Yesterday was dreadful.
I don’t know what happened to trigger it, but it was one of the worst days that my MIL has had in a while. At least since this day. And this time it manifested itself as a constant need for reassurance. As I told a friend in an email:
Ugh. Not with the ongoing problems with MMIL. It can take me 20 minutes to get her to settle down, only to have her get wound back up about something ten minutes later. Needless to say, I’ve accomplished almost nothing today.
I literally spent at least half the day just sitting and talking with her, doing my best to help her remain calm and not obsess over contacting her parents or going “back to school”. Even with all my experience and what I’ve learned about distracting her and redirecting her attention, it was an almost constant battle.
And in the middle of it, I got an email from another friend with a link to this video:
That’s basically the last six years of my life compressed into six minutes. You want to have some idea what it is like to be a care-provider for someone with Alzheimer’s or other age-related dementia? Watch it.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Climate Change, Daily Kos, Flu, Flu Wiki, Government, Health, movies, NYT, Pandemic, Predictions, Press, Richard Matheson, Science Fiction, Society, Writing stuff
It’s been a little while since I’ve written about our old friend H5N1 – the “Avian Flu” virus. Partly this is because I like to keep my posts varied according to topic (which is a nice way of saying my attention wanders a lot these days). Partly, though, is because the mainstream media pays little attention to the threat of this flu virus as a general rule. Which is curious, given the potential threat it presents and the amount of governmental effort going into tracking and preparation for a possible epidemic/pandemic. Even if you take the cynical view that our news is event/entertainment-driven, you’d think with the release of I am Legend, the latest adaptation of Richard Matheson‘s SF novel of the same name, would be a natural tie-in to news about the flu.
Because yes, there is indeed news about the flu:
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan – International health experts have been dispatched to Pakistan to help investigate the cause of South Asia’s first outbreak of bird flu in people and determine if the virus could have been transmitted through human contact, officials said Sunday.
Four brothers — two of whom died — and two cousins from Abbotabad, a small city about 30 miles north of Islamabad, were suspected of being infected by the H5N1 virus, said WHO spokesman Gregory Hartl in Geneva. A man and his niece from the same area who had slaughtered chickens were also suspected of having the virus.
Another person in a separate case who slaughtered poultry in nearby Mansehra, 15 miles away, also tested positive for the disease, he said.
And if you saw either this diary on the front page of Daily Kos yesterday or check out the Flu Wiki, then you’d know that the situation is even potentially more troubling. From the Daily Kos diary:
See Flu Wiki’s Sunday wrap-up for the week’s documented human and bird cases, courtesy of the wiki volunteers who track cases around the world – helpful to CDC and WHO and other public health officials as they do their work (more than a few have written me that they stop there to get the morning news – this is netroots activism applied to public health!). Not only are there new human cases scattered throughout Asia (including Pakistan, Burma, China and Indonesia, all of whom are less than than transparent about internal news), there are also new bird cases of H5N1 in Germany, Poland, Russia, Vietnam, and Saudi Arabia (and the hadj is soon, 1.5 million pilgrims expected).
Now, I’m not claiming that it’s the end of the world. Or even the end of what passes for civilization. But I do find it somewhat curious that this reality gets so little press attention, even when there is an obvious entertainment tie-in that can be made to the latest big-budget post-apocalyptic movie. Odd.
Well, when I do get back around to trying to find an agent or publisher for Communion of Dreams, at least I’ll be able to point to the ongoing threat of a pandemic flu that exists. Provided, of course, that the pandemic isn’t already underway.
Jim Downey
“Well, I’ve enjoyed my time here, but I really should go.”
I sat on the couch next to her chair. The slight hiss of the oxygen cannula under her nose could still be heard over the sound of the concentrator in the other room. Her hands picked absently at the shawl we had over her lap and legs. “Well, we’ll be having supper in about an hour.”
“We will?”
My wife entered the room, sat on the floor by her mother’s feet. “What’s up, Mom?”
“Well, I was just saying that I thought I should be getting home, but he tells me that we’re going to have dinner soon. I don’t have any money for dinner.”
“It’s OK, you don’t need any money,” said my wife.
“Oh.” Pause. Look at me. “But I should still tell my mother. She’s been on a long journey, and just got back. She’ll want to know where I am.”
This has become routine. I answer, “She knows. Everyone in the family knows where you are. They know that you live here and we take care of you.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, here,” my wife grabs a nearby phone book, turns to the page we’ve marked during this exact same conversation previously. “See, right here is your name, and the address, and the phone number. Anyone who wants to find you can, right here in the phone book.”
“Oh.” Still dubious. “But does my mother know?”
“MIL,” I say, “she asked us to look after you, until she comes for you.”
“Really?”
“Yup. And you can stay for as long as you want, until she comes. And then you can go with her.” I’m impressed by the certainty and reassurance in my wife’s voice.
“Oh, thank you dear, that would be lovely. This is a very nice place you have.”
Indeed it is. It’s been her home for 53 years, and is just the way she wanted it.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
She seems to be stable again. Following the events mentioned in this post, we weren’t sure which way things were going to go. But after talking with the hospice people, tweaking her meds some, a few days of increased sleep, and with long talks with her to help settle things when she got anxious, she settled back more-or-less into the most recent patterns we’ve seen. There’s little doubt that she suffered one or more TIAs, or a small scale hemorrhagic stroke.
But she has once again proven to be surprisingly resilient. I’m fairly confident that she’ll make it at least to Christmas, probably to the new year. But as in all things, nothing is certain.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
I wrote this a couple of years ago, as a submission to NPR’s This, I Believe series.
The Power to Forget
I believe in the power to forget. On December twelfth, 1969, my world changed forever. My father was murdered. I was eleven years old.
In the middle of the night I woke to flashing lights from a police car. A knock at the door, and I heard my mom answer it. Then I heard a man say: “Marlene, Wil’s been shot.”
See, my dad was a cop. And as happens all too often, he was killed during a routine procedure, in this case a burglary investigation. They caught the man who killed my father that same night. He was tried and convicted, sentenced to die. That sentence was commuted in 1973 by the Supreme Court, and to this day he is in prison.
I think he is, anyway. I don’t know for sure, because I have tried my very best to forget him. It was that, or succumb to the hatred that threatened to define my life.
For a while I tried forgiveness, since that is supposed to be liberating. When I say for a while, I mean for years. But I failed. There are some things that cannot be forgiven, at least for me.
Instead, I have slowly, and carefully, excised his name from my memory. Now and then something will happen; I’ll come across a story in the paper about him being up for parole, or a family friend will ask “whatever happened to so-and-so,” and I’ll have to start again to forget.
It’s not easy. Much of our culture, much of our popular literature, is based around the theme of a son avenging the death of his father. The whole “find the bastard who shot my pa…” thing. You may not notice it, but I do. And every time I hear about another officer down, every time Father’s Day rolls around on the calendar, I think about my dad. And I think about his death. And I deny the existence of the man who killed him.
Even now, as I write this, his name tries to emerge, tries to struggle free from where I have buried it. But forgetting means that I don’t have live with a constant, aching anger. It means that I don’t have to be trapped in that moment of history. It means that I can continue with my life, never forgetting the love I have for my father, or what it meant for him to die, but not being possessed by a need for vengeance.
I believe in the power to forget. How many old grudges still fuel the fires of revenge in this world? How often have more people had to die because of a fixation on a memory? How much better would things be if we could just clean the slate, forget the offenses we’ve suffered and the ones we’ve inflicted, and move on?
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
Now I am not so sure. Watching my MIL, caring for her as she slowly forgets even the names of her children, that she was ever married, I wonder whether the burden of forgetting is worth the peace. Certainly, she is at peace (most of the time), so long as we do not disrupt the carefully constructed cocoon around her.
I would not want that fate, even if I would be mercifully unaware of it, as she is.
Perhaps, as in most things, it is the matter of intent that makes the difference.
Jim Downey
(Cross posted to dKos.)
I wanted to follow-up to this post of yesterday, for anyone interested.
It seems likely that my MIL has had one or more T.I.A.s or possibly even a small full-blown stroke. This would explain her marked shift in sleep habits, increased confusion and much greater aphasia – and is really about the best explanation we can come up with, since there haven’t been any other changes in her diet or condition which would account for the rapid deterioration.
It is frightening, for both us and her. Clearly, she is confused and unable to explain herself and her worries to us, and frustrated by trying. She is completely lost in time and location, not aware of being at home, constantly fixated on “going home” and seeing her parents. But we know she still loves – every chance she gets when my wife is close to her, helping her stand or dress, she will kiss her, holding on tightly for a moment, letting that touch express her feelings.
I never did hear back from our hospice nurse, which is both disconcerting and disappointing, but since there didn’t seem to be a medical emergency to deal with, I didn’t want to keep calling her. This morning we will contact the hospice agency and see if they can help us out with some additional anti-anxiety meds for my MIL, since that seems to be the best thing for her at this time. Otherwise, we will do what we can to continue to make sure she feels comfortable, and safe.
Jim Downey
Those who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night.
— Edgar Allan Poe, “Eleonora”
A friend passed that along, from today’s Quote of the Day. It is very appropriate. Howso? Well, because for the last 24 hours or so we’ve seen a rapid deterioration of my MIL’s mental condition, including a lot of seeing people and things which are not there (at least in my perception). Further, she’s been holding conversations with these people and things, as though they are responding to her. And when you come into the room, genteel and considerate woman that she is/was, she wants to include you in the conversation, or explains what has been going on so that you don’t feel left out, and expects you to understand and participate. It is very disorienting, because there really is no logic or coherence to these visions, and the conversations are little more than word salad.
Further, her sleep habits have changed as well. She had been sleeping more and more, but all of a sudden yesterday afternoon she didn’t really nap, and last night she was awake more than she was asleep. My poor lady wife, who was on-call, had a very rough night of it (and I’ve sent her up to nap for as much of the day as she can).
We don’t know what is going on, and all my experience and speculation has been useless. I have a call in to our hospice nurse, and will discuss the situation with her, see if she has any thoughts on the matter. It could be as simple as a UTI (not that UTI!) , which is a common problem with dementia patients, and known to cause such symptoms. But we take prophylactic measures to limit the chance of a UTI in my MIL, so I would be surprised if that were the source.
Clearly, something is going on. Whether or not it is something we can or should try and correct, we’ll see.
Jim Downey
I suffer from a mild form of bipolar disorder, as I have written about previously. Looking back, it started in adolescence, though I didn’t understand what was going on until my mid-20s. It is mild, though, and I have never suffered either a hypomanic or major depressive episode (though I have had some very dark periods), and have been able to control the disorder with minimal impact on my life. In this sense, I guess you can say that I am a little bit crazy – nothing major, nothing which requires hospitalization or heavy pharmaceuticals, nothing which puts my life at risk. I’m just a little bit crazy.
Being a ‘little bit crazy’ isn’t like being a ‘little bit pregnant’ – there is a range of severity with any mental health issue, just as there is with almost any other kind of health issue. You can have a mild case of the flu, which can be annoying, but doesn’t require much in the way of treatment – or you can have the kind of flu which can kill you if you don’t have medical intervention (and perhaps even then). You can have, say, a rotator cuff problem which requires nothing more than regular light exercise, or you can have such significant shoulder problems that surgery is required. I think that this is the thing which most people don’t really consider when it comes to mental health, because of the stigma attached to mental “illness”.
And make no mistake – there is still a huge stigma attached to any mental health ‘problem’. While I’ve known for about 25 years that I’ve suffered from this mild bipolar condition, I’ve largely kept that to myself, for this very reason. Attitudes are changing somewhat, but still . . .
One good example that I have seen played out countless times in discussions about religion: atheists see belief in God as essentially irrational, in that there is no demonstrable “proof” that such an entity exists. That’s why religious belief is called “faith”. Yet if you say this, in almost any form or phraseology that I have seen over the decades, people will instantly assume that you’re saying that all believers are “delusional” and basically “insane”. And it’s not just the people of faith who will think this – I’ve seen plenty of atheists jump to the same conclusion.
But that’s silly. There is clearly a difference between types of religious faith, as well as degree, just as there is in the range and severity of mental health ‘problems’. I dare say that most people who don’t really spend a lot of time thinking about it have what can be characterized as only a nominal religiosity – ask them, and they’ll say that they believe that there’s a God, but they don’t really spend a lot of time dwelling on Him/It/Them. Even among the devout there is a wide range of manifestation of religious fervor – the little old lady who goes to her local church every Sunday and prays for relief from her arthritis pain is significantly different from the kook who straps on a bomb and goes off to blow up unbelievers. The couple who pray for the intervention of the Virgin to save the life of their child are different from, say, the guy who taps his bat three times against his left shoe before stepping up to the plate. Et cetera, et cetera.
I’ll be honest – I see all of this as ‘magical thinking’, and not grounded in reality. But it is not all the same. Much of it is harmless, just amusing and not truly toxic either to the believers or to the world. Just as my mild bipolar condition is not the same as severe bipolar disorder, let alone true depression or schizophrenia. I’ll be even more honest – most such ‘magical thinking’ is of very little real concern to me. I see the bulk of it as just adding some richness to society. And I wouldn’t even necessarily say that people should get rid of it. Hell, I can’t say that I really want to be rid of my mild bipolar condition – it is manageable, and there are benefits to it, and I’m used to it. Yeah, sure, in some ideal world I wouldn’t suffer the periodic bouts of mild depression, just as in some ideal world everyone was rational and grounded in reality.
But we don’t live in that ideal world. I’d settle for having a little superstition and magical thinking, acceptance of the fact that we all have our quirks and small problems, in exchange for getting rid of the toxic manifestations of religion as well as true mental illness. How about you?
Jim Downey
(Cross posted to UTI.)
Filed under: Alzheimer's, Bipolar, Depression, Health, Hospice, Sleep, Writing stuff
We’re back to the train metaphor. My MIL has either been traveling via train, or is waiting for someone to arrive on a train, or is going to catch a train, or just thinks that she is presently on a train (this last happens when she’s in bed, with the bed safety rails up). I cannot help but think that this is her subconscious’ way of understanding that she is in transition from this life to whatever comes after. Why a train? Because when she was a young woman, that’s how she traveled, to St. Louis for shopping, back and forth to college.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
But she doesn’t stop there. Yesterday morning I went to get her up from her morning nap, and she asked: “Is there a job or something I can do to earn some money?”
“Money? Why do you need money?”
“Well, to call my mother.”
“???”
“I came over here to play, and have been out playing on the grounds. Now I’d like to go home, so need to call my mother. But I was laying here thinking, and realized I don’t have any money!”
“Ah. Well, that’s OK. You can use the phone here – you don’t need any money.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
As I walked with the dog in the cold, stiff wind this morning, little pellets of spitting snow falling around me, I realized something I should have noticed a week or two ago: I’m a bit messed up. Lethargic, unmotivated, finding it difficult to concentrate even enough to write short entries for my blog. But I haven’t been sleeping well, either. I’ve been grumpy and short tempered, impatient and always feeling slightly annoyed. In other words, my mild bipolar condition crept into darkness, a slight depression.
Part of it is just the ongoing effort of being a care-provider, of course. Part of it is seasonal, with the grey clouds that settle in this time of year. And part of it is just personal, as we approach December 12th, the anniversary of my father’s murder. I’ve learned to expect something of a downturn this time of year, but it always seems to catch me off guard at first. You’d think after almost 40 years, it wouldn’t come as a surprise.
It’s not the vicious blackness of a full depression, and for that I am thankful. But still, it needs some tending – awareness, being a little more lenient with myself, a little more indulgent. Try to nap when I can. Worry less about my weight, enjoy some favorite foods in moderation. Work when I can, hope that my clients and readers will understand. Be as gentle with myself as I am with my MIL, at least for a while.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
I was on-call last night. I first heard my MIL stirring around 1:00, but she settled back down again until a little after 2:00. The second time I got up, dressed, went downstairs to check on her.
I put down the safety rails, helped her sit on the side of the bed. At first touch I knew she was running a fever. I got some slippers on her feet, helped her onto the commode that sits beside the bed. Her eyes were watery, uncertain. Her temperature was 2.5 degrees above normal.
“Here, MIL, you need to take these pills,” I said, dropping her usual nighttime meds into the palm of her hand.
She looked at the pills, then at me, then back at the pills. “No.”
“???”
“I’ve already taken my pills. That woman was in here a few minutes ago, and I took them then.”
“Um, no, no one else has been here tonight. Maybe that was just a dream. These are your pills – you need to take them.”
“No!”
This was a completely new one – she’d never refused to take her meds before. “Um, yeah. You need to take those. Now. Here’s some water . . .”
“NO!”
It took me over 10 minutes of cajoling and commanding and pleading to get her to take the medications. She was adamant that she had taken them already, some memory fragment or bit of dream stuck in her head.
And it was almost two hours before I was able to get back to sleep.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
She’s been cranky today. Stubborn, demanding, a bit petulant.
But also so very weak and confused. Perhaps another TIA. Or perhaps just another step down in her overall condition.
We’ll know more when the hospice nurse comes tomorrow. Or not. You learn to live with that ambiguity, that uncertainty. As best you can.
Jim Downey
(Cross-posted to dKos.)
Filed under: Alzheimer's, Book Conservation, General Musings, Guns, Health, Hospice, NPR, Predictions, Publishing, Science Fiction, Sleep, Society, tech, Writing stuff
As I’ve mentioned previously, I try and catch NPR’s Weekend Edition Saturday regularly. This morning’s show was hosted by John Ydstie, and had a very nice three minute meditation titled Reflecting on a Past Generation which dealt with the differences between his life and his father-in-law’s, as measured in physical weight and strength. You should listen to it, but the main thrust of the piece is how Ydstie’s FIL was a man of the mechanical age, used to dealing with tools and metal and machines, whereas Ydstie is used to working with computers and electronic equipment which is becoming increasingly light weight, almost immaterial.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
Last weekend, as part of my preparations for tackling in earnest the big conservation job for the seminary, I got a large fireproof safe. I needed something much larger than my little cabinet to safely secure the many books I will have here at any given time. And about the most cost-effective solution to this need was a commercial gun safe, the sort of thing you see in sporting goods stores and gun shops all around the country.
So, since a local retailer was having a big Holiday sale, I went and bought a safe. It’s 60 inches tall, 30 inches wide, and 24 inches deep. And it weighs 600 pounds.
And the retailer doesn’t offer any kind of delivery and set-up.
“Liability issues,” explained the salesman when I asked. “But the guys out at the loading dock will help get it loaded into your truck or trailer.”
Gee, thanks.
So I went and rented a low-to the ground trailer sufficiently strong for hauling a 600 pound safe (I have a little trailer which wouldn’t be suitable). And an appliance dolly. And went and got the safe.
When I showed up at the loading dock and said I needed to pick up a safe, people scattered. The poor bastard I handed the paperwork to sighed, then disappeared into the warehouse. He returned a few minutes later with some help and my safe, mounted on its own little wooden pallet and boxed up. The four guys who loaded it into my trailer used a little cargo-loader, and were still grunting and cursing. I mostly stayed out of their way and let them do the job the way they wanted. Liability issues, you know.
I drove the couple miles home, and parked. And with a little (but critical) help from my good lady wife, it took just a half an hour and a bit of effort to get the safe in the house and settled where I wanted it. Yes, it was difficult, and I wouldn’t really want to tackle moving anything larger essentially on my own. But using some intelligence, an understanding of balance, and the right tool for the job I was able to move the 600 pound mass of metal with relative ease. And it made me feel damned good about my flabby own self.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
In contrast, the most difficult things I have ever done don’t really have a ‘weight’ to them. Communion of Dreams took me years of hard work to write and rewrite (multiple times), and yet is nothing more than phantasm, able to fly through the internet and be read by thousands. There are no physical copies to be bought, shared with a friend, lugged around and cherished or dropped disgustedly into a recycle bin. It is just electrons, little packets of yes and no.
And these past years of being a care provider, how do I weigh them (other than the additional fat I carry around from lack of proper exercise and too little sleep)? I suppose that I could count up all the times I have had to pick up my MIL, transfer her between chair and toilet, or lay her down gently on her bed. But even in this, things tend towards the immaterial, as she slowly loses weight along with her memories of this life. And soon, she will be no more than a body to be removed, carried one last time by others sent by the funeral home.
How do you weigh a life?
Jim Downey
It was the second time I’d been in this morning, checking to see what the sounds I’d heard coming over the monitor were all about. My MIL was over next to the side of the bed, almost up against the safety rail.”Are you OK?”
“Yes. I was just trying to turn on the lamp.”
The lamp is deliberately out of her reach, otherwise she’d turn it on in the middle of the night in her confusion. “Why did you want the lamp on?”
“So that they could find me.”
“Who?”
“The people who are coming for me.”
Ah. “Well, until they come, is there anything I can get you?”
“Do you know where my toothbrush is? And toothpaste?”
“Yes. They’re in the bathroom.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
“Well, I don’t want to forget them.”
“We won’t forget them. And we won’t let anyone else use them.”
“You promise?”
“Yes, I promise. Now, see if you can go back to sleep. It’s still early.”
“OK.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
After my last post, and other conversations, my wife’s sister decided to come in a week early, rather than wait until her scheduled visit starting the day after Thanksgiving. She didn’t want to miss seeing her mom one last time before the end, since it seemed so sure that the end was close.
She got in late, and we chatted a bit before she retired. She asked how her mom was doing.
“Not bad. Of course, now that you’ve rearranged your schedule to be here I’m sure she’ll live until January or something.”
“Yeah, but had I not come early, she would have died this week. That’s the way of it.”
“True enough.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
There’s a common phenomenon with Alzheimer’s patients which has been known to drive care-givers nuts: that for short periods, they can rise to a level of lucidity which makes it almost impossible to tell that they are suffering from the disease. This usually happens in response to the visit of company, particularly family members, whom they don’t get to see often. As a result those family members will have a decidedly mistaken impression of how their loved one is doing, and will wonder whether the care provider has been over-dramatizing things, or what. It is insidious, in that it undermines the support the day-to-day care giver gets from the rest of the family, who think that things really can’t be as bad as they say. And it leads to a lot of tension between the care giver and the patient, since the care giver will sometimes resent the ‘performance’ put on for other family members but not them.
The solution to this is to have a family member stick around long enough that the facade fails and the true condition of the patient is shown. Since my SIL usually comes to visit for a week or more, this always happens with her mom, and she has come to expect it. This time, however, the period of performance was extremely short, reflecting my MIL’s deteriorating condition. I think that, as much as anything else which has happened in the last ten days, told my SIL that she was right in coming early.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
It was the third time I came into the bedroom. “What are you doing, MIL?”
“I want to get up.”
“Well, it’s early still. You don’t get up until 8:00. See, the clock says that it is only 6:50.”
“But I have to get up early to get to school!”
“Don’t worry, today is Saturday. There’s no school on Saturday.”
“Oh, OK. ”
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
I was napping when the Hospice nurse came to visit this past week. Because of the holiday the schedule was rearranged, and she came in the middle of the afternoon rather than first thing in the morning. I’m trying to do a lot of sleeping now, banking it while my SIL is here to help out, because the coming weeks are likely to be even more demanding. So I didn’t get to hear what the nurse had to say. It sounds like it was the usual routine – slow decline, we’re doing all that can be done, let her know if there’s a problem.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
My MIL started choking and coughing at the dinner table, disconcerting the other family members who were over for the big Thanksgiving meal. As she coughed spasmodically, her face turning red, my wife and I looked at her, and in unison called out loudly “Take a deep breath. Real deep. Hold it. Now cough real hard.”She did, and it cleared the blockage caused by aspirating some of her food. In a moment she was back to eating, her attention focused on the food before her, mostly oblivious to the reaction around the table.
“That’s the best way to clear it – she just had a bit of something go down the wrong way,” I said to the others. And from the look on their faces I realized that my wife and I must’ve appeared unconcerned and relaxed in the face of what seemed to be a sudden crisis. My SIL nodded.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
I came down from a nap this afternoon, came into the kitchen where my wife was doing some baking. The monitor to her mom’s room there on the counter, the sound of my MIL snoring emanating from it.
“Good nap?”
“Yeah.” I nodded at the monitor. “How’s she doing?”
“Pretty well. We got her up from her morning nap, and she wanted to know where her mom was. Said that she had been in bed with her just a little bit earlier.”
“That’s becoming pretty common.” It has – my MIL has said some variation on this almost every day for the last week.
“Yeah. She’s close to the veil, but fighting with everything she’s got.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
Jim Downey
(Cross posted to dKos.)
Communion Of Dreams 