Author Archives: Sans Souci

161. Mother-Daughter Journey: Today is My Mother’s Birthday

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She is 102 years old. Living in a residence. She has the help of aides who travel on buses and subways. Think about that. She is cogent most of the time but has occasional bouts of old-age ideations, the typical paranoia and all that goes with it. She can be so “normal.” She can be so impossible. But, she is still here and she made it to another year. A year I never thought she would reach. She was born in the year of the 1918 Spanish Flu Pandemic. That means that her parents survived it as well as an … Continue reading →

I Stood Up.

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Yesterday my son and I escorted my husband to the dermatologist for Moh’s surgery for a basal cell carcinoma under his eye, something that should have been addressed years ago, and was now, as it was revealed, HUGE. The surgery spanned four hours and left him with fifty-two stitches under his eye. An eye that would soon turn black and vision would be impeded. But that is not what this blog is about. The incident I am going to describe is becoming more and more typical and disturbing. When we entered the waiting room which was the size of a … Continue reading →

160. Mother-Daughter Journey: Give Us This Day Our Daily Crisis

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  Let’s get back to the buckeroo commode, shall we? While my mother has been riding her bucking bronco of a commode, whereas a new one was requested and because of letters and emails and quirks and confusion and phone calls, and agencies and code numbers, it took months to arrive, we are, my friends, back where we began: On the same bucking bronco. HeeeYa! The said new commode was delivered and needed to be installed over the toilet as her current rickety but heavy one is now. Mother wasn’t pleased with the lightweight frame and fragility; the driver claimed … Continue reading →

The Lesson

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There’s a lesson in everything. What we are reminded of now is that we are all connected, for good, bad or indifferent. What happens on one side of the world affects the other side. It is not a case of, “Whew, it’s over there, not HERE.” We are a global community for better or for worse. Make the EARTH great again. It’s crying. ~Sue

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New York City Photo Journal: A Visit To a City Agency: Visual Commentary

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A recent visit to a branch of the NYC Department of Transportation, Access-A-Ride, March 4, 2020   This is where the disabled in the borough of Queens go to be evaluated for para transit. (Something we felt we should get as a back-up to driving due to health issues and limitations.) You bring an application, medical documentation and are interviewed and evaluated. You are picked up by a vehicle assigned by this department and returned home, but because they pick you up at least an hour and a half early, you end up waiting hours for return transit, and if … Continue reading →

159. Mother-Daughter Journey: The Case of the Play-Doh Money

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Well, friends, I’ve had a short respite and here I am again. The commode still hasn’t arrived, but is finally, due to arrive tomorrow. [Addendum: I just received a call from the health supplier who was to deliver the new commode: The driver delivered it, said his job was not to install it, didn’t do it properly, hence my mother refused it. After months of waiting. To be continued.] So, what’s the latest? Play-Doh. Actually, Play-Dough. Hang on, I’m going to explain. I began receiving calls from my mother last week about theft. She has been talking about all kinds … Continue reading →

158: Mother-Daughter Journey: When Commodes Become Commodities: A Pity Potty Party

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  Well, folks, here’s another page-turner on what the elderly have to deal with and on what the caregivers have to put up with. The usual nuttiness prevails: let’s just say it all began with my mother’s need for a new commode. If you’ve never seen one, you are  lucky because you likely don’t need one. [See the photo above.] At least a month ago, maybe two, my mother announced that she needed a new commode. (The one she has been using was in her apartment in Florida and belonged to someone else, someone who left and maybe even died. … Continue reading →

157. Mother-Daughter Journey: The Case of the Smoking Fish

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    At 10:23 AM the phone rang; the caller ID was that of my mother. I had a choice: answer the phone or not. If I choose not, I hang on every ring and listen to the message being poured into the answering machine, it will go on for two minutes, then get cut off;  I will sit there ruminating on what I’ve heard. It will haunt me. If I answer, I pay the price immediately. I paid the price immediately. Most of the time when my other calls, there is an air of urgency with underlying fear, if not … Continue reading →

156. Mother-Daughter Journey: Pillow Talk

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When the phone rings I let the answering machine pick up; well, I generally do, after screening the caller I.D. Invariably it is spam. Invariably it is my mother. If it is my mother, it is usually at an inopportune time. If it is my mother she usually leaves a message. The message is always URGENT. When I hear the message my physical reaction is usually to feel ill. I am working on this, to tone down the reaction, to disengage from the urgency, the fear, the entrapment. During this past week the “good aide,” Candy, so named by my … Continue reading →

The Puzzler #31:The Wall Street Journal: 1/28/20

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  1/28/20 Link to puzzle   Evan is mentioned in this article in The Guardian   ” Here, we see some terms that setters consider familiar. Although, for “setters”, read “constructors” in the case of Evan Kalish’s US Universal crossword, where this clue … 54ac Convincing, algorithmically generated video … and a hint to the word concealed in 17-, 23-, 34- and 46-across … alludes to the presence in entries CLOTHES HAMPER, SPANISH-AMERICAN and CHRISTMAS HAMS of the hidden word SHAM, thereby indicating Collins’ suggestion DEEP FAKES. And another Collins proposal appears in a recent quiptic – the Guardian’s stepping-stone for beginners and … Continue reading →

The Green Coat

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  Shopping in 1939, before my time: Union Square, Manhattan. S. Klein’s On The Square   I mentioned in another post that I grew up on East 14th Street in Manhattan and that I am admin for a group of over 1200 nostalgic former Stuyvesant Town, Peter Cooper Village kids who grew up in the 1950s and 1960s. This blog post on shopping and the stores in our neighborhood reflects a post series I began on this area: The Automat, Union Square (restaurants and stores). S. Klein article [ And, I just realized, that the author of the article was … Continue reading →

155: Mother-Daughter Journey: The Orders: From Commodes to Wrinkles

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During the last week or so I have been receiving phone calls from my mother. My mother calls frequently to make sure that if there is something she needs I am on it a.s.a.p. She called and told me to get her a new commode. The instructions were to call her long-term care, but I knew before hand that just sending out the command does not get the order placed. You need a PRESCRIPTION. You need a CODE. Invariably, as this time, it doesn’t go through because something is missing or wrong and I end up making at least two … Continue reading →

16. Life Is A Journey But This Is A Trip: The Nerivio Device Report (3)

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The migraine report continues. Let me set the mood: this morning at around the time I was going to eat breakfast, I had a solid gold spot in my vision that looked more like a retinal migraine except is was perceived in both my eyes making it a brain spasm. It dissipated. A couple of hours later, back at the dining room table as I was opening a package, BOOM, without warning, a standard issue of ocular migraine. It was quick to reach my perception and by the time I got to my Nerivio device I was about 7 minutes … Continue reading →

15. Life Is A Journey But This Is A Trip: The Nerivio Device Part Deux

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  A few hours after yesterday’s blog was published, I was sitting at my computer and sensed the beginning of an ocular migraine, the third one of the week.  There was a time I was getting them everyday and even several times a day. For years I have been drawing circles around dates on piles of calendars, tracking these events, trying to figure out links, causes, ties of some kind, but nothing felt consistent, it just, well, happened. Happened on its own terms. I have even thought that this condition could be due to a virus that was lingering and … Continue reading →