What is this?
Look carefully.
Birthday boy – Baz!
Today was Anthony’s best friend’s 50th so I went into the nursing lodge and picked Anthony up to bring him to the party early, before the throng arrived, so that we could have a quiet drink with Barry (Baz).
A lot of things went wrong:
- Anthony couldn’t walk from the car to the chair to sit down and Barry and I took awhile to get him seated;
- Anthony started shaking and shivering immediately, so Baz gave him a red wine to help and that seemed to work;
- Anthony had to be back at the nursing lodge by 6pm at the latest, for his pills and for dinner;
- It took a couple of people to get Anthony back into the car to go back, by which time I was openly crying which was embarrassing;
- Anthony squeezed my knee as I pulled out of Baz’s driveway, but I was so distressed and disconcerted that I banged into the fence on the left, and then on the right;
- I got Anthony back to the nursing lodge in time and went back to the party to make sure I hadn’t damaged Barry’s fences (I hadn’t – phew!)
A lot of things went right:
- Baz liked his birthday present;
- Ants and Baz were happy to see each other;
- Baz’s wife, Julie, and I had a huge, wondrous, hug, as Anthony and I were leaving;
- I have now realized that Barry’s birthday party will be the last one Anthony ever goes to.
Happy birthday Barry, and I wish so much that Anthony could have been there properly – not like this sick, old man, but like the life of the party he used to be – oh well!
Unchopped wood
Here is a typical little scene of when Anthony/Husband comes home for the day:
I hear yelling outside as I am preparing lunch. I hear the slow chopchop of the axe. More yelling – Son to Anthony. I hold a grrrr tight in my chest.
Then, like a constant re-run of an old episode ….
Son (running into the house in a panic): Mum – Dad is trying to chop the wood again! He won’t stop!
Me (stirring the fish mornay for lunch): Is he okay?
Son: Yes, but what if he chops his leg off?
Me: If he chops his leg off we will deal with it. Just stop yelling at him. Let him do it – please – let him do it.
Son: Well do I supervise or what?
Me: Only if you don’t yell at him.
Son: Grrr!
Anthony usually manages to chop enough wood to start a fire in the fireplace before exhausting himself. Before he moved to the nursing lodge we would have a fire going 24/7 because he feels the cold so badly. But, when he isn’t here, Son and I don’t bother because, until next February, when Son’s spine is totally healed from the operation, he is not allowed to do things like chop wood, lift heavy objects, ride his motorbike.
So, except for when Anthony is home, that pile of wood remains unchopped and the fireplace unlit.
The warmth of Anthony’s presence is much more than metaphorical!
Pondering 2
Some people say that love never runs out but I think this might be a lot of crap (and I don’t mind debating this), because it does run out. It runs out all the time in all sorts of different situations. Sometimes it dries up from the heat of exhaustion; sometimes it trickles into other ponds; sometimes it kangaroos away; sometimes it smothers itself with toomuchness; and sometimes it simply evaporates.
Some people say that the opposite of love is not hatred but indifference and, to some extent, I understand this theory but not entirely; I have been the recipient of both and the perpetrator of both. I hate Anthony’s disease(s) and I hate those who have hurt him and both of these hatreds will never become indifference while he is alive.
Son’s attitude has altered from hatred (of Anthony’s disease, of Anthony himself, of life and circumstances in general) to indifference (again, supposedly the opposite of ‘love’). This has only happened recently and, to begin with, I was upset because, as Anthony’s wife and Son’s mother, I wanted Son to keep on loving his father, but the fact is, quite simply, he doesn’t because he can’t. And that is perfectly all right because he is only 18 and has helped me in the caring role for many years now and he deserves to soar ahead of us.
Last night on the phone to Anthony I told him that Son had a problem coping with the situation, and with him, and Anthony, always pragmatic, just said, “Give the kid a break, Jules! I love him and he loves me and we both love you more than anyone in the world.”
Some people say that love never runs out and I agree. It just gets a bit whispery.
Inviolable
I love this word so much.
It signifies strength, fortitude, courage and it means you can step off the metaphorical mountain and freefall into the water and easily – very easily – swim to the shore.
Inviolable.
If I had had a daughter I would have called her Viola!
A visual feast – http://tracielouisephotography.net/
Baby wren
Budgie, I think!
I’m not sure what this is.
Wagtail
Kookaburra. One of these once smashed through a window into our house!
Osprey
Twins
Tracie’s blog is both a visual and a verbal feast and I am enriched every time I visit it!
When the status quo shifts
When we first got Okami and Uluru we didn’t know that, underneath all that wool, they were quite little!
Once they had been shorn (earlier this year), we got rather a shock and had to retrain our brains to see them the way they are now instead of the way they were.
I don’t like to be overtly symbolic but this is very similar to the way Husband/Anthony, Son and I have had to retrain our brains in order to tune into the ‘now’ of Anthony’s Parkinson’s disease and its associated dementia.
In many ways, this creeping dementia is okay but in other ways its evidence always gives me an alpaca-shock!
“You were pretty crazy on the phone last night,” I say to Anthony. “Are you normal again?”
“Jules, I was at this party at Kingley Park.”
“Okay, so where are you now?”
“I’m at this place, you know, the old age home. When are you coming in?”
“Tomorrow morning – is that okay?”
“Bring me some of that chocolate I like, you know the one?”
“Yes. I’ll ring you to say goodnight.”
“Well don’t make it too late because I might be in bed.”
…………………………………………………………………………………………….
There is something extremely comforting about these phone conversations, but also discomforting (or is the word ‘discomfiting’?). On the one hand Anthony seems comfortable and content, though lonely. On the other hand, he often sounds confused but when I see him (every couple of days now), he is always perfectly lucid and the friends and relatives who visit him say the same.
I am about to go out and feed Okami and Uluru so I will ask them. Their huge eyes are always full of gentle wisdom.
Out-foxing the fox
If you were a fox, would you attack or retreat?
If I were a fox, I would retreat!
Sitting on the fence
Out of all of the ducks and geese, Tapper, our female Muscovy duck, is the only one who can fly. Even Zaruma, the Muscovy drake, can’t fly even though he is supposed to be able to. So, because I put all of them into their yards for the night, it always amazes me to find Tapper outside the next morning, having a lovely time all by herself.
For weeks I had assumed Tapper simply flew up and over the high fence of the yard, but I had never seen her do it. During the day I would often see her fly off the ground (to a height of around 2 feet) and horizontally across the lawn, but the yard fences are very high now (about 7 feet) so, one evening, after locking the gang in, I sat and watched because I wanted to see her fly vertically up and over fence.
I watched and waited from a bit of a distance. Then Tapper did her trick and, when I saw her do it, I couldn’t stop laughing because she doesn’t fly up and over; she actually climbs the fence using her big webbed feet and her wings to flap herself upward. Then she sits on the fence, like this.
Sometimes Tapper poses on top of the fence for ages, swaying back and forth (she can do this for over an hour!), as if to say to the others, ‘You think I’m a little squirt, but now I’m the biggest – nyahnyahnyah!!!’
She has the most incredible sense of balance!
jmgoyder 