Whitman's sampler ... of crap

I talked to my dad recently. It had been a while. He'd tried calling but I'd been out, or just not gotten back to him. In truth it's hard to talk to him at times because of the spectre that is my mother hovering around us. 

She's gone in mind but still here in body. They had a birthday for her, her friends from her final productive adult years and dad, in a side lounge, with wine and cheese. At least that was the plan. But within five minutes she'd would have forgotten it had ever happened. 

But would she have had moments of clarity? I wonder if Alzheimer's or dementia, whatever your head-poison, is like being drunk? Where you have those sudden 'woah' crystallised moments of understanding about yourself or something you're doing. It's almost like the game paused so you could think your way through a puzzle. I wonder if she gets those moments where she goes 'oh, fuck, I'm in a home'? Or is it just that she drifts, floating like a feather, though a dry curled leaf is more apt, from moment to moment, either in a zen-like state of abeyance of thought or stuck in a permanent confused loop of 'now, what was I doing?' Forever locked in that moment you have when you're in the kitchen and you've forgotten why you sent yourself there.

I often go to the cupboards in that mind blanked state and then by reflex open them and stand there. I come-to and find I've been standing there for some time subconsciously seeing see if something has tripped my yumdar, my threshold for investing time and effort into grabbing something probably tasty if I put some effort into into preparing it. 

In many ways it seems dementia is like the description to the (A)D&D Feeblemind spell. Here's the Second Edition version. 

This spell is used solely against people or creatures who use magic spells. The feeblemind causes the subject's intellect to degenerate to that of a moronic child. The subject remains in this state until a heal or wish spell is used to cancel the effects. Magic-using beings are very vulnerable to this spell; thus, their saving throws are made with the following adjustments...

My dad said that lately they've been getting the dementia-afflicted into the communal areas, or "GenPop". There's a nurse—Canadian, dad thinks—that tries to keep the less-bad ones, the ones that can maintain a rough timeline in their decaying noggins, mentally active. So she's been reading them stories which they can then follow along. Lately it's Wind in the Willows. 

When we were children, and if mum was able given her time and resource constraints (1), she would read us stories. She'd do voices, too. Dad then said that when she read us Wind in the Willows that her favourite bits to do were Toad's bits. I think because he was so joyous, so marrow-sucking-of-life. A total fucking narcissist, for sure, but fuck me, did Toad love life. Anyway mum loved to do Toad and she loved to yell 'Poot Poot!' for when Toad was careering around in his motor car and scaring sedate country dwellers with his horn and erratic driving.

Dad said he'd like to think that might spark a memory in her. Oh wouldn't it be grand if it did? If she had one of those 'fuck, my mind's gone' moments of clarity but with it was twinned a memory of us, snuggled around, listening to her read Wind in the Willows and in Toad's joyous voice, shouting 'Poot, Poot'? And that she'd get comfort in that?

Damn, Second Edition Advanced Dungeons and Dragons description of Feeblemind was right ... mum did cast magic spells.

At work, as I was talking to Robot, he announced he didn't like the way my arse-fat was hanging over the sides of my chair. My arse is large, it's actually quite muscular and I am sure would go down like fine crackling down hill-folk way, but it seems to fit in regular chairs okay. But Robot was semi-insistent. Apparently there should be an inch or so either side of the body. I had squeezed along the sides a little on the way in ... and apparently over. 

I had been feeling on the up until then. I had my cane on show but barely needed it. I even felt a little trim over when I'd last been at work. Then the Robot comes along and delivers some arse-flab chair overhang truth-telling smack-down and takes your mood right back down. 

Again, I win first time those words in that order; the contest!

(1) Sorry, lapsed into public service speak. She was a mother in a household of five, four of them male, three of them child-to-adult. Cooking, cleaning, you name it. On top of that she studied as a mature-age student, re-inventing her career from housewife (she worked before we worn born in the hotel trade) (1a) to teacher. And then from teacher to regional journalist for the ABC (each town in a regional section had a correspondent who worked part-time to file copy, attend council, or talk to notable types. My mum did that!). Then back to teacher then librarian. She did uni face-to-face then by correspondence. Before the MS took her legs, and her mind started to go, she'd even prepared to start first year English. So you know what, she did have time and resource constraints. Mainly it was us.