Cookies and Cigarettes

What's it like to spend time with an aging parent? Absurd, poignant, bewildering, and beautiful--it's a lot of things.

Photo by Stephen Hocking on Unsplash

May 4, 2018, Friday

Mom stuns me this afternoon when I visit her. I have not seen her so lively and lucid, so vivid and vital in months.

She and the t.v. room seemed to glow. Was it just that all the lights were on? Was it my imagination? Had I had too much coffee? Not enough?

I wondered if I should look under the couch or out in the garage or go whistle in the yard for the demented old lady I had been talking to and seeing, the one who muttered in loops of nonsense of English and French through swirling circles of smoke.

Today she was gossipy (“I heard Ned Bonnie died. Did you?”), abrupt (“I am starving!”), demanding (“I have got to get up!”), candid and cheeky (“How is your father? Deaf as ever?”), contemplative (“I don’t like being left alone; I am just like a turtle on its back”), confiding and wistful (“Tookie, I sure do miss her, I sure do”), cheerful (“Jess and me, oh, we are chummies”).

She was insightful. She was impatient. She was nimble. She was quick. She was with it. She was herself. I have no idea where that demented old lady went. She could be back tomorrow. She might even be back later today. But the mom I visited was a refreshing change of pace probably as much for her as for me. She had her “sixes and sevens” all lined up and if I had asked I bet she could have told me they equal thirteen.

When I arrived mom was about to go to the kitchen. She was wearing a light pink nightgown dotted with white patches covering cigarette holes. She moved so fast after Jamie helped her from the couch that she was almost to the steps before I had turned to follow her. She pulled out the footrest on her walker by herself and pivoted right into its seat on her own. “To the cookie bar!” she ordered Jamie when Jamie asked where they're going. “I want a Bordeaux!”

The cookie bar is the counter between the sink and the refrigerator, stacked with bags of Pepperidge Farm Bordeaux and Shortbread cookies. The cookie dulled the edge of mom’s appetite.

A few minutes later an Uber driver arrived with an order from Panera. Jamie took mom back to the t.v. room where she munched and crunched her way through a thick turkey sandwich and a bag of very crisp, very salty potato chips. Uber? Mom is now part of the gig economy. You go, girl!

While mom had her lunch in the t.v. room I worked on the air conditioning. Mom had complained that she was hot.

I thought the house felt warm and stuffy too. I went to the dining room and switched the thermostat to On. Nothing. I adjusted the temperature. Still nothing. I went to the basement to check the circuits. They looked okay but I flicked through all of them anyway. That did the trick.

The air kicked on and the house began to cool. When mom finished eating I joined her on the couch in the t.v. room. She asked me to light her cigarette. Clicking the lighter as mom tilted her chin toward me and the cigarette dipped I eyed the whiskers sprouting from her chin to make sure I kept the flame away from them.

Before lunch arrived mom said that she had slept well. Her appearance suggested otherwise— wizened, hunched, shaky, serious bed head. But her appetite and good spirits indicated her true condition.

Mom had taken an antihistamine Thursday night. “But I had some trouble waking up,” she admitted, looking up at me from her stroller and cracking through the last piece of a Bordeaux.

“That is better than not having slept,” I said. Mom agreed. Crunch, crunch. Now I see why sleep is called beauty rest. Mom was great and gorgeous today, holey pink nightgown, fuzzy mug, scrawny legs, and all.

May 14, 2018, Monday

For Mother’s Day yesterday mom had a serious social carousel of visitors. And the explosion of roses, lilies, and other flora that she received from friends and other family blast the little yellow petals off the trio of tulips I brought her Friday afternoon despite their being at their golden peak.

When the children and I visited yesterday mom was pretty chipper and mentally intact. She recognized the children, asked them about school and other things, commented on Polly’s eyes and her shoes and socks, admonished them never to smoke.

She clicked her lighter at the cigarette bouncing up and down between her lips. Polly and William watched her warily, perhaps wondering if she were going to connect the flame with the cigarette or set something else on fire. “It’s soooo addictive,” mom said, taking a drag.

She tapped the cigarette into her ashtray. Despite the smoke and potential fire hazard Polly joined mom on the couch. More reserved, William sat in the chair across from them. Before we left Polly gave Missy a biscuit and William chewed his way through a few gummy bears and a bite-size Twix bar, mom’s newest indulgence.

This morning when I got to mom’s around ten she was pulled up to her place at the kitchen table awaiting breakfast—a tomato and basil sandwich and a splash of milk in her aluminum measuring cup. A small dish next to her milk held her morning meds.

“Finish your pills,” Anita said. Mom grimaced. Now that mom is blitzing her way through burgers and fries and pizza and sandwiches from Panera via Uber I had been wondering what had happened to the tomato and basil sandwich about which mom used to rave. Now I know—she has it for breakfast.

Or at least she did this morning. Tomorrow it could be ice cream as it was when I was here for breakfast a few weeks ago. A week or two ago she was up at midnight having meatloaf with Rhonda. Her palate knows no clock.

This morning mom is cogent but not peppy or cheerful. She may not have slept well. The dizziness she has recently experienced has tired and annoyed her. She slept in her clothes as well as her shoes. She does this often. This keeps things beautifully efficient and simple but the habit also leaves her smelling sour.

When mom finished her medicine she wanted to go to the t.v. room to lie on the couch and smoke so Anita and I moved her there. I opened the curtains to let in some sun and found the remote for the t.v. and put it on her tray.

“Oh, don’t turn that thing on,” mom said. Had she reached her threshold for watching t.v.? I could never have imagined that but maybe she has. Mom also wanted to call David to thank him for some flowers he sent. I handed her the phone. When she recited his number from memory as she punched it into the handset I nearly fell over into the fireplace.

After leaving David a message mom asked me to get her some Bordeaux cookies so I went back to the kitchen and put a couple on one of her coffee cup saucer plates. As soon as I brought them to her mom asked me to get her a Band-Aid from the bag of supplies under the seat of her stroller for a spot on her wrist.

Mom does not have much energy but I can appreciate why the people around her need theirs. Mom might need this, she might want that—she needs to go to the kitchen, she wants to go Pieology, she needs to go to the bathroom, she would like some Coke or a cookie or a cigarette. Someone is coming to do this, someone is coming to check on that.

Mom needs help with everything. Someone must help her with everything. Mom may be slow but she keeps everyone around her on their toes. There are also the basic chores of maintaining her home—grocery, cooking, cleaning, laundry, restocking and organizing the various supplies such as medicine, bandages, diapers, cigarettes, cookies, pistachios.

A comfortable, functional home and mom is just one person. She is not a couple. She is not a family with a child or children involved in school and all manner of activities. But taking care of mom is work, constant, endless, and tiring. There is never nothing to do.

May 16, 2018, Wednesday

This morning I had not planned on visiting mom but I had some time after doing some errands and I was feeling groggy and figured that keeping going was better than coming home and trying to fight through the quicksand of inertia that would claim me there. I am that glad I rallied. It was fun.

Mom was alert and vivid despite saying that she had not slept. She and Anita were in the t.v. room, mom wearing a white nightgown that Anita made for her, the overhead fan whirling and the air conditioner roaring.

As I came into the room I put my hands behind my back and asked mom to guess which one held a surprise. She looked startled but then pointed to my left. Bingo! When I was at Walgreens earlier I got her a bag of bite-size Twix. I put it on her tray table and sat on the nearby footstool and Anita went into the kitchen.

Mom sipped from a glass of ice water. “Ice water, I just love it,” she effused. “I am just crazy about it.” She spoke as if it were a new experience or she had just stumbled parched and sun-baked into a desert oasis with wonder and disbelief at finding something so unexpected and refreshing. It also occurred to me that mom’s appreciation for ice water may explain why I also find it so satisfying.

For breakfast earlier mom had finished off a sandwich from her most recent Panera order. For dinner last night mom had Cornish game hen, mashed potatoes, and something else I can’t recall but mom noted that the mashed potatoes turned soupy after being microwaved. She spread her hands before here as if skimming the top of a pool.

The hen sounded fancy. “Anita said it had been in the freezer for a while and it was time to use it up,” mom explained, “so she did.” I relate. I get tired of looking at something that seems as if it has been in the freezer for years so I cook it. It’s time. Only to fill the space with a surplus of something else that no one can eat when it’s prepared before it spoils. The cycle continues—the brick of meatloaf goes where the block of lasagne was, and so on.

Talking about mom’s diet over the last twelve hours led us to discussing the uselessness and inanity of categorizing food for breakfast, lunch, or dinner. Eggs and toast for dinner—why not? We both agree. Ice cream for breakfast? Sure. “Just get something on your stomach,” mom said, “that’s the idea.”

We digressed briefly to discussing the painting above the couch, the nighttime scene of two cars at a gas station. It reminds us of driving to Amelia Island for spring break when Neville and I were children along with other families, everyone piled into station wagons packed with clothes and coolers of drinks and soggy sandwiches in plastic bags and not a seatbelt in sight.

In addition to food mom had numbers on her mind but not sixes and sevens. Instead, four days since her last bowel movement—“I feel so fat,” she sighed, patting her abdomen—and some Tylenol 3 for a migraine she had yesterday. “I had six,” mom told me, “and that took care of it.” I should hope so. That would take down a horse.

I think of the week-to-week calendars that Granny used to keep. For years on every page until a few months before she died she noted her appointments and other activities as well as the weather, her pain, her bowel movements, and her medication, every day an intricately webbed recording in green, blue, and red ink and pencil.

Mom has used the same week-to-week calendars as Granny. She’s recorded appointments and marked birthdays, anniversaries, and other occasions, circling the dates with blue, green, or red ink and some pencil and adding the name of whoever the date concerns. “Neville.” “Tookie.” “Lee.” “Mother.” “Daddy.” She must keep track of the numbers somewhere else.

May 28, 2018, Monday

When I got to mom’s this afternoon she and Anita were not there so I called Anita to see where they were and when they might be back. “We’re just comin’ up the hill,” Anita said.

She and mom had been out for burgers, again, this time to a place called Home Run Burgers. I was glad they were returning not only so that I could see mom but also so that I could witness the maneuver of getting mom out of the car and into the house. It is a process.

After pulling up by the lamppost next to the driveway, Anita reversed mom’s car right over the front sidewalk to the box bush by the front door and parked. Then she got out of the car, got mom’s walker from the back, and then hoisted mom from the passenger seat onto her walker and guided her through the front door into the house. Somehow this reminded me of a basketball player making a free throw or a kicker sending a football through a field goal. Score!

I followed mom and Anita into the front hallway. Making the turn into the kitchen mom decided that she wanted to use the bathroom before continuing on to t.v. room. Just as Anita closed the bathroom door the Schreibers arrived to visit. They choose to wait for mom to finish in the bathroom. Do they know how long this could take? I wondered. Do they have dinner plans?

They got lucky. It didn’t take mom long to finish her business in the bathroom. Anita brought mom into the t.v. room to join the Schreibers there. Since Dr. Schreiber and mom are both a little deaf their exchanges were basically a shouting match with both of them listing toward each other to hear better like leaning towers of Pisa.

But they all nevertheless seemed to enjoy their rapport. So did I. They share a connection that has lasted decades, a reservoir of reminiscences and reflections on which they still draw and refine. I was impressed that mom held her own recalling and detailing one thing and another with them.

Mom showed similar resilience when I stopped by this past Saturday afternoon. I arrived just as she was pushing herself along with her walker by the back door, heading for the t.v. room, trailed by Sylvia.

As they approached the door mom reached over from her walker and opened it for me. Wow, I thought, that is really something! Once Sylvia had mom settled on the couch in the t.v. room we talked about nothing much. I suggested she could watch the Indy 500 this weekend. “I could care less about that,” mom admitted. “I went to a car race once,” I told her, “I thought I had gone to hell.” “I’m sure,” mom said.

I admired and complimented mom on the haircut Donna gave her earlier Saturday. Trimmed and tidied mom’s hair no longer looked like straw exploding every which way from a hole in a scarecrow’s overalls.

Mom lit a cigarette. “What about the N.B.A semifinals? LeBron James?” I asked. “I know who he is, but, no.” Mom exhaled. A small swirl of silvery smoke danced toward the ceiling through the mellowing sun coming in the window behind her. What was for lunch? A sandwich and chicken and rice soup from Panera via Uber.

Mom has broken a couple of crowns and needs to get new ones. “I hope you will get a lot of anesthetic,” I said. “Oh, you bet,” mom assured me. I mentioned the root canal I had just before spring break. “They’re not so bad,” mom said. “No, they’re really not,” I agreed,“They just need a new name.” The juxtaposition of “root” and “canal” unnerves. What will I be doing the rest of the day? Laundry, cooking, cleaning, errands. “Just, you know, stuff,” I said. “Yup,” mom said.

Talking with mom now about nothing much has become something special because it has returned to being the routine, ordinary exchange of this and that, of just stuff, and even kind of dull and lulling, calm and quiescent. We’ve had a reprieve from the roiling, distressing mind-warped nonsense she was uttering a few weeks ago.

I remember sitting with Granny one time as she sat in her bed eating some soup for lunch. “It’s not very fun sitting here looking at me slurping up my soup, is it?” she asked me. “You’d be surprised,” I said.

May 29, 2018, Tuesday

This afternoon mom and Anita tried Bluegrass Burgers. I had recommended it to mom. “We didn’t like it,” mom said when I saw her a little later. Well, that’s that, I suppose. She found it dirty and the burger “just so-so.” She held up her left hand and see-sawed side to side. “They slid around on the plate a lot,” she added. The fries were its only redeeming feature. “She’s a fry queen now,” Anita said.

Mom was in good spirits although some pain in her neck was bothering her. Anita soothed it with a warm towel. “Isn’t she a peach?” mom said, even though they had bickered earlier over the origins and status of a sore on mom’s elbow. Mom swore that it resulted from bumping it on something. Anita countered that mom had started to pick the area. Back and forth, back and forth. “Okay, whatever you say,” Anita said, not giving an inch.

Mom told me three times about going to Bluegrass Burgers. I wondered if her aching neck was distracting her, if the pain was fracturing her thinking. Later mom told me about the stone in one of the rings she was wearing. She paused to light a cigarette. Resuming her story mom said, “Where was I when the lights went out?” I took her remark literally and wondered if she’d just lost her mind. “The lights are on,” I said. “Oh, it’s just a figure of speech,” mom said, waving through some smoke. Silly me! Mom was on her game. I was not.

To read more about my time with my mother, please see Fast Food and Back Rubs, Peace Plants and Passing Gas, and Diapers and Depression.

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