by Kathy Brasby | Sep 12, 2014 | Seasons
For Lindsay, watching her mother tend to laundry stirred the same emotions as watching her children climb to the top of the swing set.
“Mom, be careful!”
Dorothy held the basket of dirty clothes in both hands and leaned against the handrail as she one-stepped her way to the basement.
“I’m fine,” Dorothy said. “I do this all the time.”
Lindsay grabbed the handrail, which shivered in her hand as many in older homes do. “This isn’t sturdy.”
“It’s fine. I know how to do this.” Dorothy set the basket on the floor to switch on the light. The basement darkness disappeared in orange brightness.
Dorothy took a cleansing breath and leaned over to pick up the basket.
“How do you get the clothes back upstairs?”
Dorothy set the basket down and leaned against the door jamb to the laundry room. “Sometimes your father takes it up for me. But I can always take up a few pieces at a time.” She smiled at Lindsay. “It’s fine.”
Lindsay’s father used a cane. Trips from room to room were slow. Like old molasses.
“It must take all day to do the laundry.”
“We have to do it,” Dorothy said. “We manage just fine.”
Lindsay called her brother later in the day. “OK, I get it now. It’s time, isn’t it?”
“Yeah,” Jim said. “We need changes before one of them falls.”
“I’m not ready to parent my parents.”
“Get ready,” Jim said. “If you love them, get ready.”
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by Kathy Brasby | Sep 9, 2014 | Stories
Unstained reputations still matter to some folks in small towns and they don’t like shadows of shame when undeserved.
So that’s why Charlie got in such a huff.
I don’t think he minded that his name appeared on the police blotter.
But the problem came when a new reporter and a police officer with scrawling handwriting crossed Charlie’s path.
The new reporter was going over the police reports, searching for news leads or at least a report on the tickets issued last week.
He thought he’d found an interesting lead. This Charlie dude had been ticketed for weed.
So the reporter wrote a piece about Charlie’s ticket for marijuana possession. Coming from a college town, it made sense to him.
The problem was that the police officer hadn’t made a nice strong S at the end of weed.
Charlie had been ticketed for the weeds growing too tall in his alley. Charlie needed to mow, not hide his stash.
And that’s why Charlie got in such a huff.
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by Kathy Brasby | Sep 5, 2014 | Seasons
Eileen’s voice rumbled down the long hallway at the nursing home, skidding past open doors and slamming into the nurse’s station desk.
“Where am I?” she asked. Loudly and often. “What am I doing?”
Two aides were helping a man re-settle in his wheelchair. They didn’t turn to Eileen.
A nurse wrote notes in a file folder. She didn’t look up.
“Where am I?” Eileen thundered. “What am I doing?”
This was Eileen’s life until one day her daughter came to visit.
“Shh, Mom,” the daughter said, leaning close to Eileen’s ear. “I’m taking you to lunch.”
“I just don’t know what to do,” Eileen said.
“You’re going to eat.” The daughter settled into a chair with a sign.
Eileen ate lunch.
After lunch, the daughter was joined by more family members who carried paper bags and a cake box.
Then they rolled Eileen and her wheelchair out the door to the patio.
Eileen looked around but she didn’t say a word.
“We’re going out here,” said a family member. “It’s your birthday today.”
Eileen nodded but she didn’t speak.
On that day, with family celebrating another milestone with Eileen, she didn’t need to ask any questions.
She didn’t ask who she was or what she was doing.
“I’ll have some cake,” she announced.
She was with family and that was enough for Eileen.
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by Kathy Brasby | Sep 2, 2014 | Hope
I remember the Christmas where Mom found the perfect gift for Dad. It was so perfect that he got two of: the one Mom bought and the one he bought five days before Christmas.
As Mom put it, “He can just have two of them then.”
She wasn’t smiling when she said it.
That was Dad’s MO: when he needed something, he bought it.
Buying gifts for Dad was always a challenge. He didn’t care about fun gifts. He wanted practical. For a while, we rotated gifts between wallets and pocket knives because he was sure to lose one between birthdays.
But my husband stumbled on an even more perfect gift.
Matt assured me that he would take of Dad’s Christmas gift one year after he found cases of antifreeze on sale at the parts store.
He didn’t even bother to wrap the case. He popped on a bow, wrote Dad’s name on the cardboard and let Dad cut it open. With a gift pocket knife, I suspect.
Dad was thrilled.
At a case of antifreeze.
It is no wonder that I never scored a great gift for Dad.
And the best part of the antifreeze? Matt then shared how great a price he’d gotten on the case. Dad couldn’t have asked for anything better.
That was the year I quit buying gifts for Dad. I was obviously clueless.
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by Kathy Brasby | Aug 29, 2014 | Seasons
It really is about focus.
Elsa shuffled her walker to the nursing home patio every afternoon unless her ankles were too swollen to allow shuffling.
“Have you seen the baby birds? ” Her face brightened as she looked to the ceiling of the patio. “There are four or five babies up there. I watch the mother ad father bringing food every day.”
She settled on a bench with a grunt and then craned her neck. “This is the second family this summer. I watched when the first babies finally flew away. They were almost bigger than the nest.”
Elsa rearranged her walker and leaned onto the top. “I come out here every day to check on them. These new babies ought to start flying before winter.”
Elsa’s legs were stiff and swollen enough she couldn’t tuck her feet under the bench. She ignored that.
“The father of that bird family helps with all the feeding. He’s as busy as the mother.” Elsa glanced at us. “I love watching these birds.”
I don’t know what causes Elsa’s swollen ankles. I don’t know why she shuffles along with a walker. I think she’d tell me if I asked.
I don’t ask.
It is about focus. Mine, a little bit, but mostly, hers.
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