Dispatches From Hellpeckersville- Missing Mom redux

Four years ago I wrote a piece for Chronic Tonic about missing my Mom, who is still here, by the way. In that time she has deteriorated a great deal. She no longer enjoys teevee, or knows what playing cards are for, let alone her poker hands. Hell, she doesn’t even really know me, but she does I’m something to her, she still loves me, and I her. But she’s been keeping me pretty busy so without further ado, I am re-running that piece, for those who may have missed it.

I miss my Mom.  I miss her so bad I can’t even tell you, in fact, most of the time I can’t even talk about it because she is sitting right there.  She is still alive and in pretty good physical health, but the Mom I knew, the Mom who brought me up and helped me become who I am is gone.

Unspecified dementia.  It’s robbing her of who she is, her memory, her cognitive abilities, and even though she is on medication it is just progressing so damn fast.

Born in 1936, the youngest of nine in a close-knit Irish Catholic family, Mom was as spoiled as it was possible to be in those times in a poor family. She was a skinny kid and they called her Spike. She dropped out of school in tenth grade to go to work as a telephone operator, to bring some money home for her and the family, which was just what they did back then.

She married my Dad when she was just 18 and they lived with my Grandparents for almost 14 years before they had a home of their own. That was not unusual, most of her siblings did the same, lived at home with their families until they could afford to go out and get a home of their own. They grew up that way. My Grandparents had a big house and it was usually full. Mom was brought up in a home where people felt welcome and comfortable enough to come on in and make themselves at home.

When Mom and Dad bought the house next door they gave us the same kind of home. Our house was never “House Beautiful,” but it was always a place I could drag home half a dozen friends and take over the dining room table to build a puzzle or play a game and often Mom would join in. She was never “Mrs. Anybody”, they all called her Mom. When I was older and worked until 11:00 at night Mom wanted me in by 2:00. That was fine; I was always home by then, just usually not alone. Mom would be up, reading, when me and four or five of my friends would come traipsing through the door. Sometimes she would get right down on the floor and play Atari with us. Mom could drop the “F” bomb if that game pissed her off bad enough too. Cracked us up!

        The trend continued with her grandchildren, she was Mom-Mom to all of their friends. During my nephew’s senior year in High School he was in danger of failing and I was at a bad place in my first marriage. He and I moved in with Mom and Dad. She thought it was for the best. Not only did he graduate, but we gave him a great senior year. He was able to host a houseful of friends for Friday night poker games, pay-per-view wrestling, and I tutored him in between school and his job. None of that was going to happen for him living with his Dad and Step-Mom. His whole gang stopped in to show Mom-Mom their prom get-ups and to get their pictures taken. Everybody loved Mom-Mom.

        Mom could tell stories. She could tell you family stories from before she was born. She knew about every skeleton in every closet and she could recount events in enough detail that it gave you a feeling of the history of the time and place. Nobody ever started rolling their eyes and thinking-there she goes again, no, they would ask questions and egg her on to tell those more. Even if one of them had heard it before it was likely they would elbow somebody in the ribs and say, “Ah, this is a good one!” That’s all gone now.

I got my love of reading from her.  One of my earliest memories is seeing my Mom curled up on the corner of the couch reading.  Along with the toys and games, she made sure we had a stack of books under the tree every year at Christmas.

         Mom thought that if we were old enough to understand what we were reading and had interest in it, we should be able to read a book once she was done with it.  I remember in eighth grade my English teacher looking down at the novel on the corner of my desk (I believe it was The Women’s Room by Marilyn French) and asking me in a disdainful manner if my mother knew I was reading this book?  Oh, I wish you could have seen her face when I told her that I sincerely hoped so, as she had given it to me.  

        Mom doesn’t really read books anymore; she can’t keep a hold of the thread. She reads the paper, mostly for the TV listings.  She puts a check next to the shows she likes then later I write her a list of the shows and what channel they are on for the night.

        She gave me a love of games; all kinds of board games, and cards, cards, cards.  Mom didn’t believe in letting a kid win either.  If you ever wanted to see some dead evil glee, you should have seen my Mom as she said GIN! To an 11 year old.  No mercy what so ever.  If you beat Mom at cards it was a pretty good day.  We had grand and glorious game marathons during the holidays, with Mom loving it every bit as much as we did.  She taught us to play fair, be good sports when we lost and not to be big jackasses when we won.  My oldest son asked her if she would play Yahtzee with us the other day.  She said Honey, I don’t know if I remember how to play that.  I told her it would come back to her and that I would keep score for everybody.  She still knows her poker hands.

         My love of politics?  My never ending need to know, to be informed, and to talk about it?  Both of my parents fostered that.  I mostly talked to her.  We had a lively dinner table at our house.  We would discuss the evening news, the issues of the day, and we kids were free to offer our opinions and dive right in.  After dinner at my house one Sunday when I had a friend over he told me that my family was weird for fighting at Sunday dinner.  Fighting?  That wasn’t fighting, that’s called a discussion, and don’t you have those at your house?  He just shook his head.  Well, I was shaking mine too.  I had been to supper at other friend’s houses where the highlight of the conversation was passing the peas, and I thought that was weird.

        The night President Obama was elected my Mom cried with me and said and you helped.  Mom watched my kids while I went to a phone bank to volunteer for the campaign.  She was proud of me.  I was the first one in the family to get involved and volunteer since her Dad.  Sometimes she remembers that.  She remembers that she loves Joe Biden.

        She is not so bad that she can’t function on a daily basis, she can.  She forgets where she sets things down, what day it is, she repeats herself a lot, and lately she has started to ask questions that scare the shit out of me.  Is she my daughter?  No Mom, that’s your granddaughter.  Whose granddaughter?

         OMG, OMG, OMG, OMG!  If this is slowing it down how bad would it be without the meds? I know it is only going to get worse.  I’m going to have to find a way to get through it, and I will.  She is not the Mom I grew up with and helped make me who I am, but she is still here.  The Mom I miss, the Mom I grew up with would be horrified if she knew about this.  I am so damn grateful that she doesn’t, that is the one and only up side I can see.

          Is it Thursday?

          Yeah, Mom, it’s Thursday”

Like I said, that was four years ago. She still asks what day it is, but those other questions that used to scare me? I had no idea how scary it would get, how heartbreaking. Honestly.