I saw this sign on our walk this morning at the dam. It seemed appropriate for me now. I can stop watching and waiting for what I need to do next for Lee. It is out of my hands and the care he needs now is not at all what I or even the Memory Care Home can do for him.
It will be a couple of weeks before I can see him and only after I make an appointment and he is brought out to where I will be. I will never see his room but know that his favorite cow picture that I painted in 1984 and his television are in there, And as of this morning his recliner.
In that wing they wander in and out of each other’s rooms and yesterday Lee was seen wearing someone’s hat and carrying his stuffed cat under his arm. He is on another medication to keep him from getting overly agitated but having his cat to hold onto helps. It is the process of dementia and they are equipped there to understand and help him.
Here is his view if he gets near a window.
I took the Ankaret Dean basket that I bought at an exhibition in Canada in 1988 and kept in our living room ever since. It was what I took to his room in Memory Care for his sticks if he continued to collect them. He did not but put all his small rocks in it with feathers and some postcards. When an attempt was made by him or cleaning staff to pick it up, it became unraveled.
I decided to put it on the trail for me to continue to put feathers and rocks inside. I can see it from my studio.
It has been pushed into this old stump by the trail so with the rocks for additional weight it will be hard to knock loose. Come fall I will fill it with the beautiful leaves he and I found last year.
Our son, Patrick will return home this Saturday. He has been so helpful and fun to have around. I will miss our “board” meals.
Speaking of meals, I am going out to dinner tonight for the first time in almost two years. We are meeting friends at a local brewery to eat on the screened porch. I will comb my hair and maybe even try a bit of lipstick. Earrings too. It will feel so strange to be sitting with no mask, eating, having tacos and a beer with other people around. It will give me a chance to practice being sociable.
This morning I did more drawings of daisies and coreopsis growing among the weeds by the shed. My yard man is woefully overdue.
Til later…