This has been a wacky few weeks. As I mentioned, I was giving an on-line iPhone photography course (they call it a workshop, but the amount of time and work that went into it could have gotten me tenure at a university) so I was on-line posting and creating and helping, and researching. And migraining.

It was an awful month for migraines, just about a daily event of one kind or another, and I do think I mentioned about the violent vertigo attack; these scare the crap out of me. I try to live, if I can in between events, but travel can be very difficult and exacerbate the issue. Movement and speed are not my friends.

Anyway, my headache-neurologist’s staff was able to get me approval for the new drug which has been FDA approved, Aimovig; it is self injected monthly. It is not a cure. It may not work but I must try. Long term side effects are always a worry but my life is so compromised now that I will live for today. Fingers crossed. It is being delivered from a nearby hospital pharmacy TOMORROW. In a cooler. Like an organ to be transplanted. The following day I bring it to the doctor’s physician’s assistant to be instructed on its use. It will be injected. Then I hope for the best and add the $150 co-pay to the list of other stuff I am using/taking.

Speaking of tomorrow, one of an accepted submission of several crossword puzzles that my son created will be published in The new York Times; July 2. That’s big stuff. As a kid he used to listen to Will Shortz (the Times’ puzzle editor) on Sunday radio. I love puzzles and he used to watch me do them and eventually he surpassed me in ability and began creating them which is no easy feat. He met Will Shortz recently at a puzzle tournament and introduced himself: Mr. Shortz remembered his name and submissions. Soon after, four were accepted and another puzzle was accepted and appeared on-line on a different web site.

I also think I mentioned that I had joined Ancestry.com a number of months ago and was poking around, then had my DNA tested. The weirdest thing happened…

Years back I had a very close friendship with my colleague, Sylvia. We were beyond friends and did lots of things together. She was what I had wished my mother could be. I was friendly with the family, especially her daughter Phyllis, when I lost Sylvia to Alzheimer’s.

Phyllis just joined Ancestry and had her DNA analyzed. Good thing. For all the emotional pull and connection, we found we are related. Chew on that for a while. Still wrapping my head around it.

My mother has been calling to find out how I am; she knows this hasn’t been an easy time. She is still trying to find cures by watching…infomercials. Well the infomercials didn’t go over big for a migraine cure, but she called yesterday and told me to hurry up and order something she had just seen for leg and foot cramps. “Free shipping today!!” she chanted with glee! Rather than get it from a website I used Amazon where I get free shipping. “Relax, it’s coming Tuesday.”

“By the way,” my 100 year old mother added, I just saw Jane Seymour on TV and my skin is really bad. Order me that ‘Crepe Erase!.’ ” I have visions of the last few of her pennies running out after buying everything on TV.

“No, sorry.”

“Why not?”

“Because I don’t want to deal with those TV companies, they keep billing your credit card and hang on like pit bulls.” A subsequent venture into reviews yielded lousy comments about this product. And I know her skin is lousy because she can’t see, she refuses to shower and only sponge bathes; she is one-hundred years old.

My mother fears she might have cancer because her feet are swelling, she keeps running to the bathroom. Things aren’t working the way they used to. She is going through double the amount of, let’s call them pull-ups.

I push to the back of my mind the re-surfacing memory of what I was told when my mother fell and ended up in the hospital for a month: that they had found a mass on her ovary and wanted her to go back for tests.

No. Enough.

It nags at me. I deny all details and cede to intermittent fears.

So, while I am distracted by this new medication, a creative-crossword-producing son, the knowledge that I am related to a dear friend and her family, while I deal with all the good possibilities, I remember that my mother is one hundred plus years old. That she has, among other issues, a lurking mass, and that maybe I should reconsider the Crepe Erase.

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

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