Helping Out

I just finished doing Mary’s meds. I don’t know why but it’s not a task I relish. I get Mary to help me, and then I don’t mind as much, although it’s sort of twice the work since I have to keep track of what she’s doing, too. It’s not easy for her. I’ll open up the little compartments, say for bedtime pills, and give her a bottle (I open it first.) and tell her to put one in the compartments. If I’ve put anything in there first, it may throw her. I save the mornings for last because she gets six pills and sometimes it really confuses her. I can understand because some of them look quite a bit alike. I have two containers, so I do the pills every two weeks. I started this when I was in Lexington because I was usually gone for two weeks. I have also continued measuring out her potassium into little containers. It’s only a teaspoon, which I could measure out every morning, but this way I have it done already and I know better how much we have left. I also hate calling in the meds. I’m going to see about doing it over the internet. It’s so annoying to listen to all of the menu options.

I like to try to find tasks for Mary to do. She’s great about drying dishes—another thing I hate to do. (Are you getting the idea that I hate doing most things around here? Actually, there are some things I don’t mind like vacuuming or cleaning the toilets. But I guess I don’t really like most of the housework. I’ve made a daily schedule of tasks so I can spread it out and don’t feel like I’m doing too much, although then I actually feel like I’m always doing housework! It seems to take me so long. I get distracted very easily. I have to keep an extra list for every day to keep myself on task.) When I first moved in, Mary and I cooked and she did the dishes. I think she didn’t think I got them clean enough! I guess I eventually took over more of the cooking, and then she’d do the dishes while I did work for teaching (grading and lesson planning). In the fall I was having her sit on a stool next to the sink to dry the dishes, but with her falling a few months ago and her toes hurting, quit that. Then it occurred to me that I could bring the dishes over to her. She often argues with me about that, but I think it works out ok. It’s good because then I have to take the dried dishes away from her to give her more room and so I have to put them away right away—another thing I’m not crazy about. Sometimes I wonder why I’m so lazy. Am I depressed? Is that why I seem to be missing some essential life energy? At least losing weight has helped with that some, but there is a certain soul-energy that I am missing.

Something Mary really bugs me about helping with is dinner preparation. Sometimes it’s hard to think of something for her to do. She’s really great at peeling broccoli. She’s the best knife-sharpener around. She can chop some things up but others (like onions) require more control. She scares me to death when she peels apples. She can measure things out but I have to keep reminding her how much and then sometimes it still ends up need some adjustments. She’s good at sifting things. Sometimes it makes me so sad because she knew so much when I moved in. I remember her standing at her kitchen aid crying because she couldn’t make the recipe like she used to. She got confused and was grappling with losing her abilities. She also had a really hard time coming to terms with never driving again. I just kept telling her that we got old enough to drive and then we go so old we weren’t couldn’t drive anymore, that life she just kept evolving.

We had tabouli and hummus for dinner tonight. Mary amazes me with how open-minded she is—and how much she loves garlic.

Speaking of eating, we went to my brother Fritz’s for Easter. It was raining and I hated to take Mary out, but we managed and she made it ok. At least she’s got a garage attached to the house. We wanted to take some corsages that Jan sent to us and put them on Eddie’s grave, but by the time we’d picked up Freddy (I was running late because I was getting a migraine.), the cemetery was closed. Then I forgot about it today. Well, Bonnie’s coming tomorrow, so I’ll do it then. I don’t need to go to the grocery, just check on Dad since Mom’s in St Louis.

Well, we’ve got the TV on and it’s really distracting me.