Within a couple weeks of hip surgery, my mother was doing physical therapy at a skilled nursing facility. c 2010 B.F. Newhall
By Barbara Falconer Newhall
Ten reasons why I’m finding it impossible to write about my 92-year-old mother, even though she’s all I can think about right now:
- I love my mother, and I don’t know how to write about that.
- My mother is a pain in the butt, and I don’t know how to write about that.
- My brothers can read, and they know about this blog.
- My mother can read. So can all six grandchildren.
- My mother has osteoporosis, dementia and a messed-up stomach. She is losing herself, piece by piece, like dandelion feathers floating off in the wind, and I don’t want to think about that.
- My father is dead. My in-laws, Scott and Ruth, are dead. If my mother dies, there will be no more grown-ups left in my life.
- I don’t want to be the grown-up.
- If my mother can die, anybody can die, me included.
- If I write about my mother I might find out something about myself that I don’t want to know.
- I’d rather grab a Clausthaler, curl up with the afghan that once belonged to my mother-in-law, and watch “House” re-runs. Except I’ve already watched every last one of them in the three months since my mother broke her hip.
© 2010 Barbara Falconer Newhall
