I'll be glad when it's over but I'll miss it when it's gone

I sit at my worktable with my stockinged feet ensconced in a polyester fleece pillowcase containing two socks filled with cheap rice that I heated for two minutes in the microwave. This is the poor man's foot warmer. After ten years, the device I sewed myself sprung a leak and dribbled a trail of rice between the kitchen and my desk before I finally caught on. Tied off socks work pretty well, although as the rice is gradually pulverized by my feet, tiny bits of rice filter through the socks. Even doubling up the socks has not stopped the rice dust from coating the inside of my microwave (and probably my entire apartment).

It's winter at the Love Shack. A strangely warm winter so far, above average temperatures, so why am I so cold? There is something about the damp winter air in the Northwest that makes me want to hibernate. Moisture has clogged the holes in my salt shaker. The cupboard doors no longer close. The cutting board is swollen and jammed in the slot. Anything made of wood has swelled like a ten-day corpse. Moss and lichen grow on my car. I suspect I have mold growing in my personal crevices, although my sinuses are too congested for me to smell it.

Did you catch the super blood wolf moon? I saw the full moon through a hazy fog as I entered the back door of Mom's retirement facility. I hoped to show the old smokers the amazing sight of a lunar eclipse. Unfortunately, the full moon was below the roof line of the building. The old ladies were not impressed by my description of the glorious super blood wolf moon taking place shortly.

The moon had disappeared behind clouds by the time I got home. I watched the eclipse livestreamed by the Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles. Thousands of viewers from around the world were watching. As the Observatory played classical music, viewers commented on the event:

• Where is the red?
• Can it go any faster?
• In Belgium, she is red.
• Gah, it is so exciting!
• Super cloudy in Los Angeles
• The Death Star is fully functional and will be able to fire within five minutes.
• Does this mean we are all Lunatics?
• Everyone is so nice, this is so fun.

Totality came at 8:39 pm Pacific time. The comments continued:

• Can't see anything here in TN.
• Definitely red
• Thank God I am alive to view this.
• It's cold.
• Why am I hungry for cheese?

I listened to the classical music, which was interrupted occasionally by the voices of the scientists explaining how they were recalibrating the telescope to get a better view of the lunar surface and noting the purple crescent of light at the top, the red color or lack of red color as the eclipse progressed. Over twenty thousand people were on the live stream. The comments continued:

• Mike, can you get your flat earth nonsense out of here.
• This is not science.
• This is God.
• 14°F in NYC.
• Grandpa, are you still on?
• No red here in TN.
• Save our beautiful earth!
• No one cares about your stupid president! Look at the moon!!

This week has been hard. Mom's smoking buddy, Jane, got sick first. The next day Mom was coughing, wheezing, and running a temperature. The nurse at the facility called me to take Mom to urgent care. I did. Mom soldiered like a trooper from the parking space toward the front door of the clinic. Mental note to self: Use the valet parking service next time.

As we approached the door, Mom stopped and hunched over. It was happening.

“We'll head straight for the bathroom,” I said.

We did. I won't regale you with the details. Now I understand why parents of toddlers carry giant bags of gear. Note to self: Pack a bag of gear, keep it in the car.

Some minutes later, we emerged from the restroom. Mom seemed okay with going commando while we settled in for the hour-long wait. Fortunately, the line ahead of us moved quickly. Soon Mom was being checked in by a kindly nurse who confessed to me that she was childless and therefore had no clue how to get an old person's arm out of a sleeve. We had a rueful laugh over that. I wasn't laughing later when we had to get Mom's two t-shirts off over her head. Note to self: find her some tops that open in front.

Two hours later, I took Mom back to the facility. I parked, got her walker out of the trunk, and pointed her toward the door. She sideswiped the curb and a couple potted plants with her walker, head down, not seeing hazards in the dark. I steered her as best I could, appalled at her inability to navigate. She was running on fumes, I think. I got her settled onto her couch and covered her with a blanket. Diagnosis: Bronchitis, same as last winter. No treatment, just Tylenol, fluids, and rest. And quarantine.

Three days later, no improvement. The nurse called: antibiotics and a steroid to help her breathe. Note to self: Is this the end? The next day, yesterday, Mom was much improved, eating meals in her room and complaining about the food.  We made a get well card for Jane and delivered it to her door. We didn't knock. Mom was exhausted when we got back to her room. She hasn't had a cigarette in a week.

It's lonely making the trek down the long hall to the back door, getting into my car without seeing her hunched figure in the window, giving me the peace sign as I drive away. Note to self: Enjoy her as long as you can. You'll be glad when it's over but you will miss it when it's gone.

The Chronic Malcontent bakes a cherry pie . . . sort of

Balmy temps (50°F) have inspired me to open a window to air out the accumulated housitosis consisting of body odor, burnt onions, unvacuumed rugs, and the lingering stench of cheap perfume from the vet's attempt to clean out my cat's wax-filled ears. You would think ear cleaner manufacturers would go easy on perfume in a product meant for the delicate insides of a cat's ears. Like many cat products, the cleaning solution seems to be aimed to please human owners rather than the cats. In this case, massive fail. I'm allergic. It's been a minor hell of eye burning and throat irritation, and the cat hasn't been too happy about it either. Insult to injury, yesterday I reluctantly instigated a cat diet at the recommendation of the young, slender, perky, blonde newly minted veterinarian Dr. Danielle (daughter of the retired Dr. Brian).

“Ideally, an adult cat should be no more than twelve pounds,” she said regretfully eyeing my cat's substantial sixteen-pound girth (and pointedly not looking at my own).

I've been working on my girth. I'm happy to say, despite my conflicting relationship with food, I've lost enough girth to fit into my old out-of-style Levis. Maybe there is a god. For sure it takes divine intervention to help me follow my food plan. My food plan is simple: vegetables, fruit, eggs, yogurt. And lots of coffee.

Last week I baked a pie. If you know anything about me, that statement should get your attention. I barely cook (if you call roasting vegetables cooking), let alone bake. I eat cooked things—everyday I inadvertently overcook my vegetables until they are gummy mush—but I don't eat baked things. I would if someone baked them for me. But baking is a fine art, as anyone who bakes will tell you. It's not one of those skills you pick up in the aisle at Walmart. Allegedly . . . I do not shop at Walmart so it could be that baking skills are one of many wonderful things you could pick up in a Walmart aisle. 

Back to the pie. My mother loves cherry pie. Because I love my mother and feel it is my daughterly obligation and privilege to do things to make her happy and recognizing it has been almost two years since she's had a bite of cherry pie, I thought I would bake her a little cherry pie. How hard could it be?

Before I embarked on this foolhardy endeavor, I thought I had a pretty good chance of making something edible. I mean, I wasn't planning on making the filling from scratch. I'm not a total fool, after all. The stuff in the can would do just fine for her . . . all those chemicals, sugar, and red dyes, why, her system was built on that stuff. The main challenge, as I saw it, was the requirement to use gluten-free flour to make the crust.

When they say gluten-free, what they really mean is wheat-free. If you bake, you know that wheat is a common ingredient in baking. Flour substitutes involve grains like rice, corn, oats, millet . . . all great stuff, but maybe not that great for a pie crust? Ignorance is (sometimes) bliss: I was not to be deterred.

First, I went online and read everything I could find on making pie crust with non-wheat flour. There was some but not much agreement. Everyone had an opinion. I think it is a trait of bakers. In particular, I wanted to view videos of real people getting their hands dirty in dough. I could only find videos of bakers using wheat flour. Nevertheless, I studied their process and took copious notes.

Later that afternoon, I realized I was procrastinating. Fear does not bake pies. In accordance with my new year's philosophy regarding getting things done, I rolled up my sleeves, washed my hands, and got to work. Recipe for a nine-inch pie in hand, I cut the amounts in half to make a pie to fit into one of those dinky crinky aluminum pie tins that you can find at the store, comes in a stack of six tins with plastic covers, you know what I mean if you make pot pies to take to potlucks, which I never do, in case you wondered. Having little luck with food, I avoid pot lucks.

Pie dough consists of four ingredients: flour, salt, fat, water. Some people add a fifth, sugar. The fat can be butter, shortening, lard, or some type of oil. Mom can't have butter, and I don't stock shortening or lard in my kitchen, so olive oil was my only option. None of my online video sources told me how to handle non-wheat flour so I tried to emulate their advice for wheat flour pie crust as closely as I could. The trick to making flaky wheat pie dough is to mix the ingredients until the flour is in pea-sized nuggets but not tire it out with too much handling.

One thing I learned is that it takes a lot of water to moisten non-wheat flour to create a substance that you can flatten and form into something that resembles pie dough that can be pushed into a pie tin. In case you want to try gluten-free flour pie crust yourself, that is my observation based on my experience. Once the dough was moist enough, I was able to roll it out with my rarely used wooden rolling pin. However, looking back, I realize I didn't roll the dough thin enough. Do your best to roll it quite thin.

Second, after I poured the bright red gleaming cherry pie filling into the pie crust, I thought it probably would have been good to prebake the pie crust. Some wheat flour recipes called for prebaking the crust, some did not. In my eagerness to complete the task and check it off my list, I did not prebake the empty pie crust. I covered the pie filling with a top layer of pie crust (also not rolled thin enough). I haphazardly crimped what edges I could and trimmed the rest, took a photo, and shoved the tin into the oven.

I must say, it looked like a pie going into the oven, and after I took off the aluminum foil tent, it browned up pretty nicely. As I pulled it out of the oven, I was astounded and slightly unnerved at how heavy it was. The pie tin slid across the baking sheet, heading for the open oven. In the nick of time, my sharply honed reflexes managed to keep the sheet horizontal (pure luck). The pie did not fall into the oven or on the floor. Sometimes we mark victory by what didn't happen, right? After letting it cool for a bit, I placed the heavy little pie into a box, covered it with foil, and took it over to Mom's.

I wanted to show her the pie before we went out for a smoke, because I knew half her brain would be missing when we came back inside. I modestly explained what I had done and pulled the pie out of the box. I took off the foil cover with a flourish. Voila! She seemed mildly impressed. I could tell she was itching to get outside.

After we came in, she milled around in confusion as usual. I took one of her kitchen knives (not the sharpest knife, I feel I must say to preface my tale of what came next). My intention was to cut a small piece of pie and place it in a dish. However, the knife would not cut the pie crust. Sticking to my principle of modesty, I did not immediately blame the knife. Failure not being an option, I continued to saw into the pie crust. Eventually I broke through. The red filling came into view. I aimed the knife at the bottom crust. After considerable effort, I managed to poke, jam, saw, slice, and otherwise attack the bottom crust until at last, at last, I could free a little slice of pie for my mother.

I placed the wedge of pie in the dish. The crust stood valiantly upright as the filling dripped away and ran into the dish. Soon the crust stood alone in a sea of neon red cherry pie filling.

“Here you go!” I said proudly, handing my mother the dish and a fork.

She poked at the crust once or twice, gave up, and scooped some of the filling into her mouth. Finally, she picked the crust up with her fingers and used it like a cracker to scoop up filling, like how she might scoop up salsa with a tortilla chip if she didn't hate Mexican food so much.

The next day, Mom reported having a massive diarrhea blowout. There is no way to know if the little bit of pie she consumed was to blame, but she wasn't willing to try any more of it. Three days later, I took the pie home and dumped it in my compost bin.

Feet don't fail me now

The cat materializes out of nowhere as soon as I sit down to blog. I assume he has some ideas about what I should write. Or else there is a blob of barf that needs my immediate attention. On this rainy cold January morning—well, it's afternoon now, but it's Sunday so cut me some slack—it's hard to motivate. My eyes are bleary with winter. My vertigo comes and goes with air pressure and gravity. My sinuses are often clogged, granting me intermittent relief from the fetid smells that have accumulated in the Love Shack. Sometimes I smell old socks, overcooked eggs, and mildew, but by the time I get the energy to do something about it, my sinuses swell up and shut down the olfactory factory.

Last night I dreamed I was about to undergo a lengthy dental procedure. I asked to use the restroom first; they gave me the door code but I promptly got lost in a mall, searching through smeared glasses for clean toilets. Then I lost my car. I wrote the dreams down in my journal while I waited for my eggs to overcook. Then I practiced my Spanish (me gusta dibujar y pintar). When I tried to salt my eggs, the salt was clogged by moisture from coming out the little holes. I poked them open with a toothpick. I do this every morning in winter. The cupboard doors don't close, and the cutting board balks at being pushed in and pulled out. Anxiety and moisture rule at the Love Shack.

We had a windstorm last night but it didn't keep me from sleeping. This morning while I wrote, the only sound was the intermittent whooshing of the space heater that heats my main room. Sunday mornings are usually pretty quiet around the Love Shack. I hope someday to move to a place that is quiet most of the time, not just on Sunday mornings. I would like to live a few blocks off the bus line. As long as I'm envisioning my perfect habitat, it would be great not to have to hear people snoring, peeing, or having sex on the other side of thin apartment walls.

I dread what is coming, and yet I know it is the price of admission to freedom. I don't feel brave enough to witness the daily dissolution of my mother's once competent life, yet I show up and witness it every evening at six fifteen. I restock the gluten-free bread and cookies, the rice milk and gluten-free Cheerios, the cigarettes. I write the checks for her pull-ups, wipes, and medications. I watch her bank account slowly dwindling. Her dissolution scrapes at me, too, even though I'm not the one nearing the end of life (as far as I know today).

A couple days ago I visited my mother during the day to be present for her appointment with a foot care nurse. Mom was sacked out on her couch when I arrived. She popped right up when I came in. We sat and watched day time TV while we waited.

In a few minutes, Sandy arrived. Sandy (not her real name) happens to be a family friend; in fact, she used to live three doors down the street. She was one of the gang I grew up with. Her cousin Kim lived next door; Kim was my best friend. Sandy was one year older, one of five girls. Sandy became a nurse, and then transitioned into providing foot care for seniors. She lugged a big box and a bag of gear into my mother's apartment. I moved the coffee table out of the way so Sandy could kneel on the floor in front of my mother.

She peeled down one white tube sock, exposing my mother's purple foot.

“You have very straight toes!” she said, smiling up at my mother. “You know this is fungus, right?” I looked at my mother's bulging big toenail in squeamish horror. Was I supposed to be checking her toes?

“Don't they check her feet here?” I wailed.

“Most places don't do a good job of checking residents' feet,” Sandy replied. I wondered, is that supposed to make me feel better?

While she trimmed my mother's toenails and filed down her two hideously enlarged big toe toenails with a Dremel, spraying toenail dust into the air, we chatted about our families. She asked about my sister (in France) and my brothers (working full-time). (“It's all on you then,” she noted, to which I nodded gratefully). I asked about her parents. 

“I do my mother and father's feet once a month,” Sandy said. “Dad is ninety-seven.” I pictured her on her knees attending to the feet of her mother, the 4-H leader who taught Kim and me how to sew and thus gave me the skills that enabled me to spend ten years doing something I despised. I had several thoughts: Wow, I thought my parental payback scenario was gnarly, and Oh lord, what if my mother lives that long? 

“You heard Nellie's husband died?” Nellie was one of Sandy's older sisters. I didn't know most of her sisters well. Her oldest sister tried to teach me piano for a while, without much luck. When I was ten, Sandy's next older sister, Layla, explained the rudiments of sex to me as she pedaled her bicycle with me on the back fender. (I didn't believe her; did I mention I was ten?)

“I'm sorry to hear that,” I said, watching Sandy scoop detritus out from under my mother's toenails. “Would you be able to trim her fingernails as well?”

Eventually the mani-pedi session drew to a close. I wrote a check from Mom's funds. Mom walked us both to the front door. I told Mom I would see her later. I helped Sandy load her gear into the trunk of her car. We exchanged an awkward hug. I wanted to bask in the remnants of our safe childhood a little longer. But we've both changed. And childhood was never all that safe.

Sandy turned left. I turned right. Mom waved from the window as I drove away.

Happy 2019 from the Chronic Malcontent

Howdy, Blogbots. Happy new year to all ten of you. Here's hoping 2019 is even better than 2018. More drama, more chaos, more angst, more despair. . . or as I like to call it, more blog fodder. What would I write (complain) about if everything were just dandy? If there was enough money in the bank? If the sun always shined? If my cat never left hairballs for me to find when I stagger to the bathroom in the dark of night? Life is so rich and full. Rich in perplexities, full of frustration and uncertainty. 

I woke up to a New Year's miracle today: The truck that was parked in front of my house for more than a week was gone this morning. I don't know if the owner returned with a new battery or if the City towed it away to join the massive numbers of cars, trucks, and RVs rusting in the overflowing abandoned vehicle lots around town. I was resigned to living with that truck blocking my panoramic view of the street for an indefinite and extended time, given the backlog of abandoned vehicles. That is why I say it was a miracle. I'm not sure why I cared. So now I can see six feet further than I could before. There's nothing to see except pavement.

Speaking of caring, someone posted a hand-lettered sign at SE 76th and Stark: in capital letters, I forgive you. A couple days later, it was joined by another handmade sign: No guns for men. Not sure what prompted either sign, but I have my guesses.

A few nights ago, the temperature spiked to 52°F for one day as a minor rainy windstorm . . . a little windy rainstorm moved over the region. When I went over to Mom's, the rain was pelting. Water gathered in gutters and intersections. The former rain shelter had not been replaced. Last week, the smoking shelter was dismantled. It was coming unbolted from the concrete, backed into one too many times by oblivious delivery truck drivers. We eagerly anticipate some sort of new shelter, but in the meantime, the three chairs are unprotected, open to the sky. Have I mentioned rain does not deter smokers?

Outside the retirement facility's front door sits a large, heavy black umbrella in a metal milk canister, available for anyone to use. I grabbed it, aimed it at a rose bush, and pressed the button. It shot open with a thwang, taking up most of the porch area. I caught up to the old ladies and tried to hold it over their heads as we stumbled in the dark to the erstwhile smoking area. I pulled two chairs side by side for the ladies, and pulled my chair close in front. I rested the haft of the umbrella on the arm of a chair and anchored it with both hands, wishing I had thought to bring plastic bags for us all to sit on. I was almost knee to knee with my mother, with only her walker between us. The wind whisked her cigarette smoke away before I could suffocate. I fought the wind gusts, marveling at the mild temperature, thinking, can this really be December? and am I going to fly into space?

Last night was New Year's Eve. The clouds cleared, the temperature plummeted, and the ladies admired the stars in the sky. Lately, Mom has begun smoking in workmanlike fashion. She doesn't rest between drags or chat. She smokes diligently, listens to Jane complain about how management is trying to kill her, grunts once in a while, and monitors the progress of Jane's cigarette compared to her own.

I told them a rocket was outward bound a billion miles past Pluto, heading into outer space, taking photos as it went by interesting things. They weren't impressed. Later, as neighbors set off firecrackers and homemade bombs, I watched the countdown to the flyby with Ultima Thule and wondered at the distances between objects in the solar system.

This morning I calculated roughly how long my mother's money will hold out if we maintain the current rate of spending. Longer than my money will hold out but not by a lot. I know, I know, wreckage of the future. I have many contingency plans, devised to cope with an uncertain future. However, I find it difficult to detach from my desire to control outcomes and thereby manage my fear. I think I can safely predict that 2019 will be just like 2018, equally as rich in uncertainty and just as full of surprise.