Queen Mediocretia of Suburbia

Laundry

This is me doing the laundry: 1. I put the clothing in the soapy water. 2. I run the washer. 3. I ignore the buzzer. 4. I read blogs. 5. I go to sleep. 6. I go to work. 7. I come home and think, "Duh. I forgot to take the clothes out of the washer." 8. I run the washer with no soap, but with water, because the clothes are all wrinkly. 9. I ignore the buzzer. 10. I read blogs. Et. Cetera.

Oh, I know, the water, the waste, oh the humanity, I know. Sometimes this goes on every day for a week.  Doesn't the soapy water evaporate, then come back to earth as fresh clean rainwater? And the water from loads 2-7 never got soapy anyway. It doesn't matter since I get a free ride from not having kids.

At any rate, I'm quite bad at the laundry.  I only do my own laundry, then, not like some unfortunates who are asked to launder, dry, fold and rotate the underwear. That's why if I accidentally happen to launder Gary's clothing I get this horrified shriek of, "You did my laundry!" that reaches a level of outrage as high as the time I posted the nude photos of him.

It makes me feel inadequate as a woman, that's what I'm saying. And don't tell me I'm lucky that I'm not asked to do his underwear. If he said, "What?! You MADE me dinner! No! I make my own dinner!" I'd feel as rejected.

How cute is this?

I was looking through Mom's old writings.

 

 

 

1. What struck me at first was that she signed it "Marge" instead of Margaret. In 1956, Mom was 20.

 

2. This particular short story was a narrative of how she and her roommate Nanci murdered their housemother.

 

3. Interestingly, she experimented a little with Margi. Note the classic circle / dot over the i.

4.Margee.

5.Margi. (Sans dot.)

6.Margye.

 

 

7. - 8. She evaluates Margye versus Margi.

 

 

 

Clearly, Margi (sans dot) wins, because that became her byline in college, plus it's the one she circled on the Margee / Margi / Margye test run.

(Ellen / Ellyn / L.N. / Ehlyn)

(New college-era post from the great beyond at Mom's blog!)

New Town

We were interrogating the new co-worker.

"Where do you live?"
"Oh, off of Elm, by the river."
(Gasps of horror.)
"Oh my God. You live in New Town."
"NO! NO, I don't!"

Whew, all said, and then commenced a group review of New Town.

"Freaky."
"Weird. Just creeped me out."
"Like Stepford."
"Yeah."
"Like Stepford in the cornfields."
"Yeah. You don't live there, do you?"
"God, no."

I'd heard of New Town. It's a planned community down by the river. I thought I might wikipedia it, so you could see some photos. First I looked up Celebration Florida, the first planned community I'd ever heard of. Then, hey, maybe New Town is on Wikipedia. Guess what? They don't call them planned communities anymore. They call them New Towns.

I had heard Mom describe it years ago, and the image I had in my head was of a collection of Georgian row houses. Down by the river, instead of Regent's Park. Everything was said to be in walking distance. "Cool," I thought. "I need to take that New Town exit sometime. That sounds pretty."

The work conversation piqued my interest, so sometime came 'round on Sunday. So we motored to New Town.

It's wrong. It's so, so, wrong. First, it is no longer in the cornfield, it is a disease spreading across the cornfield. You know how DisneyWorld is "in" Florida, while DisneyLand is "IN" Anaheim? This is DisneyLand. Not so isolated anymore at all.

The first thing you see when you drive in are the display homes.  "Ew," I said, "It isn't all Georgian. It's a row house next to a bungalow next to a French Quarter home next to a brownstone."

You know what's worse? Driving past the display homes. To the "Brownstone" block, then a few blocks later the "French Quarter" block, then the Town Square. Main Street. I looked for that store where you can get ice cream cones for a nickel, like at DisneyWorld.  Then you pass Futureworld, then you pass the church (THE church), then you pass the giant sign titled "The Colors of New Town" -- the colors you are allowed to select for your New Town home. Which had better coordinate with the home next door, because there's about ten inches of side yard separating you and your neighbor.

It was such false diversity. "Be unique, as long as you conform!" I smell trouble in New Town.
I can see the Great New Town Riots of 2115.

Does anyone out there live in New Town, or in a New Town? What's it really like? 'Cause Gary wants to move there.

Post-its From the Great Beyond

The day began with a huge fight with Gary. It's my fault, I'll often find that I'll work something out in my head, make a decision, then Gary will submit to me all the same arguments I had worked through, and it's frustrating, because shut up, shut up! I already thought that out. Just do what I say. (Bongo! No talk back to Missy.)

My thoughts had been: "Bring more stuff from Mom's. Uh-oh. No room here. Purge stuff from here. Then bring stuff from Mom's."

Gary's response was "Your Mom is dead! We have no room for her in our life!" except the actual words he used were, "Stuff means furniture! I like our furniture! You want to throw out all our furniture in favor of your Mom's furniture!" But I knew what he really meant.

Anyway, after much crying and consoling and shortcake at Bob Evan's we went to pick up some remaining tiny microscopic knick-knacks and writings from Mom's house. And it was fun, because I kept finding notes from Mom.

In the china cabinet where she kept Great-Aunt Rosemary's painted china I found a letter from Rosemary talking about how she'd worked to get china painting classified as art instead of decor. "Why I didn't know that, Mom. Thanks! And thanks for putting it right by the china."

In the den, attached to the top of the 1950's shoe shine box was an ad from Organized Living with a reproduction box on sale for $35. Good to know, Mom. Thanks.

But the best part was when I found an old issue of Life with this note:

"Page 145 Life
Great Photos of the Century
Life photographer Bill Eppridge took the stark wedding photos in Nov. 1958 of our marriage."

"Who is Bill Eppridge?" I wondered, and turned to page 145, and saw some photos of heroin addicts. "Cool," thought I, "She and Jerry must have met him in Journalism school." As it turns out that is true. Or at least he went to Mizzou, graduated two years behind Mom and a few years before he started covering Bobby Kennedy for Life and took this photo:

But I didn't know that until I googled him tonight. Before tonight the only Bill Eppridge photos I knew were Mom and Jerry's wedding photos:

 

The one above was my grandmother's favorite. Jerry's worried about the bags under his eyes, and Mom has this great "I'm gonna get laid!" smile in the mirror, but Grandceil particularly enjoyed teasing Mom about the great vat of Vaseline in the back corner of the suitcase. (Click for expanditure!)

I'm sure it's that eye for detail that made Bill Eppridge a famous artist.

From Latin miscellneus, from miscre: "to mix"

• I wasted a good deal of my day today watching VH1's top 100 Songs of the 80's. I didn't listen to music in the 80's.*  That's probably why I didn't recognize the #1 song: Living On a Prayer by Bon Jovi. Kind of pissed me off since I waited four hours for it. I was at least familiar with most of the other songs. Still,  now I understand the "Tommy and Gina" reference in that one Bowling for Soup song.
  
  *And I don't want grief about missing 80's pop music. I listened to NPR. I learned about apartheid. It was all apartheid all the time at NPR in the 80's.

• The ophthalmologist  told me two interesting things Thursday. First, I have the beginnings of a cataract. I am only forty-five! Maybe I'm going senile too. Maybe I have heard Living On a Prayer. Second, the doctor who told Mom she need cataract surgery was probably defrauding Medicare. Evidently Medicare is to the point of telling some eye doctors they can't do cataract surgery unless the patient has had a second opinion.

• I asked the optician which pair of frames she preferred, and she said neither. I said I appreciated her honesty, and ~~Silk, I took your stand that no one looks good in tiny horizontal glasses. You are right. They are one step away from horn-rims and cats-eyes. Who needs a horizontal line across the face? Probably some tween who wears those layered t-shirts so there's a horizontal butt-line. So, watch out, in a week I'll be covering my face with a pair of glasses that are tortoise-shell to match my dyed hair and round to match my round face, and the optician can suckmahballz.
  

Wattle Watch '08: Stress Wattle

The wattle in retreat:

Hospice by the Numbers: Part 3

Number you dial to report a claim on Mom's life insurance:
1-800-628-8600.
Yes. 86 again. These people are sick. And you just know they all think they're being so original.

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If you have a sex dream about your Mom, she'll die 35 days later, like in  The Ring. Like The Ring if it starred Bruce Willis. (I know you already figured this out. You've been wanting to say it. I needed to say it first.)

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The 1815 Incident.

Here's the thing - this story is going to be anti-climactic. I'm only posting it to get it off my chest. AND because the guy at the drive-through said, "Shhh. It's a secret," when he handed me the wrong (more expensive) bag of food after giving my plain cheeseburger to someone else. "Great," I thought, "a secret. You know what they do to me." AND I'm writing this out because every time I relate a story of my frustration and suffering you all leave comments like, "HA HA HA" and "So funny." So. Enjoy.

In her last week, Mom had a lot of difficulty talking, and a lot she wanted to say, and she insisted I was the only one who could translate. So she would wake me up to say, "You're smart." Or, "Life is hard." Or, "Tell Wilma to buy stocks." Or, "Be nice to your brother." Or "Tell [insert name here] I love love love [him / her]." Important stuff.

One day she brought me down to her lips so she could whisper, "Important. Sue. One. Eight. One. Five. Help. Help. Help. Help."
"Help with what?"
"David. Sue. Knows ... Planter. One. Eight. One. Five. Help. Plan for David. Sue knows. Help. Help him."
"Okay. I'm writing this down." (I write it down, and I still have the notes.)
"Sue. Help. Sue knows numbers. Sue. Sue knows."" (Mom started crying.)
"Do you want me to call Sue?"
"One. Eight. One. Five."
"That isn't Sue's number." (I started crying.)
"No joke. Not funny." (Mom had taken to saying 'No joke. Not funny,' all the time.)
"Do I look like I'm joking?" I sobbed.

At that point the nurse's assistant pointed out that 1-8-1-5 is Mom's street address. We've always said "Eighteen - fifteen," but whatever.

Armed with this extra clue I called Mom's friend Sue.

"I have no idea what she's talking about," Sue said.

After some analysis we figured that Planter is the spot where the address used to hang, and Plaque is the plaque by the front door where the address is now. And "Dave" is my brother, who was driving in from the Southwest, and "Help" and "Important" must mean that Mom was worried that Dave wouldn't remember the address, and not be able to find the house. Never mind that he grew up at this house since he was eight.

Sue called back to report that she had called Dave on his cell, he was in Tulsa, and yes, he was pretty sure he could find his way home.

I reported this to Mom. She started sobbing. I started sobbing. And if I never hear the words "Ellen, help me, help me," again I will be a happy woman.

Then she pulled it together and said in a rush, "Plaque. Over the door. Mailbox. Garage. Hardware. Sue. Sue knows."
"Okay. I'll call Sue again."

I called Sue and said, "Okay -- 'Plaque. Over the door. Mailbox. Garage. Hardware.' Does that help?"
"No."
(I burst into fresh tears.)
"I'm sorry."

I reported this back to Mom and I am sad to say she did not take it well. No joke. Not funny. And, it would appear that I don't listen. I had to just walk away from it all.

An hour later, Sue called. Angels sang. The sun burst from behind the clouds in glory.

"Ellen, I've got it! I know what she's talking about."
I sighed with relief. "Oh, thank God."
"About three weeks ago she had me go to the hardware store to buy screws because she wanted the brass numbers she took off the house back ON the house, on the garage door. I'm sure she means to have Dave put those numbers on the garage door while he's here."
Long pause. "You are kidding me."
"No! I'm not joking! I am sure that's it." (Not funny! No joke!)
I thought, "No, I meant you are fucking kidding me." But I didn't say that. Instead I calmly said, "Okay. I'll tell her."

I went in and reported grimly to Mom that why yes, Sue would be happy to help David put the house number over the garage door.

"Yessssssss ..." she sighed, and smiled a great big smile.

So, the day after Mom died, Sue showed Dave where the hardware was and Gary and Dave screwed the numbers on the garage door. Or, as I like to put it, the fucking numbers over the fucking garage door.

I Could Snort Them Like That Stones Drummer

While Mom's instructions said specifically that she be cremated AND the funeral home should dispose of the ashes, the funeral home refused and we now have a plastic box of Mom that needs to be disposed of.

I have a few options.

1. Botanical Tribute

Dad's ashes were buried under an azalea.

(An aside: as many of you know, this isn't entirely accurate. After Mom got Dad's cremains, Dad's mom made a fuss that she had this burial plot and Dad should be in the plot next to hers, ashen or not. Mom "lost the fight" and, with a straight face, handed Grandma a box full of Dad. Or, full of half of Dad. The other half of the ashes she buried under the azalea bush. Shh. It's a secret.)

Thankfully I just re-read Mom's blog and found that the Dad azalea died, otherwise I would have dug up the wrong azalea looking for Dad. I'm glad to see Dad's now under an easy-to-transplant sedum:

Since we are selling the house, my plan is to take the dirt/Dad and the sedum and move it to my garden, where I will till Mom's ashes into the soil and transplant the sedum/Dad there.

The down side is that the Mom/Dad Sedum might meet the same fate as the tree honoring my maternal grandmother. It really sucks when you have a dead grandmother and a dead grandmother-honoring tree.

2. Medicine bottle Tribute

Pseudo-Cousin Chrissy told me what they did with her Uncle Ollie's ashes. Ollie was a world traveler and rabble-rouser. He was somehow involved with an organization that protested the Veiled Prophet by crashing the Ball and unveiling the prophet. And that's not the half of his exploits. He was such a character I didn't even know he owned a jazz club called the Holy Barbarian. So, anyone who visits a foreign land gets a medicine bottle full of Ollie. The goal is to scatter Ollie across the globe.

3. Jewelry

A Google Search tells me this:

"Jewelry: Keepsake jewelry has been developed as a way for individuals to keep a small portion of cremated remains close at hand as a tangible source of  comfort. The jewelry may be displayed in a glass dome or worn as a pendant. Keepsake jewelry can be made of brass, pewter, silver, gold plated or 14k gold. It is available in a variety of styles and is yet another way to personalize a loss."

4. Paperweight.

http://www.memoryglass.com/

5. Diamond

http://www.lifegem.com/

6. Mom In My Pants

It seems like I should be able to incrementally sneak her into Shaw's Garden, like the prisoners did with the dirt in the Great Escape.

Yes, I know this is disrespectful. Mom wanted to be thrown in the crematorium dumpster. It's not like I'm considering smuggling her into the iron lung on display at the Science Center.

The Stuff. My God, the Stuff.

Before I begin, know that I sound very materialistic in this post. I can assure you that I am feeling the appropriate guilt and grief over Mom's recent daughter-assisted suicide.  I'm just sick of thinking of it. (Of course, I could stop thinking about it if I stopped listening to music. It's just like breaking up with a boyfriend in high school: ALL the songs are about you and your boyfriend. Well, now they're all about Mom.)

I thought we'd picked through all the good stuff before and during the wake. But no. We forgot about the closets. I thought I'd gone through all the closets with Mom and did a big purge after Dad died. She must have ferreted stuff under her bed and then levered it up to the top of the closet without my knowledge.

I have now packed my house so full of Mom's stuff that Gary needed to mentally empty our bookshelves and buy another set to match, then mentally move the entertainment center downstairs because a new bookshelf means the entertainment center won't fit, and instead imagine he could buy one of those space-saving wall-hugging wide flat-panel televisions. I don't know if I'm more outraged that he's rearranging my furniture or spending my inheritance.

At any rate, check out these valuable prizes:

Dad's U.S. Army semifore flag set. I had no idea we had this. I don't know why Dad even had a semifore flag set. He had a desk job during the last two weeks of the Korean war. And of course, now there's no one to ask.

All my brother's old Mad magazines and my old Get Smart metal lunch box. Soon to be sold on an e-Bay near you.

Valuable art by known artists.
First artist: my Great-Aunt Rosemary. I'd already snagged most of the china plates and vases she painted, only to get a letter from her today that mentions she's a known artist. She had an appraiser look through her things and found she was mentioned in his artist database. Evidently she had painted a plate once that was found in an art collector's collection.

Second artist: my high-school boyfriend Virgil. I found that the "Ellen - ART" box contains not only art by me, but art inspired by me. In high-school I posed (fully clothed) for a silkscreen by Virgil M______. And now Virgil's all esteemed, and I have a tattered silkscreen of me from his early tempera and newsprint phase.

Valuable writing by Mom.
You may wonder why I jumped on Mom's copy of The Bridges of Madison County. "Why, wasn't that a veiled boy-fantasy disguised as a novel?" you ask, "Why would you want that?" Because this is The Annotated Bridges of Madison County. This is the copy with Mom's cutting criticisms on the edge of every page.

Even better, Mom kept a copy of some of the columns she wrote for the Harris Teacher's College paper and the Mizzou Showme magazine. I'd only read a few of them before. The first words I saw when I picked up the newspaper were "I do not like to stand in lines. Right now if Marlon Brando came to Harris especially to play the bongo drums for me I wouldn't even stand in line to see Him."

"Well, that's a blog right there," I thought. A blog from the beyond.

So I'm going to transcribe or scan one column a week and post it on Queen Mum, so her blog will live on. I'll let you know when there's a new post, like this one here.

The Wake: Part the Second

One of my favorite parts of the Wake was when people stepped up and told me things about Mom that everyone knows: she was smart, funny, never complained, and a great writer. And then Mom's friend Martha stepped up with some information that wasn't widely known, the Story of Mom and Dad. (I knew the Story, of course. No surprises at the Wake, even though I kept thinking someone would step up and say, "Did your Mom ever tell you that you're adopted?")

The Story of Mom and Dad

Margie (Mom) dated a guy named Danny in college. Here they are in '58.

If you look closely at this terrible blurry dark image, you will see my Mom (with a very, very enhanced bosom) standing next to a skinny tall guy.

So, Danny and Mom were dating. Until the fateful night when Danny did not escort her to a college Journalism dance. A gorgeous man at the dance spotted Mom, swept her into a dance, whirled her about, and kissed her when the music ended. Danny Who?

The next day when Danny came to pick her up for a date, she said, "Oh, I was just going to go out and buy a hat for MY NEW BOYFRIEND. You can come along if you want."

In six months Mom married the gorgeous man and moved to Houston. In ten years she was separated from the gorgeous man and came back to Saint Louis, while my seven-year old brother and my five-year old self stayed in Houston with Jerry. One of her friends (I believe it was "Aunt" Carleen) said, "You know, whatever happened to that Danny boy you were dating in college?" A few phone calls later, and Mom was on the phone with Danny.

"Hello, Danny?"
"Yes?"
"This is Margie Foster." (pause) "What'cha been doing?"
"Well, I've been sitting here ... by the phone ... waiting for a phone call from a girl named Margie Foster."

They decided to go see a movie, with Aunt Carleen as a chaperone, because Mom was still married. They dropped off Carleen at her apartment and fell into each other's arms.

Then six months later ... they were married.

Look at that smile!

(And look at that little girl! Look at that tan! I think this is the only photo of me with a tan.)

All this explains why Danny is my Dad and Jerry is my Technical Father, because "Hideous Mistake That Resulted in Two Children" is just cumbersome. No. Really, no one ever acted like that.

I do remember having a spat with Dad about something Mom said, and snapping out the classic kid/stepdad remark, "Well I've known her LONGER." He laughed and reminded me that no, actually, I was about ten years behind him.

Once someone heard that Mom married Dad only six months after she separated from Jerry, and said, "So, you married your transitional man?"

"No," Mom said, "Jerry was the transitional man."

So here they are again, at my wedding. Look at that smile!

Martha Stewart (Not) Living: The Wake

Or:
The Wake, Part the First

Sure, other people have funeral directors to plan the gathering to honor the deceased. Since Mom had requested immediate cremation, we needed to find a way for people to gather and remember Mom. I suppose we could have rented space at a funeral home, but Mom has a nice large house and everyone knew how to get there.

Food:
The Sunday before she died, Mom learned she'd be having a visitor the next day. "Poundcake," she mouthed, "Helfer's Pastries." I crossed my fingers and hoped they'd even have poundcake when I made my first visit ever to Helfer's Pastries. It turns out they did, thank GOD, because if they hadn't - think of it - a deathbed food request I couldn't fulfill. They also had eclairs, also known as breakfast. Filled with heaven. And deep butter poundcake, which in their world is gooey butter cake without the gooey.

So of course, later I picked up eclairs and poundcake for the Wake, and Mom's friends had already volunteered to bring dip and cookies and wines and beverages and to make the coffee. (As a note for those of you with living mothers, be sure your Mom cultivates take-charge friends who know their way around your Mom's kitchen. Mom had a group of great friends who would come and make breakfast at Mom's every other week. They showed up and I took a nap.)

Decor:
I knew from Dad's service that photos are essential. I fretted a little about finding frames for all the  photos of Mom, then I remembered Mom always displayed treasures under the glass top of her kitchen table. (Mom topped her table with a tablecloth, then a layer of, say: dried flowers, or flower photos, then a big round circle of glass.) That worked out well. 

Favors:
In the death file she had suggested that after her death she wanted her friends to each go through her house and pick something to remember her by.

The thing that made this hard was that Dave and I  had to strip the house of everything we wanted first. Mom always joked to her friends that there wouldn't be anything in her house that her kids would want, and instead we'd pitch it all into the Giant Death Dumpster you see showing up in the neighbor's driveways after a  death or a one-way visit to the nursing home. I don't know who calls in the Dumpster, but I don't think we'll use their service. Does anyone know? Is it part of what comes with an estate sale?

So even with the big speed purge, there were still a few awkward moments. ("Oh! No! That painting is MINE MINE MINE!" and "You want a television to remember Mom by?") Fortunately, Friends #2 & 3 were there to remind me, "Um ... is that a family quilt on that bed? Are you sure you want that sitting out?"

Reviews:
Mom's friends said it went well. Others said they missed seeing a body and would have preferred it to be in a funeral parlor. Mom's ghost spat on those people.

A Good Philosophy of Marriage

So, my social whirl this weekend so far has been GNO at the house of Friend #6, and oh, Mom's Remembrance Party. I need to absorb the Mom thing for a while, so let me tell you my favorite part of GNO.

Friend #6, you will recall, is the friend who "can switch from 'Oreo' to 'Sistah' at the drop of a hat," and it would appear drinking buckets of wine really facilitates that transfer. By the end of the night she was explaining her marriage philosophy to us. It is largely based on her experiences with her first husband, who was a crackhead. She explained, "Like, my new husband and I will have a fight, and he'll say, 'I'm sorry,' and I'll be all, 'What? Sorry for what? I was married to a crackhead.'"

That would have been funny enough, even though I don't have words sufficient to express the attitude she threw into it. (Marcia and I played with the idea of expressing it in dialect, i.e. "Ah wuz marr'd. To uh craick-heyah." But I realized that's offensive, or at least it was when I taught Huckleberry Finn to high school students.)

"I was married to a crackhead" was funny, but, even better, we had to keep bringing it up.

She drunkenly cooed, "My new puppy is the cutest thing!"

"Yeah, but your last dog was a crackhead."

File Under Misc.

So, at 4:30 I woke up and thought my hard drive on the laptop was really thrashing a lot. So much it was shaking the eyeglasses on the lid. Of course, other than that, I slept through the earthquake.

But I really enjoyed the aftershock that came when I was at the lawyer's office. I like natural disasters. A little part of me roots for the levee to break or the tornado to hit next door.

Oh, and this morning I put Mom's only jewelry onto my pinkies: a great-grandmother's engagement ring and Mom's wedding ring from Jerry. Which is now gone. Fell off my hand at the in-laws, probably in the grass. Oh, well, it was from Jerry, no even symbolic value. Only that Mom lives in my head and is very disapproving right now.

Time to head off for GNO, where I will drink the Mom Inheritance liquor of Scotch and Apricot brandy.

I Smell Like Chanel

Since the Mom Death File Instructions specify that we let her friends take something from the house to remember her by, Dave and I have been hoarding heirlooms before the MomFest on Saturday. (We don't know what to call it; there's no service, so it isn't a memorial service. It isn't a visitation or a viewing. Frankly, it's a party in memory of Mom. I'm thinking of using "wake.")

I wanted to liberate her can opener, but Dave protested he had just bought some chili and needed to be able to get to it. I tagged the balsa-wood Christmas tree and the Dickens. We were rooting through her drawers (since you never know WHAT people will want to remember her by) and I found an old bottle of Chanel No. 5.

It's old, so you know it's got tortured civet in it.

I put some on. It smells like velvet and powder, not civets or ylang ylang. I tried to think of why, and I realized it smells like Mom going to the Purchasing Agents Dance in her green velvet dress.

I don't recall Mom wearing perfume on a regular basis. For one of their early anniversaries, my Dad bought her a perfume obelisk. I don't know what else to call it. A perfume reliquary? I tried to find it on Google Images.

It looked a little like these, if these were 8 inches tall:

...only Mom's wasn't as tasteful. I can't even call it Mom's, it was Dad's, and you could tell because behind the outrageous gilding, inside the crystal chamber, there was a naked gilt lady holding up the vial that contained the dauber and the perfume. How gaudy was it? I, a ten-year old, thought it was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen.

Mom thought it was so "lovely" she put it on the back of the toilet tank. Since it was top-heavy - "ours" was the size of the one on the left, but it stood on a base about the size of the gilt flower on top - I think Mom hoped it would fall off.

Of course, now I want it. I have no idea where it is.

A Post With Hair On It

The Gods were with me today.

First, I got this fine award from KC at All The World's a Stage. And I would give you one, but you might have one already. Ajooja does, and RachelSkirts does. However, Becs is highly deserving, as is ~~Silk, because they write faithfully, without enough praise. And I have to give one to Stephen and Connie at Planet of the Blind, for the writing and because it looks like a tipsy eye chart.

Second, I slept through one meeting and walked in late to another. But the Gods took pity and TeddyJ canceled the first meeting. I walked into the second one, five minutes late, yet two minutes before the speaker said "Let's introduce the new employees! Where is Ellen S_____?" I was so jazzed I stood up with the Steve Holt gesture.

Third, our speaker used a new phrase: "It's got hair on it!" Is your project moving along according to predetermined timetables? It would appear "it's got hair on it." Gary says he's heard this before. I think he might just think he's heard it before, just like "we are totally in the tank for Obama" from SNL. Had anyone heard "totally in the tank for" before that SNL skit? No. But still, we know what it means.

Fourth, I got an orchid from my friend Lea, who may have commented here as The Orchid Lady a few days ago.

Oh, and fifth, Friend #3 gave me a bite of the tuna casserole she made me and then ended up keeping for herself.

 

Another Downside to Hospice

Since you get the grieving out of the way before your loved one dies, you find yourself recovering far sooner than is appropriate. For example:

1. I went back to work Monday. I'm sure there's some prig saying "Heartless cow" behind my back. But, of course, screw him or her. I mean, that prig isn't going to keep me at home, but I know this is a prime opportunity for people to participate in competitive mourning.

2. I got back on a message board and someone wrote, "what are you doing here?"  This person wasn't being priggish, but it did make me wonder when I'm "supposed" to be indulging in frivolities again. I know it will get worse later, but right now, I'm in the eye of the hurricane. I estimate I've got about a month before I start falling apart again. I should lay low out of respect for Mom, maybe.

3. Because Dave is in town this week, we're trying to tie up the few, the very few, loose ends Mom left. We need to call the lawyer, and since TeddyJ gives me free brokerage services (tedDY! tedDY!), we saw the broker about rearranging the monies so that Dave isn't eating cat food. I know that broker was thinking, "Their mother just died less than a week ago, and here they are, cashing in."

4. I didn't even look at the broker when Dave and I had this exchange:

Dave: "Shut up."

Me: "You shut up. Be nice to me. I'll put you in hospice."

David: (pokes me)

Me: "I'll go all hospice on your ass."

Hospice by the Numbers: Part 2

10. I am ten pounds lighter than I was 2 weeks ago. Mom whispered in the hospital, "Hospice diet. Write a book."

9 out of 10. The number of impending death signs Mom showed on her last day. The hospice people give you a book that spells out what physical changes you can expect at one month, one month to one week, two to three days, and the final hours. Until the end, this book was frighteningly on the nose. We grew to rely too heavily on that book. Before she died, she had all the signs except  blotchiness. After she died, I'm afraid I flipped her hand over and looked for blotches, as if to say, "she might not be dead ... she isn't blotchy." So, if you ever have anyone in hospice, know that the book isn't that accurate.

7. Mom left us a to-do list in the DEATH file, with 7 instructions. Yes, she had a file labeled DEATH. And if your parents don't have a death file, sit down and make one with them. I haven't had to make a decision all week. All we have left to do on the list is to have her name put on the tombstone her mother bought her.

86. The extension for the St. Louis Post Dispatch obituary phone line is 8600. Eighty-six. Do you think that's on purpose?

1815. No ... Still too soon.

Temptation

Okay. What follows was actually kind of alarming. But it isn't sad. I'm almost done with sad.

(On the topic of being done with sad: today I watched the TiVoed My Name is Earl episodes in which he is in a coma ... and they discussed pulling the plug ... and Gary screamed like a woman at every hospital / death / coma reference. It was pretty entertaining.  Not the episodes, which seemed uneven to me, but Gary's reactions.)

When Mom was at home, every time I administered a gel patch of that Fentanyl drug I wanted to lick the patch. I wanted to rub it all over my body. I wanted to pull off the latex gloves and "accidentally" get it on my fingers.

The hydrocodone didn't appeal to me that much (come on, Vicodin? Don't waste my time), but the oxycodone did. It would seem I turn up my nose at drugs that aren't Schedule I or II, even if I don't know it at the time. The Oxyfast droplets arrived the day she was in a coma, and we didn't even break the seal before she died. I know, because I stared at that bottle most of the day, thinking, "I could break the seal and take some. No, they'd find out. I could break the seal, give Mom some, then take some myself."

I didn't do any of those things, of course. Gary says I was just tempted by the danger, like standing on the edge of a cliff. The liquor in the house held no appeal for me, because I know I'd just be a drunk with a dead mom. (Oh, except I inherited half a bottle of blended Scotch Mom got in '88. Scotch smells too much like Pine-Sol for me, though.) The thing that tempts me most about liquor is the bottles. So pretty! Some of them look like fish, some of them hand grenades, some are blue so you think the Gin inside is blue.

But, the drugs don't have the  packaging. And I don't even KNOW how these drugs would affect me.

I do know I felt a little twinge when the drugs were flushed. (By the way, drug-flushing will end soon since so many drugs are found in the water supply now.)  Being a drunk, no, I can't see that, but I'm having sympathy for painkiller addicts. It's a little surprising, especially since I don't feel any physical pain.

Comfort

Today was to be the Day of Sleep. But I just woke up from a dream in which Mom and my friend Catherine the Red were both in hospice.  Catherine the Red was tooling around town in a convertible with her respirator mask and her hospice nurse, while I couldn't get my mom's respirator mask comfortable. I kept tearing pieces off of it and ended up ripping Mom's skin.

Yeah. What could that mean?

Sigh. Anyway, I can't get over how direct this experience is. (I just typed "how direct the death experience is," but I deleted it, as it seemed too direct.)

Mom was direct. Mom said "I am dying."  Not, I feel like I'm dying, or I could just die. She also said "Help me, Ellen, help me get out." I don't think I helped soon enough.

The hospice staff was direct. One person said, "If they open up the morphine to a full dose, your loved one will not come out of it." Useless information, since Mom wasn't on morphine, but good to know in general.

The hospice staff will answer a direct question directly. I asked, "I know you say the purpose of hospice is to give comfort to the loved one, but really we comfort them to death. Right?"  I expected, "Our purpose is not to hasten death" or some other comforting vague legally sanitized statement. She answered "Yes."

The only good thing I know is that Mom decided to do this. (I was only following orders.) I can't imagine what happens when you have to make the decision for someone else. Then again, I can't imagine making any other decision.

Hospice by the Numbers: Part 1

Number of hours since I've cried: 24

Number of months I thought Mom would live: 6
This was odd. The Wednesday that I took Mom to the ER, even before she called, I randomly thought, "I bet Mom won 't be alive in six months." Then, when I saw that the hospice booklet recommended  hospice for those with a life expectancy of less than six months, I decided that was the timeframe. Of course, Mom wouldn't waste time that way.

Number of friends who came by to celebrate Mom this morning: 4

Number of people on her "People to call after I die" list whom I have never heard of:  7

Number of phone calls I made today to tell people Mom had died: 50

Number of people who unexpectedly replied, "I know, I read about it on your blog":  5
This is an alarmingly high number.

 

This is the bad post

I'm sorry to Sherry and Mom's other friends and relatives who read this on a blog instead of through a phone call tomorrow: Mom slipped into a coma this morning at 5:30, and then died this evening at 7:18.

Her friends Pat and Sue visited her this morning, then of course the hospice nurse had to come and re-evaluate her. We excluded both private nurses while Dave and I waited with her. About 6:30 pm Mom began a downturn. Gary came in around 7:15 and talked with the nurse.  Dave and I said goodbye to Mom, then I called Gary in. "Bye bye Margie," he said, then she made a new strange noise and we watched her pulse stop.

I want to add, I've looked at your comments and emails the last few days. I've also heard of your Porch Presents, Caroline (#4), Marcia (#2), and Libby (#2). They have all meant a lot to me.   

Of course, I need to consider a few things after I sleep a while: The Anti-Hospice Viewpoint, and Hospice by the Numbers, and Oxygen Deprivation, and my latent drug addiction. But that's later, now sleep.

Epic

Mom update: She is not in as much pain (if at all). This is a huge relief, especially after six days. She is still conscious and able to talk. There have been lots of "I love you" and "You're a good kid." And some "stop patting my hand," but that's Mom.

The morning started with a nice visit from three of Mom's friends: Donna F______, Carolyn H______, and Penny P_______. She was fairly sleepy, but she recognized all of them and smiled.

Then she went to sleep. While she was sleeping, the hospice bath team descended on her, "woke her up," and gave her a bath. I helped them, we rolled Mom back and forth and bathed her and shampooed her and dried her. Quickly. Too quickly, and with too much efficient chatter, probably. At the end of it, she whispered to me, "Don't trust them. Crazy voodoo people. Call the police. They are crazy. Get Archie, he has a gun."

Not funny. She was terrified and shaking, and as she listed all the neighbors who must be warned, Nurse Jane called.

Nurse Jane, nee "That Bitch Nurse at the lung doctor's office," is the nurse at Dr. S________'s office. Dr. S________, Mom's lung specialist, is the one Mom has had the longest relationship with and the the she chose to follow her case till the end. Mom likes Dr. S_________. However, she named the Bitch Nurse.

"I'm sorry," I said, "Mom can't talk now."
"She's always been able to talk to me before," Jane snipped. "If she can't walk to the phone, you can bring the phone to her. Don't you have a mobile phone?"
Fine, I said, call me back on my cell. And she did, and I held the phone up to Mom's ear. Mom replied to Jane's perky, "How have you been feeling?" with, "They are going to kill us. Warn the neighbors! Crazy voodoo people. Archie has a gun."

I put the phone back to my ear. Jane said, "Your mother seems changed."
"I know."
"But just a month ago she was walking!"
"I am fully aware how suddenly Mom has declined." I didn't go easy on the Tone. "I'll call you back later."

Later, I called Jane.

"Jane, Dr. S________ has been following her case. Didn't they tell you?"
"We noticed you wanted to increase her pain medication."
"Yes. She's been in pain. Crying, cursing, we want it to stop. They say there are good days and bad days, and it's just been one bad day after another."
"Well if you cut back on her pain medication," Jane said crisply, "she'd probably have more good days. The pain medicine you're giving her is reducing her lung capacity."
"I see. You want LESS pain medication. Less. Let me run that past the hospice nurse." Bite my ass Jane. I hung up and dialed the hospice nurse in one fluid motion to run this whole "Go with the pain" hospice theory past her.

"I'll take care of it," she said, and explained when she called back that Dr. S_________ and Jane were not aware Mom was in hospice, didn't know much about the case, only that we were electing to ease her pain over saving her lungs. Then, she said, "they" said some "anti-hospice" things. Like, I suppose, "I've tried for twenty years to save this woman's lungs and now you say I should give up hope. She was just walking, just the other day!"

So, since Dr. S________ needs time to get over his denial, Dave and I and my medical Power of Attorney have switched the doctor on the case to our original GP, the doctor who suggested hospice as an option, the doctor who called Monday to see how we were all doing, our Mormon doctor, instead of this one who worships the Golden Lung.

And now since noon, Mom's on a new medicine and has been free of pain, finally. Other medicines and a more frequent dose schedule has her calmer, if sleepier. So, crappy day, but a good result.

Oh, and then Gary said the Lent Bunnies has left some Lindt truffles on our porch while he was out walking the dog.

More of the same...

Mom was in one of three states all day today:
1. Pain
2. Sociable
3. Hallucinatory

1. Mom in pain is not good, and Mom in pain after five days of hospice is five times worse. In the morning we doubled her pain patch, and after more pain in the evening we switched her breakthrough pain pills to something I hope is more effective.

2. Mom's two best friends visited her today, Sue and Sherri. She loves them both so much. She smiled.

3. Mom freaked us out twice today by asking about long-dead relatives. She asked about her mom in the morning. Gary took me out to dinner and I missed it when she again asked David where her mommy was. "She's dead." Dave said. Mom replied that Delores would pray for her, then she asked where Jimmy was. Delores and Jimmy were Mom's siblings. Delores died when Mom was a teenager. David had completely forgotten about Jimmy, who died of scarlet fever before Mom was even born.

And even more of the same: Again Gary found cake and wine on the porch. Has Caroline struck again?

Still Nothing Funny to See Here...

Important Mom update: Mom is still breathing, conscious, and asking for various friends.

Long Mom update: This is so bad, people. We all cried today. I am sure people walking past on the street began crying for no reason.

In the morning, Mom said, "I'm hot. Call the doctor. Ask him if I'm dying."

After a long pause, I choked out, "I don't have to call the doctor, Mom. You are dying."

She slowly rasped, "I've never died before. Tell Wilma it's hot. Call Archie. Archie knows."

(Archie, Mom's neighbor, was declared legally dead once.)

"Ellen, Ellen, help. Help."

"How can I help you, Mom?"

"Where's my pastor?"

"You don't have a pastor." (Long thought.) "Do you want to accept Christ?"

Solidly, "No." Then, "Where's Gary? Call Gary."

I called a baffled Gary and told him to tell Mom he'd take care of me. At this point the nurse assistant was crying.

Then Mom told Dave he was a good guy and she loved him very much, then the nurse came in with dreadlocks and she had me get the boom box and play "You Put a Spell on Me" by Screaming Jay Hawkins. Then she insisted everyone leave the room. Then the drugs took effect and she went to sleep.

But only until that night, when Gary came by and she gathered us all around her. Then she said goodbye to all of us and wouldn't let us put her breathing mask back on. I watched her chest turn blue over about ten minutes. Then Gary kissed me on the cheek and said, "K, hon, I'm heading home now."

"Mom might die."

"She won't die."

I asked every five minutes after that if she wanted her mask back on, and after about fifteen more minutes, she said, "Air," the code for, "Put my mask back on."

Then we all breathed.

And it's just going to get worse tomorrow. I apologize to those of you who have parents in hospice. It is great to have drugs sent in the middle of the night by courier, but the rest of it sucks solidly, except there are nurses and their assistants who cry with you and hug you when you cry.

Oh, and there are friends who drop by your house and leave chocolate cake and wine on the porch for your husband to find. Thanks, Caroline.

In Which Hell Freezes Over

Mom can't talk because she can't fill up her lungs enough to force out noise. (Marcia, I've tried using the diaphragm-pushing technique you've used with your friend, but I'm afraid I'll hurt her.) So, we've had trouble the last few days with understanding what she says. (I'm still not ready to relate The 1815 Incident, though.)

So, this was the conversation we had this evening when the new night nurse's assistant showed up:

Mom gasped something. I tried to translate, but I couldn't get it. The new night nurse's assistant (NNNA) helped me get the respiratory mask off.

"I told ... Rachel ... no pain ... was wrong ... Danny."

Rachel's my pseudo-cousin, and Danny's my Dad, who died in hospice 20 years ago.

She continued breathing out, "Danny ... Danny ... Fuck."

"Frank?" David asked.

"Fuck," Mom gasped distinctly.

"Yeah, I heard 'Frank' too," the NNNA agreed.

"Who is Frank?" David asked.

"Fuck." Mom whispered. "Fuck fuck fuck." Then, "Wash out my mouth."

Of course, "wash out my mouth with soap," was what she meant, but the NNNA happily got the toothbrush and scrubbed and had her spit, while David went on about anyone she might have known named Frank.

"Stop it. Fuck," I said. "Not Frank. Fuck."

NNNA immediately said to Mom, "Oh! Do you want some pain medicine?" And though the medicine wasn't due for six more hours after her last dose, the NNNA suggested we could give her half after three hours, and it'd been one hour, and it would be okay after two or even one and a half hours.

I like her for the way the timeline kept getting shorter and shorter. "Give it now," I said, and she handed me the pills. Then I called the agency and increased her dose.

I know from the experience with Dad that if the increase goes to a full dose of morphine, they won't wake up. Of course, Mom isn't on morphine, and I don't know what a full dose of it would be equal to, but I know the nurse who answered the prescribing hotline didn't sound alarmed by my dose increase request. I also know the medicine they decided to courier out only contained one patch. All I know is I can't have my Mom being in so much pain she says Fuck.

Dave Arrives

Mom Update: Breakthrough pain meds doubled, and if that doesn't work the pain patch medicine might be doubled again. A funny thing happened today, and if it hadn't made me cry solidly for two hours I would tell you about it. Perhaps in a year, just say, "The 1815 Incident," and I'll tell you about it.

So, today, during my daily hysteria moment, my brother arrived. I haven't seen him for ten years. Clearly he's grown in that time: first he is over twice the size he was (I'm almost twice the size), and second he didn't cry. He's a rock. He was distressed he wasn't crying. I was amazed, and I felt a little stupid since I had warned the hospice staff (while sobbing) that HE was the emotional one and would need a lot of their support.

In Which Gary Packs

Mom update: The doctor doubled the pain patch, so Mom has rested comfortably. Tonight when she woke up she placed an order for pastries for the friends who are visiting tomorrow. She is still gasping out pithy jokes. And the nurse tonight, Carol, can read the lips of people in respiratory masks AND her last patient was a polio survivor AND her dad died in hospice AND she's a Catholic / Baptist. I love her. I also sent Mom's eyeglasses in to have the new prescription put in. (Since we found out she didn't need cataract surgery, just a new prescription, she has to look through them at least once.) It took a little while to leave her alone with just the nurse, since Dad died the first time alone with the nurse.

=======================================

So, I emailed Gary a list of things I needed from home, i.e. DRUGS, all my underwear, four or five shirts.

So when he brought in two bags I asked why. He opened the carry-on bag and said, "Your drugs and shirts are in here." Then he gestured to the pilot bag front pocket. "Your underwear is in here," then unzipping the pilot bag, "Your dirty underwear is in here."

Hospice Nurse

Hospice nurse was here 20 minutes and told me to get on a daily dose of wine or anti-depressants for the crying. I told her I was on the Celexa, and she said, "Call your doctor. Increase the dose." When she left she turned to me and said "Drugs. Drugs are good."

This is Drugs. This is Your Mom on Drugs.

About twenty years ago, Mom had open-heart surgery. One day during her recovery, Mom scrawled "RAT POISON" across a notepad.

"Rat poison? Where did you see rat poison?" Dad asked.

Mom scrawled, "Mahatma Gandhi," then "Maybel. PARROT."

Later, when they took Mom OFF the morphine, we discovered Mom had been visited by the Mahatma, who stood in a corner with his hand positioned by his mouth as if he were playing an invisible kazoo. Later, her mother-in-law Maybel "stopped by" with a parrot on her shoulder. This one made some sense, given that her diabetes left her with just the one leg. I don't know what excuse Gandhi had.

So, I was surprised to hear they had started her on even a "tiny dose of morphine." I asked, and as it turned out, it's actually a "tiny dose" of opium.

Strangely, she's still asking for Tylenol. But that's better than "RAT POISON."

My New Power

Over the last few days people have had the nerve to push past my natural reserve and force compassion on me.

I find I have a new power. I can make these compassionate people cry. Hey, they want me to talk while I'm crying? Here's how it feels, suckers.

This has worked on the past three people who ignored me when I waved off their concern. The nutritionist at MoBap, the pulmonary tech at Barnes, and the optician at Barnes. All of them "comforted" me until they were sobbing.  One had been with her dad in the hospital, one had lost her dad to cancer, and one watched her grandfather die of post-polio syndrome.

I feel much better now when people pat my arm and ask if I'm okay - I know we are soon to reverse roles. Still, I love the pulmonary tech, who asked "Do you want some cake?"