That Strange Shape-shifting Time

Sitting in that gigantic metal airbus which, using any rational reasoning, should not be able to overcome earth’s gravitational pull much less fly over miles and miles of checkerboard farmland, I settled in and begin the time shift. Not the shift of time from Mountain Standard to Eastern Standard, but rather the shift in mental time from oldest daughter in a family that was started a long time ago and now exists with missing pieces to the my current mental time of being a wife, mother and grandmother whose days are filled with activities far from that former family.

My father, whose gentle demeanor and small stature would never fit the imposing image of Patriarch, is now ninety-two and a half. His walk is slow and careful, and his hearing is down to 30%, but his outlook and general health are miraculous. With pressures from his “busy-body” daughter-in-law and his first born (myself) he is adapting to some new digital hearing aides. The cacophony of daily noise is slowly being filtered by newly awakened neurons in the brain. The buttons and dials that rest above his ears are tiny and hard to identify for the awkward and numbed fingers of a 92-year-old, and yet he still tries to adjust. They actually seem to be working as I had several long if somewhat innocuous conversations with him. My father was never one to exchange deep thoughts, therefore, it is mostly talk about the “old-days” or what is currently happening.

During most of the week I was at my first brother’s house. Dad was far more active than he had been while staying at my youngest brother’s house, which had been his new home since Mom died over a year ago. This second move was necessitated by the unhappiness of my other SIL who after a year of living with Dad was requiring more privacy. (My judgement was that she was totally being selfish, but that is another story.) So the other SIL and brother have taken him in. We walked several blocks in the neighborhood each day, walked around Walden Pond outside of Boulder and elsewhere. We could see his strength and balance improving each day and he even commented on this himself. His gardening, which he loves, was limited in this new place due to the width of the vegetable beds. Still, he enjoyed watching the squirrels steal the strawberries as he sat at the kitchen table.

The next door neighbor had a sewer problem which also became my father’s new feature show. Since he was in construction years ago, watching the work of the back hoe and the activity of the laborers became another fascinating pursuit.

One memory I have from when I was a very small girl was watching John Wayne movies on TV with my father. I had purchased the John Wayne/John Ford DVD set for his birthday a while back and we watched one of those movies together while I was there.

I am involved in that traditional race where we try to fill our parent’s lives with activities and exercise to extend their life span...that race ahead of inevitable death.

Strangely, it was not unbearably sad to leave at the end of the week this time, but perhaps it was because I did not allow my mind to wander to those places in the future. I was concentrating only on the moment.