Picking Up the Pieces

"Well, somebody's got to rebuild Rio!"

I doubt more than a handful of people will recognize that quote, let alone find it amusing, but it perfectly expresses how I feel. My final challenge for the year has been met. I took my Boards test three days ago, and now... what? 

2022 has been nothing but a series of hurdles, with just enough space between them to catch my breath.  It began with my mother's decline and death, quickly followed by my decision to sell my house and move out of Los Angeles. Then came arranging her memorial service while juggling the move, followed by a midsummer trip to Europe (I had booked this two years earlier and could not cancel it), and then studying for this test. All year I've been saying to myself: You just have to get through the next thing. And: Just wait till that test is over with and I can start unpacking! 

Strangely, I now find myself with no desire to unpack. Or to do much of anything, really, except make lists. Big, ambitious lists. I have made a couple of large decisions without too much trouble... I am not going back to work full time but will continue with my part time schedule. I have made a down payment on a condominium in Florida, though the project has not yet broken ground - it looks as though I will be moving in two or three years. But it is the day-to-day decisions that are the difficult ones. Namely, where to start cleaning and organizing? In the kitchen? Master bedroom? My bedroom? Should I be working toward a garage sale, or try to donate everything, or look into selling on eBay? I don't really want to think about any of it. 

Perhaps scheduling my days would help. So many hours per day cleaning and organizing, so many hours per day working on paperwork. None of it sounds like much fun. I did start cleaning out my mother's desk today and made a dentist's appointment, so that is something accomplished at any rate. And I am trying to spend more time with my friends. I am coming to realize, though, that I have been too busy to come to terms with the losses of my parents and aunt; it's catching up with me now, as I am constantly finding little things that belonged to them which keep bringing me to tears.

Exercise helps. And I think I need to go back to church, as I have not been regularly in years. Perhaps plan another trip for next year? Something that is a challenge. I will keep cleaning, contemplating my options, and working on rebuilding Rio.  

Note: Drive-In is a fun, silly comedy from 1976 set in a small Texas town, at (yes) the local drive-in movie theater. I do recommend it if you can find it. [Update: Hey, it's available on YouTube! Maybe I'll watch it tonight!] The parody disaster movie playing at the drive-in is a lot of fun, if you remember the disaster movies that were all the rage during the 70's. 

Labels: Changes, Loss, Memories, Random Thoughts

"I Need You to Take This Fish," 

...said my brother as we drove to the Pittsburgh airport. It was early November and we had traveled to our father's home town in Pennsylvania to give him the funeral he wanted. His ashes (to be precise, half of them; we still have the other half) had been interred in his parents' grave. The trip gave us a chance to spend time with my father's older sister and our cousins. Our aunt is the only one of the three siblings still alive; thankfully she is still completely alert and was very happy to see us. One of our cousins, a real outdoors type, gave John some frozen fish he had caught for the trip back across the country.

"It'll be fine!" he had said cheerily. "I have an insulated bag for it, just pack it in your suitcase." Not without misgivings, my brother had accepted the gift. But now we were running late and my brother had just remembered, first, that he only had a carry-on bag with him; and second, that he wasn't going directly home but to a sports function for his son.

So guess who got stuck with a bag of frozen fish in her suitcase? But time was short and we had no choice, so into my luggage it went. I had visions of ruined clothing all the way back to Los Angeles. But luck was with me; the early morning Pittsburgh temperatures were below freezing and I changed planes in Denver (pretty cold there as well). When I landed at LAX it was a cool, foggy day. As I stood in the rideshare line, my brother texted me: "How's the fish?"

"Not home yet," I responded tersely. As soon as I made it home I hauled my bag into the dining room, put it up on the table and began digging through it. To my relief it was still frozen solid. I don't know who manufactures that insulated bag, but I need to get one. 

The fish was stored in my freezer for a few weeks, at which point it resumed its journey to my parents' house for Thanksgiving. My brother and his family took it home with them after the holiday. 

And that is my epic fish story. 

Labels: Family, Holidays, Loss

 The Family Gathers

My brother and sister arrive today with their families for my mother's service, which takes place tomorrow. They all have to leave on Sunday; unfortunately we all are too busy for this to be an extended stay. The place looks nice, with flowers in bloom (courtesy of the local nursery; they probably won't last a week after the service) and windows freshly washed. 

This is a large house, and I'm going to be the only one living here. I'm getting used to the little pops and clicks you hear in any house; when the icemaker goes off I no longer assume that there's a serial killer standing behind me, making ice. And I now have a coyote that visits in the early morning. He just ghosted across the patio and up the brick stairs toward the street. I'm going to be living here full-time starting in June, assuming I survive the next two weeks before the move. 

Going back to my mother, her death was both expected and unexpected. She had Covid at Christmas in 2020 and was never really the same afterward, although she did not have to be hospitalized. She developed a terrible, racking cough which improved for a while and then worsened again in the last few months of her life. When she was in the hospital, the respiratory technician looking at her blood gases  kept asking, "Are you sure she didn't smoke?" Finally I explained about the Covid and he immediately said, "Oh, that explains it." This despite her chest X-ray not showing any significant abnormalities.

Then my aunt (her sister) died, followed by my father six weeks later. I have written extensively about my aunt's illness, but not my father's. He had vascular dementia related to strokes and hypertension. The week after my aunt died, with the distraction of her illness gone, I was able to really look at him for the first time in weeks and realized how much weight he had lost due to his dwindling appetite. After a quick family discussion, I put him on hospice and he passed away in his sleep a month later. Mom never really recovered from those twin losses. She was very depressed, but when we held my father's celebration of life in August and she was able to see many of her friends, she did surprisingly well. It was the last real social event she attended. 

Many of her friends offered to take her out for lunch and the caregivers did take her out once or twice, but more and more she slipped into isolation. In December she was hospitalized, twice in January, and then she became more confused and died at the beginning of February when her oxygen level suddenly dropped and she began coughing up blood. It was shocking and sudden; none of the imaging or tests she had indicated that something like this was going to happen. When asked what had happened, my stock answer was "I could give you half a dozen possible explanations, but I don't know exactly what it was." I am sure there was some sort of pulmonary cause, but none of us in the family saw any reason to do an autopsy.

When she died, I had left her just a few hours before to drive back to my house and run errands. I do so wish I had been there when she passed away, but I did get to spend the previous evening with her, and I take some comfort in that. 

I hope to write more about her later, but I can't face it just yet, and there is much to be done before my siblings arrive. Must go.

Labels: Changes, Family, Loss