Just in time?
Sep. 19th, 2005 04:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alexpgpI got to my parents' house a little after 7 pm local time yesterday. The flight into JFK went by better than expected, and after picking up my bag I took the AirTrain to the LIRR station at Jamaica, from where I caught a train in good time.
The taxi stand at the station that I recalled from the dim recesses of my mind has likely long disappeared; at any rate, no such means of transportation was available. Between not wanting to put my dad to unnecessary trouble and the fact that I don't think I had ever walked to the house from the station, I did so.
For some reason, I had imagined my mom would be bedridden, but she wasn't. She was sitting in the living room, in a wheelchair. She recognized me, sort of. When asked, she said I was her son, but I think she had to be prompted to recall my name. Her eyes darted around her field of view, pausing from time to time on me, with a look I find hard to describe.
It was a look with nothing behind it, or everything, if your imagination is active. There was a great distance in those eyes, as if she was simply biding her time before speaking.
But she hardly spoke.
A word here or there, but nothing approaching a sentence. The only sign of life was her slightly labored breathing and those darting eyes.
There was a parade of visitors today, each equipped with a blood-pressure cuff, and they all noticed that something about my mom was different, and not in a good way. The last visitor put all of the pieces together and called the family doctor, who recommended my mom be admitted immediately to the local hospital.
My dad and I got back from the hospital a little while ago, where the doctor raised some issues that, I expect, have never been discussed in our family before. They will have to be discussed now, I reckon.
Cheers...
The taxi stand at the station that I recalled from the dim recesses of my mind has likely long disappeared; at any rate, no such means of transportation was available. Between not wanting to put my dad to unnecessary trouble and the fact that I don't think I had ever walked to the house from the station, I did so.
For some reason, I had imagined my mom would be bedridden, but she wasn't. She was sitting in the living room, in a wheelchair. She recognized me, sort of. When asked, she said I was her son, but I think she had to be prompted to recall my name. Her eyes darted around her field of view, pausing from time to time on me, with a look I find hard to describe.
It was a look with nothing behind it, or everything, if your imagination is active. There was a great distance in those eyes, as if she was simply biding her time before speaking.
But she hardly spoke.
A word here or there, but nothing approaching a sentence. The only sign of life was her slightly labored breathing and those darting eyes.
There was a parade of visitors today, each equipped with a blood-pressure cuff, and they all noticed that something about my mom was different, and not in a good way. The last visitor put all of the pieces together and called the family doctor, who recommended my mom be admitted immediately to the local hospital.
My dad and I got back from the hospital a little while ago, where the doctor raised some issues that, I expect, have never been discussed in our family before. They will have to be discussed now, I reckon.
Cheers...
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no subject
Date: 2005-09-20 08:57 am (UTC)I wish your mother pleasant dreams of mountains, oceans, rainbows and heavenly vistas..... and if she drifts away too far to recall her, an easy passage to Nirvana.
((HUGS to you and your dad))