Don’t Yell at Aunt Gertrude

         Somebody had suggested that someone take a mom for a drive to look at the fall.  Knowing my own vehicle wasn’t going to make it up the canyon (it actually was too sluggish to get near the base) I chose an alternate, perhaps a more scenic route and asked if she would like to visit my 91 year old great-aunt. 

          Aunt Trudy has ALWAYS been active.  Over the years she has become hard of hearing, but she is still sharp as ever with brand new driver’s license in hand.  She was so excited to see my mom and me (as it has been a while) and we visited just briefly.

          “Well, it was so good to see you,” my mom kept on saying – as though we’d be leaving fairly soon.  What was her problem?

          Aunt Trudy would ask a question which mom would answer – but in her quiet voice and then I would loudly repeat it for Aunt Trudy.  Mom excused herself again.  “Well, I need to get back home.”

          “What do you need to get home for?” I asked.

          “I just need to go home!” she yelled.

          “I guess our visit is over,” I said to Aunt Trudy, while trying my hardest to use an apologetic tone and expression.

          It hadn’t dawned on me until almost three hours later that my voice raising or yelling was the cause of what was bothering mom.  Corey confirmed that when he said she didn’t like loud noises.  That would explain the tension between her and Jenna – though all of us have complained that Jenna’s volume really can get too loud.  Our level of tolerance seems to be more civil than my mom’s. She gets frailer with each passing day.

          Daddy was frail before he left this earth.  But he still had his mind.  Mom’s physical condition is okay, but her mind is not.  That’s a lot harder, I think.  On us anyway.  I think it’s hard on her – but not the same way that physical pain is. Soon she’ll forget that there was any emotional pain.  She’ll resort back to a place where we just won’t be able to find her.  Often she already thinks that I grew up with her in San Francisco and is always surprised when she asks me and I tell her that I have never lived in San Francisco, only visited.

          I need to visit Aunt Trudy again – but without mom or with mom on one side of the room and me on the other.  I think I ought to invite Kayla and her two to come with me.  I don’t know that Aunt Trudy has ever seen Garrett.

Insurance Company File Clerk

          After high school I got a job at my dad’s work (an insurance company)  as a file clerk.  It was back in the days where not everyone had a personalized computer.  And the computer that my dad worked on (he was a computer programmer) was one of those ancient wall to wall machines that look along the lines of a horrible sci-fi.

          My job was to pull microfiche, file microfiche, scan documents to be cut and inserted into microfiche, and to cut and insert.  Mostly I pulled or filed.  I rarely ever cut and insert.  I actually may have done it only once.

          We were located in an ancient building which used to be a lodge for the lions (probably at the very moment they were founded) The company outgrew that building and moved to a much nicer location only eight blocks away.  (The first building we were is now some kind of night club or dance hall – or at least last time I checked)

           

          I liked our second location a lot better.  I think we all did.  It was definitely a lot roomier. And I could take walks outside during my breaks without constantly looking over my shoulder as the first location seemed to be in a seedy part of town.

          I left the insurance company to go on my mission. 

          After I returned I did not go back to the insurance company my dad was with.  I continued to do temp jobs (in addition to Snelgroves STILL) and had some assignments that led me back to the world of sorting and filing microfiche.  Unfortunately the girl they picked to be the supervisor had no concept of numerical order nor did she know how to alphabetize. 

It was a very unprofessional atmosphere with a turnover of employees between the ages of 10 and 25 (although very few of them actually seemed mature enough to be 25 – and okay, perhaps 10 is an exaggeration.  Though I actually know more sophisticated 10 years olds than some of the co-workers I had.)

          I worked three assignments at the same company.  I will NEVER go back to it – though I really did enjoy the work itself.  But if I had wanted to hear all the muck and garbage that came out of the employees that were around me, I would have just stayed home and watched Jerry Springer

          My dad was forced to take a medical retirement.  But the insurance company that he’d been with treated him well.  For many years after his death, my mom continued to receive turkey cards and updates.  I thought that was impressive.

          They have since moved their location at least one other time.  Last I heard their most recent location was at the triad center.  And I’m guessing they have done away with the fiche and have a more reliable filing system.

          I have enjoyed office work the most of any job or assignment that I’ve had.  I would think that modern technology has made it even easier.  It’s impractical for me to work full time while Jenna is still in school.  But when I have searched for part time, I have applied for office position (minus reception work or anything that is phone related)

Conversation With Mom

          My mom has dementia. Normally I visit her on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  This week I happened to drop by on Wednesday evening as well.  Since she had seen me three times in a row, yesterday morning I jokingly asked, “Are you tired of me showing up on your doorstep?”

          Quite relieved, she said, “Oh, I’m so glad you’re here.  I’ve been by myself all day!”  It was 10:00 a.m.

          “Well, [Corey]’s here,”

          “No.  [Corey] went to Las Vegas.  And I don’t know when he’ll be back.  But it sounds like he will be gone for a long time.”

          “Well, his car’s out front.”

          “Oh, is it?  Well he must have taken the train to Las Vegas” {There is no train from Salt Lake to Las Vegas – not that I know of}

                “I think he’s here.  He’s just still in bed.”

          “No. He got up early this morning.  He’s gone.  And I don’t know when he’s coming back.”

          It’s sad to see her so sad and distorted.  I knew that Corey was there – but I wasn’t going to wake him up to prove it.  And there was really no point in trying to convince her otherwise.  So I just let it go.

          She appeared to have wanderlust.  I asked her if she would like to go for a drive.  Something.  Get her out of the house.  I wish I would have thought to take her to the senior center.  I never think about it when I’m with her.

          She said she couldn’t drive {for the umpteenth time} said her driver’s license had been taken away and that she had to go to somewhere in Draper to get it back because they took it from her {as if they had stolen it} “. . . but say they will give it back if I come get it.  But how am I supposed to get it if I can’t drive?  Stupid people.”

          It’s all I can do to keep from laughing.  She then changes the subject to her first car – “you know, when we were living in San Francisco.” 
         I have never lived in San Francisco – but somehow she thinks all of us lived there.  She really was raised in San Francisco and sometimes will talk about where she lived as though I am familiar with all the landmarks and streets  and so doesn’t have to add further explanation – yet whenever she talks about her family she explains like I am not familiar with anyone but her

          “There were two of us that drove.  One lived north of Dudley Stone {an elementary school that went up to the eighth grade - when she wasn't driving} and I lived in the other direction.  And so she would take people who lived north and I would take ones that didn’t live north.  Remember?”

          I actually was familiar with some of the names she used just from her own resources given in years gone by – only I don’t know about the car pooling part - though I'm positive that she wasn't driving while attending Dudley Stone.  It’s true her step father had purchased a car for her – but I don’t think it was until after high school.

          “My mom and dad were divorced.  My dad was mean.  He used to smack my mom around.  I was scared of my dad {I think she was} but he ended up with this other woman.  I don’t know if they were married.  But she called me one day and told me that something was wrong and so I went over to her house and my dad was laying on the lawn and he was dead.  I don’t remember what happened.  I think I went to find the police and they took him away”  

          It’s true that my maternal grandfather and his second wife may have lived in California for a while – but had moved back to Utah sometime before my mom had turned thirteen – as she was thirteen years old when her mother put her on a train to Utah so that she could visit with her dad.  He didn’t die until several years later –

He didn’t die until after mom had married and given birth to three children.  We had even gone to the funeral.  I remember my brother, Patrick, looking into the casket and asking, “Why is that man in a box?”

 He died in a small town in Utah.  But mom believes (with every fiber of her being) that her father passed away on the lawn in California when she was a driving teenager

          “And my mom was 90 when she died – Oh, you are not going to believe this – my mom died at the cemetery while she was visiting . . . I don’t know who she was visiting – but she had family in the cemetery and she died while she was visiting them.  And they called me and told me I should have her cremated and they threw her ashes over the graves that she was visiting.”

          I had to throw my hands over my face so she wouldn’t see the laughter I was trying so hard to hide. First of all the only person my grandma would have known in said cemetery was my dad.  She, herself, did NOT have any relatives there.  Nor did she ever visit the cemetery to my knowledge.  My maternal grandmother died at Cottonwood Hospital.  And she was in her 90’s – I think that and cremation are the only parts my mom got correct.

          The cemetery doesn’t strongly advice cremation just because a person’s body was found lifeless over some headstones that they presume are family members.  Nor are ashes scattered over headstones.  There is a certain procedure that takes place in “scattering one’s ashes” and it had been grandma’s wish to be scattered in the ocean.  Mom had received some pictures that were taken on the east coast (Maine, I believe) to show her where the ashes had been scattered.  Whatever.  We take it upon faith that it was done, but we don’t really know

          She has lunch with a friend the second Thursday of every month.  They had met in San Francisco but had learned that they had both been born at the same hospital in Ogden.  She says they were in the hospital at the same time {I don’t know how much of that is accurate – especially since she says her friend’s birthday might be in July and mom’s is in June} and that her friend lives up the street but she’s not sure which house (probably because her house is NOT at the end of the street – though the two really are living in the same city and have lived in the same cities at the same time)

          Corey was home.  Mom was very surprised.  And happy. 

         

           While there are some things that my mom truly does remember and the details are truly real, there are just as many “myths” that have entered into her mind and have become just as real (if not, more than) the memories that really did happen.  
            Not a very reliable source, my mom.  It’s sad to watch her fall into another dimension.  And I sense her slipping further into this “marshmallow world” and there’s nothing we can do to bring her back to reality.

          I think it's highly probable that my mind may be visiting that same world that mom is now.  I hope for my family's sake that death may claim me before my mind does.  And I hope that they will be at peace with that. I think the mind-slipping thing is a lot harder to deal with.