Waste Not

I've started joking with Mary that I'm going to have the following put on her gravestone: She never wasted a single sheet of toilet paper, but she should have had stock in the Kleenex company.

She spends minutes sitting there carefully laying her two sheets of toilet tissue together. In the middle of the night this really stretches my patience to the limit.

Sleep Talking

Bonnie came over today so that I could go to a concert with a friend of my brother Fred’s. She brought her grandmother with her, and then later her friend Mary came over and they all played Bingo. I’m glad they enjoyed doing this because Mary had the time of her life and the thought of playing Bingo fills me with absolute dread. Ugh! How boring! Absolutely no critical thinking skills necessary—and therefore perfect for Mary!

Mary has said some of the funniest things lately. Of course, I always think I will remember them but have managed to forget most of them. One night as I was getting her changed for bed, she exclaimed that one of her nipples looked like someone had been sucking it. Now, isn’t that a bizarre thing to say? I told her  it hadn’t been me! She said she didn’t know who it could have been since no one had been in. It just makes you wonder sometimes if she knows, really, what she’s saying. Lots of times I wonder if she remembers from one sentence to the next what we’re talking about. I think she’s a very good faker. I’ve caught her quite a bit agreeing with me when she really shouldn’t. But, then again, I don’t know how much of it is her hearing. Man, between her hearing and her mind, she’s really screwed. It’s a wonder you can have a decent conversation with her. But as I’ve pointed out before, she’s got a great sense of humor.

One thing that really makes me laugh is the conversation we have when she points out that my hair is getting long. I’ll remark that supposedly every person has a certain length beyond which their hair won’t grow. Then she remarks in agreement that her hair never grows. Then I laugh and tell her that it’s because I keep it cut.

Sometimes I think that our conversations are so repetitive that I could just write them all down and label them A, B, C, etc. Sometimes I keep my responses to her remarks purposefully short (like, “How ‘bout that.”) because I know she’ll be repeating the remark again. She especially repeats herself if she finds something beautiful—like the weather or a top I have on.

I’ve become aware of how much time I leave her alone, while I’m cooking or cleaning. I find her distracting, so I prefer it if she doesn’t stay in the kitchen with me. Plus, I think it must be awfully boring for her. I like it most when she can sit on the back porch while I’m puttering around in the kitchen, so that she’s still close but not stuck in her wheelchair. I’ve also noticed that I often leave her for a short while without anything to do. I’m usually taking care of something and forget. However, it doesn’t seem to matter because she seems to always be able to amuse herself.

She talks in her sleep so much. Sometimes she says the funniest things—and quite loud. She yelled out one night recently, “I’m gonna wash my underarms. They’re dirty. I think I’ve been perspiring.” I was talking to her last night about how much she does this now and that I didn’t remember her doing it when I moved in. She said that maybe she talked in her sleep so much because she didn’t say much during that day. This just broke my heart. I should sit down and talk to her more often. If I do sit down, she inevitably reads me an article headline about ten times. I like to make sure that she’s got “Annie’s Mailbox” to read, so I fold the newspaper with that article showing. Unfortunately, it’s on the last page of the Features section with all the news about stars, so I inevitably end up reading all that crap that I really don’t care about, wasting my time. Argh! Why do I not seem to have enough time? I feel like I’m always busy. I should get back to writing down what I’m doing and when. It’s just like a diet. No accountability leads to sloppiness.

Sleepytown and Birthday

Lots of times when Mary gets up from the potty at night instead of saying, “Ok, let’s head into bed,” which gets boring, I’ll say, “Ok, let’s see if we can’t catch that next train to Sleepytown.” She’s mentioned Sleepytown when she’s talked in her sleep or hallucinated, and it just cracks me up. She’ll say, for instance, “Does that baby want to go to Sleepytown?” in the sweetest little voice. So I joke about the train that goes to Sleepytown at night.

I told her tonight the next one was coming in about five minutes, so we needed to hurry cause we still needed to change our clothes. She said she thought we could make it. I warned her, though, that she had to be in bed or else they wouldn’t take her. They made exceptions for arm chairs, but that was dangerous because then you had to make a transfer and you might miss your connection. There you’d be, in your bed, waiting for that train to Sleepytown, and you’d be left at the station. We had a good laugh. She’s got such a good sense of humor. I really appreciate that!

We went out to see Angie today—it was her 89th birthday. She wasn’t doing so well, but I wanted to drop off the flowers while they were still fresh. She was feeling better by the time we got there, so we went on in. She seemed to really like the flowers, so that definitely made the trip worth it. Jo seemed so tired. She should have taken a nap when Angie did—just like a mother does when she has a baby. They were concerned that Serene (Jo’s daughter) hadn’t called. Nobody called while we were there. Or came to visit. Hmph. Well, I ate a piece of cake even though I’d sworn to myself I wouldn’t. I was saving my WW Points for a chocolate pie I’d made. Jo had made it even though she was so tired and it was just the two of them there to eat it, since no one else was coming to visit. It was a heart-shaped cake just like Angie used to make for us. Then I gave her a bit of a hand massage. She was having pain around her chest and I could see that Jo was frustrated about what to do for it, which medicine to give her. Angie has a kidney infection and had a bad reaction to the medicine they gave her, so she was going to try something new. Plus, they’re giving her something stronger than Darvocet and it tends to really knock her out. Ange seemed to be getting tired but didn’t want to lie down, so we moved into the living room, where I gave her a foot massage. I saw that her toe nails really need to be cut. She said she couldn’t do it anymore. Her heart hurt when she bent over. Naturally. At first I thought, “This isn’t my responsibility. Let Jo or Pat do it.” But Jo didn’t seem inclined or interested. I thought it would really gross me out because Angie has some sort of foot fungus, but I didn’t mind too much. I moistened them and put Vaseline on them—they were so dry, and then I dug up her microwavable booties (buried in the closet—harrumph) and heated them and put them on her, which she said felt great. She said she’d pay me back later and I told her she already had—with tuna and crackers and cream cheese and olives served on the little picnic table when we were young. She laughed. I hope I really made her feel better. I thought later that I should have given Jo a foot massage, too.

Jo said she might bring her in but was concerned about the stairs. I don’t get that. There are no more stairs here than at her house. People are so strange. They came and got Anna last week so she could visit. I have to admit this made me… jealous or angry, I don’t know. So Anna didn’t want to go with us today. She’d just seen Ange. Plus, she had to go to church.

I forgot to take Angie her birthday card. I’ll mail it. It says, “Glad to see you’re doing so well for you age…you know, breathing and all.” I think it’s hilarious! She’ll probably be insulted.

Ups and Downs

I feel awful about my last post. I really felt bad, though. Thankfully, I've been better since then. Maybe it's just hormones. I think I'm going to try to pay more attention, to see if I can figure out a pattern.

I think I've found all the stock information. I keep telling myself that this is a good thing for me to go back through all of Mary's papers and reorganize them. She kept everything in envelopes, so I've been able to reduce the size a lot. Also, there's a lot I can shred such as old bills that were paid. I'm just putting everything into shopping bags and then I'm putting them all into a plastic tub, just in case there's another leak in the basement. I wonder how you're supposed to organize your papers. How do other people keep their papers? I mean, considering you're supposed to keep some things for seven years... I wonder how many people don't even know that.

I'll be so glad to get this tax stuff done. I just hope the lady at H&R Block knows what she's doing. She called another lady over and kept say that she thought she was in over her head, but the lady kept encouraging her and saying she just needed such and such. I think the info I've found will show that Mary actually lost a lot of money instead of making any. I wonder if I need this info because you don't pay taxes on stocks until you sell them. Is that the way it is? I'll have to ask the tax lady.

Yes, I'll be so relieved, but I know something else will come up soon. It always does. But it won't be as stressful as this, I don't think!

I've been so terrible--I've been looking on eBay for old Wear-Ever products. You see, Mary's first husband Bill sold Wear-Ever. She said today that he was selling it when she married him. I don't know if that's true or not. In any case, she still has several pieces and I think they're so neat. There's a juicer that's just fabulous. There were tons of them on eBay. I ended up getting a 4-egg poacher! I'm so tickled. (I know, I'm crazy.) I love poached eggs! But I hate cleaning out the pan. Also, Grandma B used to heat her dinner in a little poacher like this. Can't wait! I recently purchased an old Pepsi crate. The counters in Mary's kitchen are just about five inches too high for me to work on--rolling out dough :-) I have always thought about the bakery where I used to work--the shorter ones of us used to stand on a Pepsi crate when we needed a little height. Well, I got this one for about $22 including shipping and I just love it! Now I'm able to work in the kitchen instead of on the dining room table where bits of dough and flour were always falling onto the carpet. Plus, I can work right near the oven. Cool!

Ok, I have to admit, that apple pie from The Pie and Pastry Bible probably was the best I've ever had. However, I still think I'm going to tinker around with her dough recipe! There was a show on TV this evening about southern biscuits. I taped it and can't wait to watch it with Mary tomorrow. I don't know why, but I'm rather crazy about making biscuits, pie dough and cookies.

Losing Battle?

I haven't written for so long. Why do people always feel a need to state the obvious?I thought when I got a  DSL  connection that I'd write more, but I've written less. I even got MS Office and that hasn’t helped. Once again I’m confronted with the question of why I don’t want to do things that I want to do. I must not want to do them or I would do them.

Anyway, perhaps I haven’t written because things have been alright. When things are going ok, it seems perhaps too mundane to write about. Or perhaps I’ve just been lazy.

Actually, I feel like I haven’t had any time. I was really being careful about my time, writing down everything I did and when, from what time to what time. Then I felt like I’d gotten back on track and I quit writing it down. I felt good, productive. I think I kept going quite well for about two weeks. Then it started to break down, it meaning my schedule and my… my what? I want to say sanity, but that sounds so extreme. My feeling of well-being is perhaps a nicer way of putting it.

I started getting headaches more and more frequently. The Olympics were on and Mary and I watched them every night, but I noticed that every night I felt worse. I wonder if sitting in front of the TV for too long gives me these headaches. The computer screen seems to give them to me. In fact, it’s really stupid of me to be sitting here right now. Maybe it’s simply eye strain and I need new glasses. Maybe the problem was that the Olympics were over with so late that I was getting less and less sleep, but I don’t think that’s right because I was sleeping longer. Sometimes I think that if I sleep too long, I get a headache. Maybe it’s my mattress.

I feel like I’ve had a migraine all this past week. I haven’t been keeping track, but I think it’s true. I finally massaged my feet and gave myself a foot bath last night and did some yoga and today I was migraine free, but tonight it’s back. My feet were so sore—when I massaged them and today. The heels and the arches are especially sore. I looked at some reflexology charts to see what that meant, but I can’t understand it. I think they showed that I was having throat and pelvic problems. Hmph.

We watched A Beautiful Mind this evening, and, I tell you, maybe I’m just extremely empathetic, but I started feeling like I was crazy. This constant wondering and trying to figure out what’s causing these migraines, this tension and nausea is driving me crazy. Having to constantly repeat myself to Mary and the cat constantly begging me for attention are driving me crazy. The list of things to do that I don’t get done is driving me crazy. I spent all day working on an apple pie. Isn’t that crazy? I checked out this cookbook called The Pie and Pastry Bible and I think the lady who wrote it must have some sort of problem because she is detailed to the point of being anal and makes baking seem like some sort of witchcraft or science experiment. Everything’s terribly complicated and must be so exact. That’s why it’s so incredibly tempting to try her recipes out and see what they’re like. Why can’t I accept that she’s not right and that it’s not that complicated? As my sister Nikki said about this author, why can’t you just throw things together? I think I have to prove to myself that she may do it that way, but her way is not the only way. For example, she insists that pie crusts be made with butter, that shortening is inferior, so why use it. However, the crusts shrink so much! Well, her response is to do all this other hocus pocus to fix that: constantly putting the dough into the fridge to rest. However, I don’t think I even really like a pie crust made with so much butter. Maybe it’s an acquired taste, but I think things can taste too buttery. Like that frosting on Mary’s birthday cake. And it’s not like all that butter is healthy or healthier, even. Why am I carrying on about this? See, I’m just crazy, obsessive.

So is my life falling apart a symptom or is it the cause of my downward spiral? Is it all just hormonal? I get so tired of thinking. I get so tired of myself. But tonight I went into another room and felt that the migraine was coming back—the headache, the nausea—and I started to cry. It’s like living with a mild form of torture. Like having a screw in your neck and someone keeps tightening it. Do I need to do yoga every day? Should I take a hot bath? As Mom asked, why am I so tense? Why do I need to relax so much? How could I ever hold up under real-life (work-life) stressful conditions?

Have I been drinking too much tea? You see, I can never quit asking myself what I’m doing wrong. But I never come up with the answer. So I start looking for the way to fix things. But I don’t find an answer there either, not a permanent answer because things are always changing. I’m never the same from day to day. I guess no one is. But I think other people are more stable. I don’t think this is normal. I feel like I am on a rollercoaster. I even find myself thinking things like, “Here it is, I’m going down again,” or “I’m at the top now. How long will this last?” At least knowing that no phase lasts forever helps to get through the bad phases, but I’m getting so tired of having them. Do I need to just get over it, get over myself?

I called Mom today and invited her over for pie, coffee and dominoes tomorrow. She accepted!

I need to find some information about Mary’s investments so that H&R Block can finish doing her taxes. If I don’t find the information, she’ll owe about $80,000 in taxes, in addition to the $350 fee that H&R Block is charging. Then they ask if you want some insurance for $29 in case they didn’t do their job right, basically. That shouldn’t be legal.

On a positive note, I’ve been back on my diet for three days and I’ve been doing really well. I did some thinking about what sort of mental and emotional baggage I have about losing weight and was surprised at what I found, but also empowered by giving a name to my issues.

Hm, I thought this was supposed to be about Mary. Then I should tell you that she’s been having so much difficulty walking. That’s been at least since we got back from Gina’s, so about three weeks, I guess. She didn’t have a UTI, but Dr R sent a nurse to get another urine sample. I think they need to take another blood test, since that’s where the infection showed up in the first place. They’re going to ask her next week. Maybe I’m just stressed by three weeks of constantly telling her to breathe when she walks—it’s the sure-fire way of getting her to shake less. Also, it’s been stress whenever she gets up because she has so much trouble walking. It’s a lot of work to move her from point A to point B. I don’t want her to get weak, though, so I try to get her up as often as I can, when I’m not too distracted by other things I have to do, that is. Yes, I feel like I’m constantly trying to hold down a blanket outside on a windy day, so that we can have a picnic, but when I get one corner down, another one flies up and then something gets knocked over… a losing battle.