mom's monthly Social Security check along with Mom) wouldn't hurt...

So just maybe...

I remembered that after Mom performed her comical demolition derby a few years ago, the cop took her license. So she has no picture ID, and needs one to fly. My Florida sister has been deputized to procure a new ID for Mom, and continue the campaign of getting her to at least consider a change.

We're taking D2 back to college next week, and will stop by Mom's on the way home. I plan to give her an offer she can't refuse: California or the ALF. She simply can't continue living alone.

She's lost any real concept of others' lives --she's become like a toddler --it's all about her. But unlike a toddler, she's not been declared legally incompetent, and has every right to live as she pleases. But again, something has to give.

Last year, she robbed D2 of the spotlight of her college move in -- Mom had a fall, and my sister was in Tampa, and so the thought of Mom on the floor alone in her condo hung over what should have been a delightful right of passage like a storm cloud.

Not this year. Wifey and I plan to head up the Turnpike to Gainesville, schlep the stuff to D2's sorority house room, and kiss her and wish her a great sophomore year.

And then we'll see about Mom again.

Wifey and I would have to accompany her to California. I can't do it alone, as trips to the ladies' room with her would get me arrested, in a comical variation on the Tea Party congressman Larry Craig...

Wifey's the best --she truly loves her mother in law, and volunteered for what is NOT a fun trip --from Fort LAuderdale to Dallas to Fresno and then an hour drive to my sister's. I offered a fun tail --San Francisco or Vegas --but she said no --this is about Mom and getting her situated, at least temporarily.

Who knows? Even if she goes, it may be a disaster, and we'll need to bring her back here. But, I figure, for a 91 year old, there is no sense in long term planning --if you can give her a month or 2 at a time of a decent life, then that's the best to hope for.

It's funny: Mom left the Bronx in 1944 and headed to California to marry my Dad, who was stationed in Pasadena during the War. The married there, and started what became my family.

She loved California, as did my father. In fact, he used to tell me that one regret he had in his life was not staying there after the War. He mused about whether he might have ended up in the entertainment industry somehow --maybe as a writer.

They were salad days for Mom, too. She got a job working as secretary for the Dean of Caltech, a brilliant Southernor (she doesn't recall his name) who amazed her by offering her a vacation day for Yom Kippur --he was a Baptist, but respectful of all religions. To my mother, this represented a truly educated man...

Mom and Dad had a little bungalow, and she'd walk to Owl Drugs, and then catch a trolley to campus. Dad was at the Huntington Hotel (now a Ritz Carlton) helping prevent the Japanese from attacking Southern California. He used to joke that no subs or ships made it to LA under his watch...

So will Mom return to this storied land at the end of her life? I guess we'll all stay tuned.

Surprise Surprise Surprise

So as a semi retired guy, who plans on living off investments and not relying so much on my diminishing ability to make money, I watched our nation's slouch towards financial calamity with more than a passing interest.

Our Treasury Department needed an authorization to raise the "debt ceiling," a usually routine request, that allows them to keep printing enough money to pay our many creditors, soldiers, federal employees, my ancient mother through her $1064 monthly Social Security check...

But this time it was different! A new group of so called Tea Party Republicans were now in D.C., and they swore that the rules had changed. No new taxes! Less government, unless it involved matters of curtailing abortion and gay rights, which everyone knows is anathema to a fine Christian nation.

One of those morons gave a speech about how he refused to saddle his children with future financial burdens, so he was NOT approving any debt ceiling raise. Then it came out that he owed thousands of dollars in child support, and was fighting like any savvy deadbeat dad to avoid paying...

Politics is at an all time low in the US. One of D2's friend's Dads is a very highly placed politico in the Democratic Party. I asked him his take a few months ago --this fellow has been in the game over 30 years. He said he has NEVER seen such a divide --we truly have 2 nations --and he sees no relief in sight.

It used to be that the extremists got the press, and then the grown ups took over in the back rooms to keep things moving. But now, the Republican Party seems afraid of the Tea Party nuts, and sees the party leadership with idiots like Sarah Palin, Michelle Bachmann, Rush Limbaugh... This is why the GOP grownups were afraid to deal with the Dems...

And the Dems show little backbone as well. They learned nothing from the Clinton years --the only chance for Dems is when they govern from the center. Instead, Obama thinks he can still pull the kind of stuff that works in inner city Chicago, but that doesn't play in the Heartland...

All in all, a recipe for gridlock, which is what happened...

So if they didn't reach a deal by last night, stocks likely would have fallen 1/3, and who knows what would have happened to bonds...

I'd have had to become a barista. That might have actually been pretty cool.

But then, the Tea Party got a lot of their way...no new taxes...and no real changes in policy to the future. Obama and the Dems folded, which will just embolden the idiots for the next fight.

But at least the market won't crash, and things can keep humming along. One columnist wrote that this whole affair shows that if a group like the Tea Party is willing to see the destruction of our whole nation, they can get their way.

And the truth is, many Tea Party types are Evangelicals, who believe that the End of Time is a good thing, and if they help hasten it, well then Jesus will just return that much sooner, and bring paradise to all those toothless trailer dwellers...

I kind of like things the way they are now. And, luckily, at least for awhile, they'll continue.

But She's Not There...

So I visited ancient Mom on Tuesday, and she reached another negative milestone: she couldn't walk back to my car after lunch.

Watching someone into extreme old age really is observing the down side of a hyperbola. I've observed my Ds' milestones as they grew, and my mother is doing it in reverse: each day losing some new measure of physical or mental function.

So I wheeled her in her walker, and got her back to her condo. Her spirits were pretty high, though, especially when I assured her that I continued to take care of all of her practical affairs. "Oh David, I'm such an idiot, that if you didn't --we'd both be bankrupt!"

And then Thursday am, my sister called me to tell me the latest adventure: she called Mom, and caught her entertaining some guests --2 young girls. They were lost, Mom said, and trying to get a ride home from their mother. My sister asked to speak to them, but Mom said they didn't want to talk on the phone.

My sister immediately became concerned. Were they criminals? Mom has little to steal, but still...So she called 911, and the Palm Beach Sheriff said they'd send someone over. My sister and brother in law headed to Mom's condo.

The cops were there, and pretty sure no visitors had come. Or, is somehow 2 young ladies found there way to my Mom's condo, past the guard gate, and picking my Mom's unit out of the nearly 8000 old people homes there, well, they did no harm.

Mom couldn't offer more details, except that they mentioned they were friends of my cousin Janet's daughters. A quick call to Janet confirmed that wasn't so.

I called Mom later that night, and she insisted she WAS visited, but was cloudy on details. And then, she launched her pre emptive strike about refusing to move to an ALF, or anywhere else, but maybe she SHOULD start locking her front door...

My California sister weighed in the next day --a nurse she knew figured it all out: my mother should be on NO medication. I politely explained to her that her friend is a moron --diagnosing a patient he's never seen from 3000 miles away.

No --medical advice isn't the problem. Mom's cared for by Dr. Eric - a Harvard trained interninst and cardiologist who's known her for 32 years...

I emailed Eric, and asked him to check for more dementia at her next appointment. Eric, of course, suggested a neurologist consult. But that's not going to happen --when someone is 91, we all know what's coming, and all more medical intervention will do is make things more complicated and uncomfortable.

I'm reading Russell Baker's autobiography, written in 1982. He went through the same issues with his aging mother. She began living in the past, mentally.

So I wish the same for my mother. The hallucination came on a day she had no visitors --Thursday --and I think she simply invented some to help pass the time.

Last night our neighbor and friend Diane came over, with her pretty friend Cindy. Cindy just turned 50, like me. She reported that she's been going to a bunch of funerals for 50 and 60 somethings lately. The last 2 were of defense lawyers I knew as well. Her theory is that our "sandwich generation" is under stress from worrying about our children as we also worry about declining parents, and the stress lets the cancers and heart diseases gain footholds...

She's probably right, of course. All I know, or knew as I drank my 3rd stiff Middleton, is that the end is bad: either too soon or too late.

Diane and Cindy left, and Wifey and I went swimming around midnight. It was exquisite. The recent USAF planes spraying for mosquitos had done the job, and we heard nary a buzz.

We floated together in the moonlight, laughing that if the Ds saw us it would lead to months of psychological therapy to get the vision out of their minds...

But we celebrated our relative youth. And life. And no hallucinations...

Dead Singer

D1 called from her restaurant job a few hours ago to tell me that my prophesy had come true: the singer Amy Winehouse was dead.

I rarely follow the personal travails of actors or singers, but I really dug Amy's music. The first time I heard her, I thought it might have been a newly discovered Bessie Smith record. Amy's voice is so smoky and sultry and throaty --the last thing I expected to learn is that she was a young, English Jewish girl.

Her songs were stirring. The arrangements were sparse and clear --like I was listening to a rehearsal in a small jazz club. She sang in a way that went right to my soul --you could hear the pain and suffering in her voice. I bought 2 of her CDs --and buying records is a rarity for me.

She seemed to cram too much living into her short life, and became addicted to a bunch of drugs. Her life story is cliched, of course. She died at 27, like Hendrix, Morrison, Joplin, and Cobain --the tortured artist --somehow too intense in her art to exist in this world.

I told Wifey and the D2 3 years ago that she'd be dead soon. Somehow, she eked out another 36 months or so of failed concert gigs and numerous domestic dramas, and failed rehabs.

The Facebook (tm) postings will be full of tales of the fallen diva. My friend Arnold, ultra conservative and strict Catholic, already commented showing this as a passion play in favor of tougher drug laws. Arnold's a terrific guy -- wonderful husband and father, true community leader. He's also a political retardate. As if tougher drug laws would have mattered.

Better to legalize and tax and spend more resources on treatment and drug abuse prevention.

But what do I know? All I know is that a talent is now silenced for the future. And when her hit song "Rehab" comes on, in which she sings about refusing to go, it will have a deep poignancy --deeper than it did before.

I'm so glad my family and close friends are mere mortals --no artistic geniuses among us. Our run of the mill demons are enough to battle, day by day, and night by sometimes sleepless night.

Take a Load off Fanny...

Today's Herald has an article about grown children and how they share the load of dealing with ancient parents. As next month is the one year anniversary of a crisis time for my ancient Mother, I read it closely.

We were all set to move D2 into her dorm for the start of college. That is an exquisite time for a parent and child, at least in my view. It's a mix of happiness, wistfulness, and reflection. Unfortunately, D2 got pushed off of center stage.

My mother had had a fall, and seemed in a death spiral. My local sister was in Tampa visiting her daughter and grandkids, and my California sister was a whole country away, and dealing with her manifold issues. So, in the middle of stuff, I had to go up to Delray, and fetch Mom, and then drive her back to Delray on our way to Gainesville, in our over packed and over stuffed SUV.

And then, as if in a sitcom, after we left Grandma in her condo, we got a flat tire, and had to spend some time at the tire store, again with the packed and college ready SUV.

D2 was a trooper about the whole thing. She showed a lot of maturity, and realized that, even though it was to be HER time, it didn't work out that way. Of course, we made it to Gainesville ok, moved her in, met the roommates, and did the classic Wal MArt and Target trips, where all of the other parents and undergrads jostled carts full of shelves, and chairs and toilet paper and all manner of supplies. And then we had our menancholy goodbyes...

And then stopped back to make sure Mom was alive. She was.

Now, a year later, Mom is actually doing better. My sister and I have settled into a happy cooperation about taking care of her. I really appreciate that --I no longer feel that I have the whole load myself. We coordinate with each other when we visit, and make sure there's coverage when one of us goes out of town.

The Herald article says that the task are never completely shared, and, in fact, our California sister, due to geography and economics, isn't much of a factor. But we've settled in with Mom, waiting for the inevitable other shoe to drop with her...

And in a few weeks, we move D2 again. She'll come home from summer session, spend a week, and then we drive up to Gainesville for what seems like the thousandth time (D1 started in '06, so by now I can recite from memory what each Turnpike rest stop offers).

D2 is moving into the sorority house, so there's no real furniture to buy, but there is still a trip to Target and Wal Mart for supplies and decorations. I get to schlep the heavy stuff up the stairs, Wifey (and presumably D2's roommate Ali's mother) get to make the crucial decisions about layout and colors and coordinating supplies...

So I'm looking for a happier move in this time. Mom is stable in her condo. Any reasonable evaluation of her would find it absurd that she lives alone, but that's the way she demands it.

My sister and I truly share the responsibility of her, and I'm grateful for that...it makes things much better all around.

Hello Gainesville. Here we come again...

Not Even a Wafer Thin Mint

So my birthday eating orgy is nearly over. I'm meeting my old friend Jeff in an hour at Lots O Lox for breakfast, but I'm already done. Maybe just a coffee and bowl of oatmeal...

Saturday I gorged on the gourmet offerings of Captain Russ, on his lovely sailboat. Sunday night the Ds, Wifey, and D1's boyfriend Joel ate steaks at Smith and Wollensky on South Beach. It was a great night --major thunderstorms gave us a show over Fisher Island while we ate and drank.

Yesterday, Wifey and I took D2 for a farewell breakfast before her flight back to UF. We went to Wagon's West, and I thought --why not --it's my birthday --I'll have pancakes. So I did, and they were delicious.

I headed to the office, and Stuart took us all out for sushi. I just had some soup, and thought that was it.

D1 and Wifey offered a final dinner, but I begged off. No more eating! And then...

Stuart, Brian, and I gathered in Stu's office for "one birthday toast." But then, while we were there, Brian got a call from a defense lawyer: a case we got referred to Brian, which we hoped he'd settle for nuisance value, got an offer of $800K! It was Brian's biggest settlement ever. So there was a second cocktail...

And then Barry called, having just left the hospital. I told him to circle back to my office for a celebratory toast, which he did. The 4 of us sons of the Ashkenazim laughed and talked. Brian left, and then, somehow, hunger set in.

So I picked Burger and Brew, which started in South Beach and opened its second location in Mary Brickell Village. We parked, and went in.

I ordered the appetizers: mini fried corn dogs, fried onion rings, and then Stuart added deep fried pickles. We each had a beer. We each had enormous burgers. Then came their signature dessert: deep fried twinkies with vanilla ice cream.

We laughed at our absurdity. What an orgy of unhealthiness. To make things better, the parking garage houses an LA Fitness, and a bunch of the gym goers got into the elevator with us, all slim and sweaty...

So I ended my celebration of becoming 50 much the same as I probably celebrated becoming 15.

Where are the salads?

Ahoy!

Biscayne Bay, where the Cuban gentlemen sleep all day...

So Wifey and I fetched D2 from MIA. D2 got into the car and was greeted with a turkey breast sandwich, black and white cookie, and an ecstatic little Spaniel who immediately took a lick of her sandwich...

And then last night Wifey and I drove over past the Seaquarium, and mustered with Eric, Dana, Barry, and Donna, and boarded the Captain Sir! for a sunset sail. Captain Russ and First mate Susan set out a lovely spread of cheese and fruit and crab cakes, and crusted sea bass and his award winning key lime pie. It's true - food tastes better on a luxury sailboat on a gorgeous, breeze filled Miami night.

Eric mixed martinis and cosmos, and even Wifey had a drink! She got nicely buzzed, she said, for the first time in awhile. We sat on the foredeck and drank and chatted, and laughed. Susan played 70s tunes on the sound system, and Dana and I showed our name that tune chops are still very sharp, though we needed help from Eric's shazam (tm) app on his I phone to identify the singer of "Show and Tell" (Al Wilson).

The lights came on in the city. An impossibly huge orange full moon rose over the Port. The beauty was almost absurd.

I've been everywhere, man, like Johnny Cash sings, and seen some gorgeous places. Miami, on a night like last, from Biscayne Bay, tops them all. It truly does. The evening light, the office and condos reflecting off the water, back lit by the orange moon --it was surreal. Like we were watching something created in an animator's studio.

I felt bad for anyone who has never seen it. I really did.

We headed for home. The enormous bottle of Stoli that Eric figured we'd use a fraction of, well, it was 3/4 empty. D2 smirked as she saw it and welcomed us back.

Eric and Dana made me a gorgeous photo mosaic of our families. Eric is truly a pro level photographer (and bartender). He only keeps his day job as cardiologist to pay the bills...

Barry and Donna gave me some fine single malt Scotch, and a Cole Haan Kindle cover. Barry and I have been talking about Kindles for years now --the Ds bought me one for Father's Day, and I suspect Barry will get his for HIS birthday, which is a week away.

Even sweeter --there were birthday cards from Barry's boys, to their terrific "Uncle." I'm so proud of them. Scott is a mini Barry (though mini isn't the right word for the 14 year old who is already 6'2"). He excells in school, and is loved by his classmates. Josh, the musician, marches to his own drummer, and confounds his parents constantly. But I have no doubt he'll soar as well...

So we're back on land for now, though headed back next to the ocean for dinner tonight, with both Ds, and D1's boyfriend Joel. D1 is working like a dog at her "part time" job --and working like a REAL dog, not her pampered Cavalier...Tonight she's taking a well deserved break.

This turning 50 thing doesn't really suck. As long as you don't go it alone...