Miz S

What Did Delaware? Idaho! Alaska!

Lots of good guesses on that last post! Pam L. wanted to play 20 questions to get the answer, which would have been really fun. I only wish I had thought of it!

The correct answer is IDAHO! Land of survivalists and potatoes.

We will fly into Spokane, rent a car, and drive to Coeur d'Alene. Many of you probably know that Coeur d'Alene is located right next to a huge lake named, aptly, Lake Coeur d'Alene. It is also very close to a 72-mile rail-to-trail bike path called, um, Trail of the Coeur d'Alenes.  We will kayak and bike to our hearts' content. And if we get tired of those pursuits, we can nip on over to the nearby national park to look for bears. It's called--you probably guessed-- Coeur d'Alene National Forest.

And by God, I will learn to spell "Coeur d'Alene" without pausing and furrowing my brow.

You may wonder how I came to pick Idaho's panhandle as a getaway.  After finding out that airfare to Ireland in the summer would run us at least $1500 per person, round trip, I was all "Fuck you, Europe! USA! USA!" I googled "most scenic bike trails in America" which led me eventually to Idaho. We were able to use some accrued frequent flyer miles for one of the tickets, so that worked out well.

No, we are not bringing our own bikes. We will rent bikes. 

Three things about Idaho:

1. Neither Josh nor I have ever been there before. It's fun to explore a new place together.
2. I don't really want to see a bear. My sister and her husband were attacked by a grizzly bear in Montana's Glacier National Park way back in 1980 or so. They survived with a minimum of injuries. That story is on this blog somewhere. If I have time I will find the link. The main point being, bears are scary DUH.
3. The survivalists fascinate me. In fact, I have been lurking on a survivalist forum called survivalistboards dot com (I'm not linking to them because I'm afraid of attracting their  attention). The tagline for this particular website is "Endure. Adapt. Overcome."  (I think that any number of us could use that tagline to describe a typical day at work. You feel me?) I love the message threads. They range from the dire to the perky.  Here are a couple of my faves:

• 18 Signs The Collapse of Society is Accelerating
• Getting Married -- How To Warm Her Up To Survivalism
• Investing In Copper Bullion? Industrial Metals Will Always Be Of Value!

I don't mean to sound like I'm sneering. Being prepared for all sorts of situations is prudent. I'm just...fascinated. Oh, and I've bookmarked the thread that explains how to manufacture your own insulin. Evangeline will thank me some day.

I'm off to my parents' house right now (Mom just called to say that Pam--the aide--has disappeared and must have decided to take the day off GOD I can't wait until she forgets how to use the phone), then a doctor appointment. Adios.

Why am I SUPER EXCITED?

You guys are really sweet and funny and amazing. I am possibly the worst blogger of all time in terms of consistency, and I can't imagine why anyone bothers to click over here, but damn if you don't all just sort of magically appear and say wonderful things when I show up to moan about my dogs and my parents. 

I enjoyed the jokes after Tuesday's post. 

I liked the fact that FC left a nerdy science joke, and that Leah left knock-knock jokes that don't make any sense because apparently her children made them up. Cathy S. wins the prize for the longest joke. (Not that I'm really handing out prizes, mind you. No prizes. Move along, you greedy people.)

But the joke that makes me snort every time I read it is the one that Miz Robyn left: 

Question: What's brown and sticky?

Answer: A stick.

Yeah, it's dumb, but it's FUNNY.

*     *     *     *     *

At first, I was abashed about what I posted on Wednesday.  I thought for sure that people would be sick of hearing about my parental-care woes. I even swore a sacred oath that I would take a break from eldercare posts. And it turns out that a lot of you are interested in the life and times of the aged and infirm. So screw the sacred oath! It's full steam ahead with droning on and on about my parents, with occasional forays into the pit of despair that contains my dogs -- one with cancer and the other with canine dementia and crippling arthritis.

But first, I will take a break from all that to tell you about something that I am really super excited about. So super excited that I must use the phrase "super excited." (But I will not utter the word "squee" which is the most annoying word ever bandied about by the internet community. I forgive you if you have ever unthinkingly used it.)

Back story: Josh got this idea that he wanted to take me to Ireland for our 30th anniversary, which was last September. He wanted to wander the moors on a starry night with me and sing drinking songs in Irish pubs and make love in a romantic cottage with a thatched roof, etc. (Note: he never brought up any of the aforementioned activities. I just assume that's what he wanted to do.)

And I was all, "I can't go to Ireland! I'm moving my aged parents to assisted living!"  He understood, of course. But he kept bringing it up over the course of the year.  And I would say, "I can't go to Ireland! I'm teaching!"  Or, "I can't go to Ireland! It's expensive!"

I've got nothing against Ireland, by the way.

The next thing that happened is that Josh changed his laptop's background so that every time he opened his computer, a haunting Irish folk-tune would start playing against a panoramic scene of Irish lakes and mountains.

And I was all, "DUDE! You're JEWISH! What's with the Ireland obsession?" But honestly it made me feel a little sad. Like our lives were passing by with no cool trips to Ireland or anywhere else.

Then, one day a couple of months ago, my mom behaved badly towards me. I forget what the trigger was, but she was bad-tempered and disagreeable and just wouldn't stop no matter how I dodged and ducked. I felt like I was 10 years old and was being unfairly punished for something, when in fact I am 53 years old and was very kindly spending time with her and my father and NOT smothering her with a pillow. She should be thankful for that lack of smothering.

By the time I left, I was feeling very sorry for myself and wept the whole way to my car.

And then I thought to myself, "What better way to celebrate my martyrdom than to take a vacation? IN IRELAND!"

So I went home and started planning our Ireland vacation.

And this is where I must stop and tell you that we are not going to Ireland. Do you know how much airfare to Ireland is? Screw that.

We are going somewhere else. There will be biking. There will be kayaking. There COULD be bears, but Josh doesn't want to see them. There are DEFINITELY a lot of crazy-ass white people.  I hope Josh can pass for white.

Where could we be going? Betcha can't guess.

 

We are our own reality show.

My mom in her backyard yesterday, feeding the birds, which she does about 4 times a day. She totters out, carefully puts in approximately 3 tablespoons of birdseed, and totters back in. This is where the next fall will be, mark my words.

I have been alluding to another parental move. Here are the details.  It's all quite ridiculous.

Some of you remember that 11 months ago we moved my parents to an assisted living facility in nearby Washington DC. It took the combined efforts of my siblings, my husband, my own kids, and assorted nieces and nephews to pack up the house where my parents had lived for 40 years, sort through a frightening amount of stuff, and settle them into their new place. My parents must never, ever find out about the dumpster that we rented and placed in the driveway after they were gone.

They never really settled in to assisted living. And this didn't surprise us, not really. My father is shy. My mother is friendly but socially inept and prone to providing inappropriate commentary in a never-ending loop with a voice as clear and carrying as the bells of Notre Dame.

They had no friends there. They made no friends there. My mother can't hear what anyone says, and her dementia is more and more obvious.

They never figured out how to manage the dining room. They didn't understand the seating arrangements. My mother demanded table changes. Service was slow and the wait staff were often rushed and impatient. It was agony to eat down there with my parents and imagine them navigating it on their own most days.

The activities, the lectures, the chair aerobics, the little concerts--they never went. My father wanted very much to see the nightly movies but my mother would tire after 10 minutes of not being able to follow the plot and so they would shuffle back upstairs. And it was no use suggesting that my father stay down and enjoy the movie and my mother go up and read the newspaper, because my parents are inseparable.

We were never able to let their private aides go. My father would forget to use his walker and would fall. Or he would try to manage by himself in the bathroom. They would never think to call the front desk and ask for help. My mother refused to allow the nurses to administer her medication, so the private aide would coax her into taking the right pill at the right time. The private aide drove them to their doctor appointments because my parents couldn't manage to reserve the shared car and driver ahead of time. The one time they used it, my mother was outraged that they had to wait 30 minutes for the car to arrive after the end of the appointment. She couldn't understand the concept of a shared system of transportation.

It turns out my parents need constant supervision.

I am giving you a very abbreviated version of events here, and believe me, we tried everything we could think of to make this work. But in the end, the only affordable solution was to move them back to their old house and negotiate with one of the aides to become a live-in. We have installed a stair-lift for my father. We had the bathroom remodeled so that it is safer.

We moved them back home last week.

Old people should always live in a house at the top of a hill, yes?

My mother already fell and broke a rib. By tripping on my father's walker, as I mentioned in yesterday's post.

Why has my life become so ridiculous? That question is rhetorical and there is no need to address it.

Swear to God, no dog posts and no eldercare posts after this. Instead, I'll borrow someone's baby and become a mommy blogger.

Got Jokes?

The staff at the doggie oncologist clinic LOVED Rosie.  Here is an excerpt from the notes: "Rosie is soooo cute, we love her!!!"   3 exclamation marks. For real.

A week or so ago, I took Rosie to the doggie oncologist for a consultation. We already had the definitive diagnosis (lymphoma, stage V), but I needed to have as much information as possible to be sure that we are making the right decision (not to treat her).

Cancer treatment for pets is not for the purpose of effecting a cure. Instead, the goal is to buy some time while maintaining a good quality of life. The chemo doses are lower and are well-tolerated by most dogs.

But Rosie's lymphoma is in all her lymph nodes, her bone marrow, and her blood stream. We could opt for the full-on, multi-agent, cadillac of canine chemotherapy treatments, but it would only buy her about 8 months. Maybe. And it would cost somewhere in the neighborhood of $6000.

I love how white Sasha is.

Can you put a price on the life of a beloved family pet?

Yup.

I can be surprisingly practical at times.

The treatment we have chosen for Rosie is daily doses of prednisone. It will do nothing for the cancer, but it will stimulate her appetite and her energy and alleviate some of the swelling in the lymph nodes. When we see signs of systemic illness (lethargy, lack of appetite, vomiting) we will know it is time to put her down.

And, just to make this summer EXTRA fun, April is failing fast. At 16 years old, she has arthritis and general craziness. We have thrown everything we can at the arthritis, but she still hobbles around horribly, especially at night. Josh often sleeps downstairs with her to try and settle her down.

My beautiful glow-in-the-dark daughters!

Sasha thinks we should put them both to sleep at the same time. I kind of think she's right. The thought of putting one down and then coming home to see the other one all alone, while knowing that the other one is also on borrowed time, just kills me.

This is depressing, I know, and I'm sorry to lay it on you. Many of you have pets and have been through something like this or will go through it one day. And some of you even have cancer yourself, or are living with a loved one with cancer. In which case this might seem trivial.

But never fear! Tomorrow's post will be hilarious! It is all about how we moved my parents to assisted living last July, and then moved them back to their old house last week! And my mother promptly fell and broke her ribs! BY TRIPPING ON MY FATHER'S WALKER!

That's comedy, Jack. Dark comedy, yes. But comedy nonetheless.

Also, don't stress about leaving a comforting comment. I've been all over Facebook about this, and I think this is my 2nd post here since we found out. So, it's not like you haven't already said something sweet and comforting. Maybe you could tell me a joke, instead.

Es la verdad.

A classroom vignette:

I am sitting at my reading table with a couple of kids that need help with a writing activity. The other kids are all busy and relatively quiet at their tables. I glance up and scan the room several times a minute to make sure that all is well, i.e., Rochelle hasn't sneaked into the cubbies to rifle through others' backpacks, Alex is not decorating inside picture books, Roberto and Wilbur are not playing punch tag, etc.

Wait. I sense a disturbance in the force. Why is Yesenia's head down on the table? I can't see her face. Is she resting, or crying?  Why is Elaina leaning over to look more closely? And why does Rochelle, that little shit, have a nasty, smug expression on her face?

Back story: Yesenia has no social skills and is an easy target. It's not her fault. She has a learning disabilty, including a language processing disorder, and she can be difficult. Rochelle has bullied her all goddamned year long. Rochelle is a queen bee (there are several in my class), smart as a whip, and Yesenia is always on the outs. I have addressed this through gentle conversations with the offenders, strongly worded conversations with the offenders, loss of recess time for the offenders, proactive strategy sessions with the victim, role-playing scenarios with the victim, whole-class role-playing scenarios, parent phone calls, parent conferences, visits to the principal, and trips to the guidance counselor. The problem has ebbed and flowed all year and I am sick of dealing with it.

"Come here, Yesenia," I say.

She stumbles over to my table with her hair in her face and I see that she has been quietly weeping.

"What's wrong, honey?" I ask.

"Rochelle say I'm [mumbles trailing off into sobs]"

"Rochelle said, honey. Not say. Tell me again. I can't understand what you said."

Dammit. I've been working with her on past-tense all goddamned year.

"Rochelle say I'm mumble mumble sob mumble shriek"

I feel my irritation mounting. What did that little brat say to Yesenia? Or is Yesenia confusing time and place again? Is it something that happened a month ago that Yesenia just remembered?

"I can't understand you. Take a deep breath and try to stop crying."

"Rochelle say I'm going down there! SHRIEK! SOB!"

"Going down where?"

What the hell is she talking about? Is Rochelle making fun of the fact that she goes downstairs to see the resource teacher? But lots of kids go out of the room for different things. How would Rochelle even put that together?

"She say I'm going down there! [points down with her finger] Where the debbil is!"

"Rochelle said you are going to HELL?"

I hear a few gasps. The classroom is suddenly very quiet. They live in a very religious community, and every year my first-graders loooooove to talk about God and Jesus and heaven. If they mention hell it is never by name. They call it "down there" and they point cautiously, as if the very gesture might somehow alert the "debbil" to the fact of their existence.

"Rochelle. Come here."

I am using my dangerously quiet, crisp voice.

"Did you say that to Yesenia?"

Rochelle's eyes are big and innocent, but she nods. She won't bother to deny it. Too many witnesses at the table.

"Why would you say something like that?"

She just stares at me and doesn't say anything.

"Go to time-out."

Man, that was close. I almost said, "WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU?"

I turn to Yesenia, who is still snuffling and sobbing.

"Yesenia. Look at me. You are not going to hell. I promise. Is Rochelle God? Is Rochelle in charge of who goes to hell? Alright then. You have my permission to tell Rochelle to shut up.  If anyone ever tells you that you are going to hell, ask them if they are God. If they're not, they can't say who's going to hell, okay?"

Despite what you might hear at church or on TV or from your own parents.

*     *     *     *     *

Dudes, I was pissed. It wasn't so much what was said, but to whom it was said. The child who loves the mean girls and craves their attention. The child who doesn't have enough language in English OR Spanish to defend herself.

After school, we all stand in the gymnasium with the walkers and hand them off to parents, siblings, or babysitters. Rochelle's mother arrived, and I asked a team-mate who speaks Spanish to translate an on-the-spot parent conference for me.  

I described the incident to Mom. I mentioned that the bullying has been an on-going issue. Mom said she knew nothing about any of it.

I call bullshit on that, but fine, whatever.

Mom looked down at Rochelle and asked her in Spanish, "Why did you say that?"

And Rochelle looked up at her with big eyes, shrugged, and said simply, "Es la verdad." (It's the truth.)

My friend doing the translating actually gasped when Rochelle said that, and broke out of translating mode to begin chastizing her in Spanish. I explained to the mom that the child in question also comes from a religious home and she understands the implications of going to hell and the poor thing was very upset AND BY THE WAY, WHY IS YOUR KID SUCH A SHIT AND  WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU TEACHING HER AT HOME?

I didn't really say that last part, but I think it was implied.

The mother said a few things to her daughter, then left. My translator told me that the mother said, "We don't know that. You can't say that to people."

I hope they will talk about it more at home, and I hope the mother really meant what she said.

I fault Rochelle for the meanness and the bullying, not for what she actually said. I understand that she has been taught a very fire-and-brimstone evangelical form of Christianity, and that she is merely parroting what she's heard. Her understanding, filtered through her mean-girl brain, comes down to:

1. Bad people go to hell.
2. Yesenia is dumb. No one likes her. She tattletales on me. She is bad!
3. Yesenia is going to hell.
4. Hey, I think I'll tell her!

And I feel a tiny bit bad, because Rochelle is just a little girl, and I am her first-grade teacher. And it's been hard for me to like her. It's been hard all year long.

Es la verdad.

More weekend stuff. And, bad Rosie news.

I like this picture because Sasha looks like she is about to blow a whistle and make us all start hiking again. And because you can see me anxiously watching while Evangeline tests her blood.

Oh, screw it. I can't finish recreating my Memorial Day Weekend. At this rate it will be the 4th of goddamned July before I get to the wrap-up. Here's the condensed version: The day after our fab bike ride, we drove to Antietam with our girls (and their boys) and went on a 5 mile hike. It was special because, well, mostly because we got to spend hours with our kids. And they invited us. It was THEIR idea. They don't seem to mind us too much, which is mystifying but quite acceptable.

And I like this picture because if you look really carefully at the forest of legs, you can see that Paul is the only one who has any brown in him. The rest of us are so white we glow. Also, notice that I am still hovering over Evangeline and holding her shoulders like she might fall down or something.  No, seriously, she might. Oh, and yes, I always dress in all black when I am hiking in 90 degree weather.

Memorial Day weekend felt like the best weekend ever in my whole entire life. Probably because I just haven't done anything fun in a really long time. It's all been work and headaches and worries and eldercare and schlepping crap from here to here, and...CALGON, TAKE ME AWAY!

Fucking A, I'm referencing commercials from the 1980s, much like my parents used to quote Burma Shave ads.

In other news...oh this sucks, really.

Remember awhile ago I took Rosie and April on a walk and made a HILARIOUS video about it (which has not gone viral--you people just disappoint the hell out of me). And I said I was taking her to the vet? And then I made a video of that? And then I was exhausted? Remember?

At first the vet thought she had cancer, but the blood work came back inconclusive and the needle aspiration of her enlarged lymph nodes came back with no evidence of cancer, so my vet decided it was an infection and put her on antibiotics. 

Blah blah blah more boring details, now cut to the chase.

She DOES have cancer. Lymphoma, stage 5. 

I am going to take her to the oncologist for the initial consultation, but I highly doubt we will treat her.

Poor little Rosie. Poor little waggy-tail, scruffy, in-love-with-everyone Rosie.

 

Memorial Day Weekend, Part One.

On Saturday we drove to Cumberland, in beautiful Western Maryland, with our bikes in the back of the van.

An old man loaded our bikes into a train car.

"Careful, you clumsy fool!" I snarled at him.

 I am nostalgic when it comes to trains. Nothing like a good ol' steam engine!

This is NOT a look of pretend interest, Betsy. It is a look of focusing on holding my main chin up so that the camera will not capture my other chins.

The train took us to tiny, beautiful Frostburg.

We ate lunch at the Princess Diner. (Betsy, that definitely IS a look of pretend interest on Josh's face.)

Then rode our bikes 15 miles back down to Cumberland, on the Great Allegheny Passage bike trail. A gentle, downhill grade the whole way. How sweet is that?

Was it beautiful?

Yes, it was.

Was I happy?

Yes.

Happier than I have been in months.