Summer in Wisconsin ain’t too shabby either!
Brotherly Love on Mom’s Birthday
Of all the things I could give Mom for her birthday, the very best would be the promise to always try to work things out with my bros. Mom cherished each one of us, in different ways, and having us all in her life, in the ways that we could be, not only made my role as primary caregiver doable, it also helped to make her life, at 85 and with dementia, complete.
—excerpt from Living Is for Living: A Caregiver’s Story
Triple Salchow – enough is enough
As my spouse put it when I fretted: “getting your Mom two weeks in Maine is like completing a triple salchow – that’s something to feel good about.”
—excerpt from Living Is for Living: A Caregiver’s Story
The Happiest Days, i.e. “Going to Camp”
As we weighed the challenges of getting Mom to camp vs. her love of summers there, I remembered her advice twenty-five years earlier when I asked her about taking our newborn first to live in Prague so that Doug could take a job there: “Go for it.”
—excerpt from Living Is for Living: A Caregiver’s Story
Summer Solstice 2017, the longest day and grief
After a busy spring, I was exhausted. It helped that, when our youngest played Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass on his phone, Mom danced in her chair, from head to toe.
—excerpt from Living Is for Living: A Caregiver’s Story
Looking for Dad
It’d been fifteen years since Dad died, and I looked for him every day, grateful for all the ways he was still right here, with me.
—excerpt from Living Is for Living: A Caregiver’s Story
Under One Roof
Under one roof – a tremendous relief – our whole family, even when it’s brief.
Truly, I’m glad they’re livin’ their dreams – still, it’s not always as great as it seems.
Keepin’ it simple, I miss ’em when they’re away – not said to hold ’em back, just to enjoy this day.
There’s nuthin’ in the world like our home when it’s full – the laughter, the fun, even the bull.
A rambunctious crowd – I’d have it no other way – this is our family, each with our say.
Monday will come, as will the Fall, we’ll rearrange, still we’ll always be all.
Under one roof – a tremendous relief – our whole family, even when it’s brief.
—from Living Is for Living: A Caregiver’s Story
My Sisters (in-law)
My sisters (in-law) may not have been part of my start, still, I was grateful they were part of my present. Although we were from different gardens, I loved our awesome bouquet!
—excerpt from Living Is for Living: A Caregiver’s Story
a thousand words
Time to Be Three
Our ten-year-old, done with elementary school and on his way to middle school, sat at the kitchen counter one early summer morning,
“You know what I don’t get?” he said to me.
“They start preparing us to be big when we’re only three.
We go to pre-school to get ready for kindergarten,
To kindergarten to get ready for first grade,
To first grade to get ready for second,
Second to get ready for third,
Third to get ready for fourth,
Fourth to ready for fifth,
And fifth for sixth.
Now there’s sixth for seventh,
Seventh for eighth,
then eighth for ninth,
ninth for high school,
high school for college, and
college for your job.”
Our ten-year-old son, with the big blue eyes,
looked at me with clarity and asked,
“When does a three-year-old get to be three?”
—from Living Is for Living: A Caregiver’s Story
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