John Dies Leaving Secrets

I get a call from a social worker from the hospital. Through the open door of John's trailer a neighbor saw John lying on the floor. They were having trouble keeping John in the hospital, he had tried to crawl out and had been restrained. He had given them my name and they had tracked me down. He trusted me to bring him his wallet and his money and check his trailer. Could I meet the social worker at his trailer? I agreed to meet her and we set up a time. But it was snowing that morning so I walked over and the social worker didn't come. I left a note on the door with my phone number on it for her to call in case she came later.

The next day Meals on Wheels called, would John be needing meals? They'd read the note on my door. The snow kept me home so I didn't visit John. Then it was Thanksgiving Weekend and we took the train to Portland to visit my mother. By the time I was able to visit John in the hospital, he could no longer speak. But the social worker hoped that I could get him to give permission for hospice care.  He was agitated when he saw me and wouldn't focus on the social worker so she left. Then he tried to get out of bed. He probably thought I could take him home. There was only an aide by his bed to help calm him down, so I left feeling unqualified to help him.


A couple of days later a social worker called me from the nursing home where the hospital placed John, and asked if I could sign John up for hospice. I was the only contact listed for him. I'd never been able to get any personal information from him so I didn't know anyone in his family who was still alive. The social worker told me she didn't think John would make it through the night and they wanted to offer him comfort. I finally told her, if I were the only one that could sign, I would. I couldn't let John die without comfort, but it would put me in an awkward position at work. She called back and told me I wouldn't have to sign. She talked it over with the supervisor and they would accept a not from John's doctor saying he would agree to hospice care.

The next afternoon a case manager from the nursing home John had been placed in called, John had died that morning, could I come and pick up John's keys and possessions? He said he could just turn them over the trailer park manager, I told him to call the case manager and give him the name and number. I also tell him John did have money and there is a file cabinet and probably the information he needs is in it. A nice young woman from the funeral home calls next, do I know how John wants to be buried? By now I'm wishing I could go over and take a few bills from John's hidden cache. No, but I know there is file cabinet in his home, if they could go there, they could look it up.

I went to Interfaith Clinic to leave a message for Chris, case manager who was kind and concerned about him. I forgot to bring in the last of the lancets so I go back out to my car. Chris comes running toward me and thanks me for letting him know. He also says, "don't feel bad, John lived the way he wanted to."

I wonder when I'm going to start living the way I want to?

One last note:  When I was in California on my way to my son's house over Christmas vacation I got a call from my supervisor who told me a cousin of John's had called the office and asked to speak to me.  When I called her back she wanted to know how John had spent his last few years. Who were his friends? I didn't have much to offer, I'd never met any. I asked her who had finally gotten a hold of her. She told me the man who owned the land that John's trailer sat on had finally gone to John's trailer to look at the files.  He also told her he was to meet a brother of the funeral home director and a friend there. When he got there the other two men had entered the trailer and the contents of his safe on the floor ! She told me she would fly over the Christmas break and see what John had. She would call me and let me know. She never called me back.

A final note: A couple of weeks later I was in the elevator visiting another client and the woman from Meals on Wheels who had delivered John his meals got in next to me carrying a bag of dog food. She recognized me and told me she had also visited John. When she was there the man in the bed next to his overheard them talking about John's dog, Jake, an old scruffy mutt, and offered to take the dog. For me that was the ending I needed to close John's chapter, someone caring about the old and scruffy.

Was Prom Like this for You?

Too complicated?

The boys in my daughter’s group find out if a girl will go with them before they are asked. So word was out that my daughter did not want to go to prom with Tyler. I don’t know how Tyler was told, but  he knew he wasn’t supposed to ask her. However, she did tuck him in to the back of her head as a last resort so she could go to prom. She was hoping Brian or Zach would ask her. No one goes Dutch, which I think would be a good solution rather than expect one friend to pay for both dinner and tickets. Although the boys all decided to go to Bob's Burger and Brew, which sounds inexpensive enough.  We don’t have enough money for my daughter to ask her desired date to her school's prom. An additional complication is that her desired date doesn’t go to her high school. So she really did have to wait for him to ask her to his prom.

Brian tells her he would ask her, but he’s going to a relative’s wedding in Alaska. And while he’s there he’s going heli-snowboarding, which as an option to prom, is a no-brainer.  So that leaves Zach. Her friend, Nick who is also Zach's friend, tells her Zach is going to ask her. But by now it's the weekend before prom,  Zach still hasn’t asked her and Tyler asks someone else so she tells Nick that she’s given up on going and not buying a dress. She tells me she is okay not going; after all it’s her junior prom. But she's going to start saving up now for her senior prom because she's going to go to it. But Nick keeps telling her Zach will invite her.

On Tuesday afternoon I get a call from my daughter, Nick has assured her Zach is going to ask her and she needs to buy the dress and we have to drive 20 miles to the next town because all her friends have been scouring our community (and Bellevue) for dresses and they haven’t seen any they like for her. Now I wish I’d put some time in looking with her. So I get home on this rainy afternoon, we eat leftovers to fortify us and head prom dress shopping. Emily has looked up a couple of places online that she wants to check out. In looking for one place, we find another, Davis Bridal Shop. We look through the clearance rack and find a lovely green dress. We also see the dress we’ve seen advertised that looks so cute in bright rosy pink with roses surrounding the skirt. She is a knockout in the moss green dress with her long dark hair and pale complexion, the color is just right for her. As she stands there, with the low cut of the dress and the way it drapes around her body and her flushed cheeks and red lips, I imagine her as Rose Red in fairy tales and the young woman she is turning out to be.  Later when she tells me all the girls are getting spray tans, I have no sympathy that I can’t afford it for her, her complexion is flawless and her coloring lovely. But the dress is a little snug under the arms, also it is too much to wear to a prom with a boy that she barely knows who waits so late to ask her. She doesn’t need to be a princess just yet; after all it’s her junior prom.

We find the other shop; it’s run by a Latina woman and the dress are fun, but a little too much for prom. So we head to the mall. We try Penney’s first because the prices are reasonable, but their slim selection doesn’t offer anything appropriate. We walk along the quiet mall peering into different stores that offer causal clothing. We end up in Macy’s and there we find a dress we both like. I’m surprised I like it on my almost seventeen-year old daughter; it’s black, and rather sophisticated with one strap. Straps are important. Once she went off to one dance in a strapless dress and she was uncomfortable all evening tugging up the front.  The dress is snug, but stretchy and she’s comfortable in it. It looks like a dress she can wear again, maybe out for a nice dinner. I open a Macy’s charge account to get 15% off.  It’s more than I want to spend, but reasonable for a nice dress she can wear again. So she' got the dress, but no date !

Do I Mean What I Say?

As the mom of a teenager I get confused about what I'm saying and doing as a parent. How do I know how to handle some of the situations my daughter brings to me?

Yesterday when she got home from tennis practice, she was all excited, Brian came to her school at lunchtime and left three cheery daffodils with a note asking her to his school's Tolo dance, which was my Sadie Hawkins dance; Tolo is also a resort town in Greece. The secretary commented that she thought girls were to ask the boys, Emily replied that since it was at his school, he could ask her. But one of her well-meaning friends had told Brian that Emily didn’t have any money to ask him. She disappears into room to start cleaning it. I’m looking forward to spending the evening together. We can talk over what she needs to do about college. Although as I look at the bathroom that she was supposed to keep clean after our last conversation, I wonder if conversation is enough.

 She told me that she doesn’t want to drive down to Seattle to the College Fair with an adult, by herself, because it will be awkward. The conversation about her going to the College Fair isn’t over as far as I’m concerned, but the sun in my garden is too captivating to discuss anything with her right now. Then she comes to the door and tells me there is room in the van for her to go to Seattle tonight. Knowing I shouldn’t really spend the money on a bus, I let her go, but ask her to make dinner so we can eat together. As I trim my roses and clean up my garden I start to feel better. Then she calls me to come in and have dinner, when I get inside she’s back in her room packing and no dinner in sight. So I start pulling food ideas out of the refrigerator and call her to the kitchen. Ten minutes later her friend bounces in. I go out to the van to find out how they have made room for her, the mom tells me their daughter is going to sit on the floor. My heart sinks, I wouldn’t let my daughter travel without a seat belt. But the mom reassures me that they do it all the time when they travel. Emily is smiling and chatting with the friend sitting next to her on the seat with her seatbelt strapped on. Zooey reassures me too. I don’t express my concern at their choice and wave cheerfully like I mean it as they drive off.

Thanksgiving Train Ride

 --- to Portland

Train food isn’t what it used to be when I was a child. Hot meals were served on white linen tablecloths, on china plates, in the dining room. Although to be fair, I’m on the Cascade 530 from Vancouver, BC to Portland, not a long distance train. But the snack bar is unworthy of being called a bistro as it serves slim portions of teriyaki rice, practically meatless turkey sandwiches, okay chicken salad served on plastic and probably lackluster coffee.

            When we headed out this morning an inch of snow had already accumulated on the ground. I took a deep breath before driving to the station. The roads to the station were dry yesterday and it was snowing so hard and fast I didn’t think it would have frozen back on the roads already. Once we were on the train, I enjoyed watching the white snow swirling outside our windows.

            The train was a half hour late crossing the Canadian border. Larry, the overly talkative conductor, told us the time won’t be made up. Although at the rollicking speed it is going, it seems like a possibility. A very tan man with light blue eyes and a white blond hair wearing a smart looking canvas shirt and jeans stopped with his daughter to watch the 18-month old girl across from us twist and whine as her parents entertain her with puppets. The couple in front of me, especially the man, has found a willing audience in a mid-thirish looking woman with long, long dark brown hair, wearing a black shirt, skinny black jeans and brown boots with stud patterning. He tells her: “I grew up with strong women, a different paradigm.” Strong women —a different paradigm? So the common paradigm is weak women? Eventually we leave our families, isn’t it possible we gain other views that overshadow the original ideas? Although, it does seem difficult to overcome some of the ideas that my parents passed on to me like prejudice. I’m not sure where my father stood on it, but my mother is racist and sometimes I hear her voice in my head saying something awful and I want that voice to shut up.

We’ve stopped at a small red brick train station, red brick sidewalks and Spanish tile roof. The large lettering says it is Centralia. A genuine Americana small town that has a walkable main street, the Olympic Club Hotel, and an old white painted brick Shell gas station. Then we pass the freeway overpass ripping through the town, destroying the image.

Emily’s friends, including Colton and Drew, have texted her a Happy Thanksgiving. Katy, says Happy Thanksgiving to one of the beautiful people I know?

The little girl across the aisle is quite busy. The grandmother keeps trying to pacify her, she’s following her down the aisle right now, but she has been the one to rock her to sleep. No one has gotten up and walked her down the aisle, it always seemed that walking used to work with Emily, or is that a false memory? Now the grandmother left, she set the little girl into her seat across from her parents who are clapping and making faces at her.  Imagine having people that determined to entertain you.

The train ride back from Portland

We are returning from our quick visit to Portland. Bunny held court last night. As we left today, Mom said, “I thought he’d changed.” But I didn’t think so; it takes more than one gloomy doctor appointment for people to change. And when I asked him on the way to the restaurant he told me that he’d seen a different doctor had given him a better prognosis, from the perspective of an electrician vs. a plumber.  Mom and Aunt ML didn’t stay long; it wasn’t possible to say much to mom. I didn’t know how to avoid the conversation in his living room since we were staying at his house, in his bedroom and he picked us up— it seemed like I should pay the courtesy of listening to him. Although his daughter told him, twice, to give the Reader’s Digest version of the story, which I thought was a good idea. He was telling the four stories of how Sajawaja saved the Lewis and Clark expedition. Also he’d had quite a bit to drink so what do you owe a drunk? Would he even remember the next morning if I were rude the night before?

We are flying down the tracks now, swaying back and forth through the darkness as if an evil being were after us. It’s only 5 o’clock but neither Emily nor I got enough sleep last night and we’re tired. I didn’t sleep well because Bunny has no curtains in his room, so there was light pouring in to the room and I can’t sleep well in so much light. My heart pumps in beat with the clickety

Mom commented on how she didn’t always pay attention to ML because she’d gotten so illogical. I realized that I did the same thing to Mom to some degree too because she’s gotten hard of hearing and isn’t always following a conversation when she asks questions. In the next generation, Emily gets impatient with me when I don’t hear her because of background noise or she’s turned away from me when she speaks. Understanding doesn’t always make for sympathy.

I realized that the Moka Joe coffee, the hazelnuts, and certainly not the lumpy chocolate-raspberry sauce that I’d brought as thank you gifts for Bunny, weren’t gourmet enough for him. I’d forgotten that despite his vulgar drinking, he fancies himself a knowledgeable chef. So I gave Ross the gleaned hazelnuts, which he appreciated. He doesn’t drink coffee, so I gave it to Becky and took the sauce home with me. I bought Bunny a bottle of wine at the restaurant where we ate lunch.  Ross will give it to him, he promised me he would take it home if Bunny made a disparaging comment about it.

Ross and I had a humorous, but bizarre conversation at lunch. Topping each other over recent tragedies. We told him about the woman slamming into the teenager while was she texting. He told us about looking down the street and seeing cars that had slid around the road. He crept down the road, but slid into the cars, missing the husband who jumped out of his way, but pushing the car in front into the wife. Then he told us about a man who had road rage and through out a woman friend’s dog, we told him about the Chihuahua that we saw running down the road after he was tossed out of a car that rolled over. He told us about some kids who had burned down their school, we told him that there had been an accidental fire leaving only the shell of Whatcom Middle School. Since children had burned the school in San Jose, we added about the fire that middle school children had started, burning down the old shopping mall in Lynden. Laughter worked to heal the fear of so many incidents happening recently to young people in Bellingham. Even David, Becky’s husband had mentioned the young Western student who disappeared, his body found later in the bay. Mom kept asking Emily what we were laughing about, and when she explained, why it was funny. Who knows? It might not be to Ross and I in a later conversation. As I told her good bye at the station, my eyes welled up, I was suddenly aware of how fragile she is, she’s 88-years old. I can’t take seeing her again for granted. I need to be more careful.

I just walked up and down the station sidewalk in Seattle, the conductor announced that we arrived early and wanted us to pass on the information. I jumped out of the car to shake out the stiffness and was told we were leaving at 1850. Okay, I’ll have to do the math to figure out the time. I walked into another car to check out whether or not when you flush the toilet it goes directly onto the tracks. For extra measure, I washed my hands too. Then I dashed outside to clarify whether or not the water goes directly onto the tracks. It looked like the soapy hand washing water was emptying on to the tracks, but I can’t confirm the rumor that the toilet water is flushed onto the tracks. When I go back to my seat I spy the man who sat in front of us going to Portland, educating the woman across from him, is in front of us again, he’s quiet this trip. When I got back to our seat, Emily told me couple of men got in to a rowdy fight. The conductor is standing, blocking the aisle looking authoritative; he told them if they didn’t settle down, he’d throw them off the train. His stance says that he will. And I missed the excitement during my water drainage experiment.

Emily hopped off the train for a short walk. When Michael was eight-years old and Matthew and I got off the train in Montana, I asked Michael what he would do if we missed the train and he said, he wouldn't worry, he’d just get off in Spokane. What a sophisticated child! He’d been to Spokane before and knew the cousins that would greet him, but he was so calm.

Emily and I watched the movie Ondine the rest of the trip so I quit writing. We arrived back to flooding rain.

Paintings and Dancing

November 5

Tonight Emily and I went to the Smithsonian exhibit at the Lightcatcher Museum: “1934: A New Deal for Artists.” Artists were commissioned during the depression to show America. Some uppity eyes have seen these same paintings because FDR hung thirty-two of these in the White House.

One of the most striking paintings was of a young African-American girl staring into the viewer’s eye as she sat in front of a red checked tablecloth, her dress casually pulled up showing the garters on her stockings. Her dress like one I’ve seen in pictures of my mother, and Shirley Temple, at that age in the 1930s, light green with tucks draped from the shoulder and a white collar trimmed in lace. I didn’t realize girls so young wore garters.

There were stylistic pictures of industry, especially of factories and changing cities. New buildings tall and gleaming towered about older buildings, showing the painter’s pride in the building progress that was happening during the times. The paintings show people in similar circumstances of today, men trudging off to work in jobs they aren’t accustomed to doing. Long lines at food banks.

Often the paintings represent pride in what is being built. But when I pass all the empty buildings on Cornwall, Sunset Square, it doesn’t look like we need new buildings. I believe we need to rethink, re-imagine our cities. At least during the depression the cities were walkable and cars hadn’t taken over. We hadn’t polluted our oceans. It’s hard for me to believe that I live in a time where libraries and schools, the park service, don’t have the funding they need. Although I believe my daughter is getting a good education, probably better than what she would have gotten in the 1930s, I worry about her future. I find it alarming that voters voted to cut back government revenue, that the mad cries of the tea party want to cut back government services. Who will pay for the safety net?

In one picture at the exhibit, the older red brick buildings were being torn down. Another painting was of a gleaming white underpass painted over a photograph, another of the Golden Gate Bridge under construction. Rich red brown hills looming in front of green fields, rustic mail boxes representing the new rural mail service.  A claustrophobic red brown painting of a man with a pneumatic drills under the ground in a gold mine, his chest sweaty from the hot, dirty work. A panther in a lush tropical forest, his black fur against a bright red flower in the deep green forest. Two monkeys in the jungle – representing the Brooklyn Zoo in New York. A group of people recording at a radio station, including an exceptionally pretty woman with manacled hair.  Many of the artists had similar bold, colorful styles, rolling shapes. A group of colorful ice skaters in snowy Central Park. In some paintings the dark, somber colors suggested the distress of the times, so similar to our own.

We dashed out of the exhibit after an hour to see “Five” the Bellingham Community Dance Theater production for its fifth year. The dancers from the production I’d been in, “In the Context of Life,” were dancing. The dancing was sensational. The dances ranged from light hearted to intense to funny to fascinating. The women’s bodies moving gracefully, angularly; they moved on the floor, over each other, flying through the air into each other’s arms, over, under around each other weaving in and out like poetry. Either I haven’t seen any modern dance before that was to my taste or my taste has changed to enjoy watching modern dance. Emily enjoyed it as well.

At intermission a woman who had seen “In the Context of Life” told me my piece was her favorite, that I was beautiful and she loved it ! Imagine that. I thought my piece a bit drab compared to the others. I exclaimed my astonishment to Emily when we got back to our seat and she leaned over and kissed me and told me that I w as beautiful. It was a magical moment that stilled the world for me.

It is two different experiences watching a dance and being in one. How I felt about being in the dance varied from night to night. The experience subtly changed me into being more who I want to be. Pam told me all the hard throwing herself on the floor has taken a toll on her body so she was only in one fanciful piece with Angela. They wore black wigs and black and white dresses, twins from different mothers. Vanessa, who was so saucy and playful in the community dance, was intense and athletic. If I hadn’t spent so much time watching her in the other dances, I wouldn’t have recognized her. Ella seemed the most like I’d seen her in the pieces of “In the Context of Life.” The evening uplifted me.

Lesson from a Doctor

Lessons from a doctor

On Thursday, a client had two doctor appointments.  I brought along my knitting so I could knit as we waited. Unfortunately, for my knitting, the first appointment was with an eye doctor who kept turning off the lights as I was trying to pick up stitches around the neckline. The doctor told my client his eyes were as good as they could be after the surgery to repair the damage from diabetes, My eyes widened when I heard that, the client had told me his eyes were damaged during the Vietnam War from Agent Orange, so he was “owed” treatment. After we got into the car my client asked me what the doctor had said about his eyes improving. I repeated what the doctor had told him,  his eyes would never improve; they’d been too damaged by his diabetes. He wistfully replied that he had hoped to ride his Harley again, but now he couldn’t. He’s been a difficult client to work with, but he looked so crestfallen I felt sorry for him. I suggested that he could still ride behind someone, would that be all right for him? He said it would be okay, but I knew it wouldn’t be. He didn’t want pity so I let him be with his thoughts.

We got to the second appointment twenty minutes early, I pulled out my knitting, but before I could set up, the nurse was ready for us. Who ever heard of doctors being early?

I’ve been frustrated with the health care system and the way some people abuse it. I suppose in part because I haven't had health insurance most of my adult life so I can't afford to see a doctor often. I have elderly clients that go into see doctors whenever they want. This client decided he didn't like the wait at Interfaith Community Clinic so he made an appointment at the Senior Health Services to get a new primary physician. He went on a day I wasn't there. But I picked up the phone for a reminder call for his follow up visit. So I told them I would talk to John to see if he really wanted to change physicians. He didn't so I canceled the followup appointment. When I first started working for him, I found a stockpile of pills that Medicaid had paid for. I took more than 25 bottles of outdated pills and dumped them at the drugstore bin. Despite his protests, I scooped out a cupboard full of lancets that he never used to check his diabetes and took them to the community health clinic for other patients to use. But the doctor at this appointment, a diabetes specialist, upended my thoughts.

After looking at the results of his tests showing that his blood sugar had way up, he talked to the client for twenty minutes trying to figure out how the client could remind himself to take his medication, even asking me put red balloons above his bed. Suddenly, the doctor said, “ I’m resigning from your case. I like you, but I need to be treating people who I can help. Unless you go into an assisted living situation, I can’t help you.” He told the client that he could come back if he went to an assisted living facility. The doctor said he would notify the primary physician of his decision as he walked out the door. I was astonished. Most doctors just let him keep coming. As we walked to the car, the client scolded me for telling the doctor that he wasn’t taking his medication. I told him it wasn’t fair not to give the doctor the correct information. If he let the doctor think he was taking his medication, the doctor might prescribe the wrong dosage. The word fair hung in the air. What is fair about life?

When we got back to his trailer, he asked me to show him what medication he was to take.  So I explained the Mediset to him, again. I asked him if I could put up a sign to remind him, but he told me he didn’t need it. I wondered what he’d remember over the weekend. He hadn’t eaten breakfast, but he didn’t want me to fix him anything. I checked the refrigerator, he had a Meals on Wheels meal, I didn’t know how old, and a dried up pizza. He had hamburger patties in his freezer that I knew he would cook so I left.

The doctor’s straightforward statement has stayed with me. I was as dazed as my client walking out of his office. The directness was powerful. Of course life isn’t that clean, the primary physician still has to deal with him not taking his medication. I keep reporting the irregularities and neglect that I witness with the client. One day after washing his clothes, as I pulled out his clothes, I found at least 15 wet, one hundred dollar bills in the washtub. After scooping up the money and placing it on the shelf above the washer to dry, I was shaking to have that much money in my face. I called my supervisor, she called his case manager, he is not to have that much cash and be on the program that pays for my services. I've filed his bank statements showing that he has enough money in Canada to disqualify him from Medicaid, but after I call my supervisor, and she calls his case manager, nothing happens. I don’t know what else to do. He needs help, I need work, so I show up.

Others' Creativity

I’ve been feeding my creativity by enjoying others creativity. Friday night, September 29, I went to a poetry reading, which Judy Kleinberg opened with a reading of some of her wonderful poems. I especially liked her poem “theft of the pomegranate” about Persephone and the images of sensual red. Peter Ludwin and Lorraine Healy also read. Lorraine Healy’s Argentinean expressiveness captivated me. I haven't tried writing much poetry.

Saturday night I heard blues singers Ruthie Foster and Eric Bibb at Mount Baker Theater. I worked the member’s pre-show reception. I was taking pictures for Emily Weiner. So when Eric peeked in to listen to what his manager said, I couldn’t resist asking him for a picture. He looked dapper in a purple shirt and hat. I wish I had the vocabulary to discuss music in a meaningful way, other than just saying I liked it, especially Ruthie’s sister’s violin, more fiddling. I’ve had violins on my mind.  Mine is tucked away in my closet, I wish it were easier to play and make it sound good. Today I stopped by Dorothy who is a luthier - imagine being able to make a violin? And asked her for an interview for my radio show. She’s been battling cancer and told me that the one thing that was important in life was love that we are here to give love and create love.

For my own creativity I’ve been editing two short romance pieces and I’m still working on Emily’s sweater. I had hoped to knit some at work this week, I did get started on a scarf, but Wednesday when I was working with a woman in a wheelchair, she kept slipping down and I was afraid she would slide right on to the floor so I pulled up my chair and spent my creativity keeping her up. More than once I was definitely not feeling creative as I crawled around the floor to get her slippers back on her feet. 

But it helps to keep thinking of the lines of Judy's poetry, 

"crunches a single red jewel 

between her teeth

crimson light flooding her mouth"

It puts me in a red mood.