“Your mother is a crappy driver!” he snarled and proceeded to tell me all about it. The next day my mother called me and said, “Did your brother call you about my driving?” I guess another conversation must happen soon about how much longer Mom can go on terrorizing the neighborhood with her old Toyota Camry. A topic for another blog post.
Today the adventure at the credit union took a bit longer than expected because she had forgotten her wallet (and ID) at home. She was understandably upset. To a young(er) person, forgetting a wallet at home might be attributed to stress or carelessness or just plain laziness. When you are 85, a lapse in attention is a harbinger of impending institutionalization. As we went back out to the car, I tried to help her put her lapse into perspective.
“It could be a whole lot worse,” I said. I went on to say how lucky we were (us privileged white Americans, is what I was thinking) to be born here and now, and not over there, or way back when... it could be a lot worse. “And look, it's not snowing, or even raining. If you have to forget your wallet, today is the perfect day to do it.”
She didn't look convinced, but by the time we drove back to the credit union with her wallet, I suspected it had faded from short-term memory. At last we sat down with a rep at the credit union, who couldn't seem to figure out what we were there for. After much confusion and checking with managers, it seemed that no signatures were needed after all.
Mom was miffed, but I was resigned, not angry. It does no good to get angry over these things, I now know. Anger is the dubious luxury of the so-called normal people. Whoever they are. I have no idea. I'm not normal, I know this... but actually, I don't think I know any normal people. Huh. Maybe I'm just running with the wrong crowd. Or maybe I'm defining normal in some weird way, like people who drive SUVs and own poodles.
With the credit union drama over, my main objective of the day with Mom was to calculate her income, expenses, and assets, so we can go shopping for a retirement community armed with accurate information about her finances. When we got back to the condo, I pulled out my laptop and looked for room at the kitchen table to set it up.
I don't know how your mother's kitchen table looks, but this is what I saw on my mother's table. Not counting the dusty table cloth and stained placemats: two commuter coffee mugs waiting to be donated to the thrift store; a brass teapot filled with loose change; a tired aloe vera plant in a clay pot; a stack of handwritten lists and notes (important items!); various sizes of manila envelopes; a half-used book of stamps; a small stack of plastic clamshell-type packaging items (trash); a pile of kitchen implements, including baking pans and utensils, also bound for the thrift store; her old black cordless telephone; her current library book; a coffee cup with successive black rings around the inside; a small open box of Belgian chocolate (sent by my sister from Europe), a couple pieces looking slightly nibbled; an unruly stack of newspapers; and four white facial tissues, well-used and wadded into balls, clearly set aside to be used again.
I got my laptop set up and got to work. While I struggled to decipher the penciled figures in her tiny notebook (e.g., groc 6.81, gas 20, cigs 47) and enter the numbers into an Excel spreadsheet, my mother prepared her breakfast. I tried not to look, but I couldn't help but hear. She poured a bowl of store-brand Cheerios while two pieces of day-old bread toasted in the toaster oven. Tick, tick, tick, tick. She shook up a box of almond milk, opened it, and poured it over her cereal. Sploosh, crackle. (I guess I should be thankful she wasn't eating store-brand Rice Krispies.) Next I heard her buttering her toast: scratch, scrape, scritch, scritch. She put the bowl on the table next to me and laid two burned pieces of buttered toast directly on the placement where you would normally place a drinking glass. No plate, is what I'm saying.
She ate. Crunch, crunch, gloop, glug, swallow, crunch. Can you tell I'm a misophoniac? I am desperately averse to certain sounds. Eating sounds might as well be fingernails on a blackboard. Meanwhile, I am thinking to myself, thank you for this opportunity to refrain from strangling the woman who gave birth to me. Thank you, thank you, universe, whatever you are.
Finally I wrangled the numbers into the spreadsheet and throttled some formulas into telling us the bottom line. If she doesn't fall down any more stairs or get pneumonia or give her money away to destitute children, she can afford to move into a retirement community and maintain her current lifestyle for at least another ten years. Of course, this means we sell the condo and liquidate all her assets, but it is good news. She seemed greatly relieved.
I had some moments in which I could not identify what I was feeling. One of those moments occurred when I realized that my mother's monthly income, most months, is barely over $1,200. Another odd moment occurred when I entered her expenses: she spends as much on cigarettes as she does on food. Then I thought: Who will do this for me when my turn comes?
I still don't know what I'm feeling. I suppose I should take a nap. This odd freefall feeling will fade, and I'll be back in denial, trusting the universe to catch me as I daily leap off metaphorical cliffs. The cat snores in the chair next to me. I sit staring at this blog post, thinking about suffering and uncertainty at home and abroad, and wonder...am I too self-centered and depressed to acknowledge today's lesson of patience and gratitude? Yeah, probably.
