On this day, the day of our son’s birth, Evan took me to visit Robert. One has mixed emotions about days such as this due to timing, association of events, (in this case birthdays) and just plain anxiety. And because, due to rules, Evan was not permitted to come upstairs with me, he opted out and decided he wasn’t going to visit his dad without me.  There have been times when we have been able to circumnavigate the rules and go together but this time was a sensitive time: Evan could not do it.

When I arrived upstairs, wearing my visitor badge, armoring my heart, the nursing station was virtually empty. It was an off-hour that I have never experienced before, later than we usually go, likely due to Evan’s procrastination, because it’s downright hard.

Robert’s door was closed which means the occupants were being administered to: it is diaper change time, and once the door is reopened, even a mask doesn’t make the area around the doorway inviting. One has to wait.

There is, I believe, a new roommate in Robert’s room and I managed a short peek. No one is yakking it up in Greek or Italian any more. This denizen was Asian, contorted, silent, and somewhat indescribable. His television was playing. Robert’s television was playing in competition. They were, in fact, living in parallel universes of end-of-life, separated by a curtain.

So, here we go again: I enter the room, Robert is facing the other way, I say, “Hi, Rob!” He answers “Hi, ” without looking at me and I say, once I catch his eye, “Do you know who I am ?” and he says, “Susie.” And then something about knowing my voice. “How are you doing?” I ask and he says a compliant, relaxed, “fine.”

It all seems very familiar, even as familiar as the lack of a chair for me. There is one on the other side of the room: It is wedged behind a rolling bed for the roommate. There was no way I would cross the imaginary boundary and even attempt to extricate that heavy metal chair. So, I do what I have been doing and try to find a corner of the bed and I sit. I can’t get comfortable.

Robert listened to everything I said and in his way, held up his side of a conversation. A pragmatically correct give-and -take with words. I am sitting closest to the sink where a fluorescent light is on which I eventually turn off. He says it doesn’t bother him but it bothers me.

Maybe I should have figured out a way to record the conversation just to have it for the days I can’t fathom what is going on; I did not, I wasn’t thinking about the future, I was in the moment.

Today is Evan’s birthday, I say. Last Friday was mine. Yours is at the end of the month. I share Evan’s newly reached age and Robert says, “Wow.” I reiterate my age as well as how old Robert will be in a matter of weeks. He seems surprised. He listens. There is no spontaneous message or good cheer to the recipients of the birthdays. This topic segues into a history of his presence at this place, a place which he began residing in almost a year ago, the day before he turned seventy-four. He has not been home again. I’ve told you many times about the hospital, the Covid, the triage in different places his return here last February and how he has been wasting, wasting, diminishing.

Teeth. Robert’s parents did not get him much-needed braces. His chewing and aesthetics were not affected, but I knew his mouth was cramped with too many teeth. I knew but it never seemed important. But, now that he has morphed into a person who appears to be at least twenty years older than he is, I am flabbergasted each time he speaks. I see how small his mouth is and wonder how all those teeth which look even more crooked at this point, could fit in his mouth.

It is not evident when I speak how shocked I am; I am hiding behind my mask.

So, back to the above segue: I am telling Robert about his last year. I am telling him again what happened since that last fall in the house, I am reiterating all the details and when I get to the part, the part where I reiterate how long he has been out of the house, almost a year, he says, “WOW.”

He got it.

Maybe what I said registered in his long term memory, maybe his short term. But at that moment it seemed to make sense to him, in the world in which he lives which has little temporal or spatial affiliation. He lives in a bed and every moment is in suspension and then it becomes the next moment.

I am sorry to say that my own memory of the visit taps into a limited ability to play-back the moments. But I will say that perhaps during the last month I have noticed a better ability on his part to respond, if not to actually converse.

He said, something like, I am so sick of food! It was a spontaneous comment. Was this about the Food Network? I asked if he was referring to a program as I look up at the television and see something on about dream houses. He says yes. I was hoping he was not saying something about his own eating. OK, so that was interesting!

I switch to a corner on the other side of the bed, my back was killing me from twisting to the left. Now I am on a small space on the other side, twisting to the right. We are holding hands. I am horrified by the length of his nails and I am sure I told the desk three times about cutting them. Everyone I speak to tells me I have to call to make that request.

I am running out of things to say. I am reminding myself that the moments of cognition and all that goes with it are gifts. Strange gifts. Surprises.

I begin to disengage. OK, I say, I’ll see you next time. I have to walk around the bed to the other side. I am standing to his left, closer to the doorway and he is staring near my right side, away from my gaze. What is he thinking?

I love you, says I.
I love you more, says he.

Do you want to say something, is there something you want to ask me, I prompt, wondering what he is looking at.

No.

That’s a good slogan, he says.

Slogan, where did that come from? So I ask, “What do you mean, slogan?”

He was looking at the visitor badge stuck to the right side of my sweater.

On your badge, he says and then reads, “Get Better, Go Home.”

 

Crooked Teeth
Death Cab For Cutie

 

 

 

 

📌The series starts here:
Part 1: And The Band Played On … a mother’s life, a daughter’s journey

The previous post is here

The next post is here