Today’s weather is the definition of ‘unsettled.’ The sun
comes out, goes in, thunder rumbles, the sun comes out… I am unsettled as well.
I wonder if it was the distant energy of lightening that woke me with a feeling
of anxiety. It was a sense of missing something, having to hurry somewhere when
there was nowhere to go.
Maybe it was because of an unsettled night that hadn’t been
shaken off in my dreams. Last night our dog, my closest buddy, had trouble
coming up the stairs. He has missed steps before, but he missed them all. His
back legs don’t quite hit the stair and he pauses, tries again, makes it, moves
on. I lifted
him on the bed and he breathed quickly, his heart beat fast for a long time.
John and I kept petting him, afraid his little 13 year-old body was giving out.
He is better today, but his health is becoming an obsession. Sometimes it takes
some effort to shake it off.
Today I am going to my mother’s to help wash her hair. She
is slowly becoming bed-ridden. Still refusing a bed-side toilet or Depends, my
sister continues to help her to the bathroom then sometimes out to the living
room to eat and doze in her chair. The gradual loss of autonomy and memory is
death’s advance. Creeping.
I guess a slow advance is easier than the sudden shock of
loss. Or not. The bandage is a soft unwinding, but it is also so much longer
than the band aid. There are so many more moments of pause and assessment. How
is she today? How far have we come? How far do we have to go?
It is unsettling. And it gives me a new appreciation for the
care-taker, my sister. Being close to the process is not comforting. It is
exhausting, the definition of creeping into grief.
The clouds have moved in. Thunder rumbles. How soon will the
sun return?
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