Yesterday, I was a stranger unto my mother, for most, if not all of our visit. We sang and talked of old times, but there was a strong feeling that much of her conversation was just bluffing, and trying to be congenial...she would have acted much the same no matter who was leading her in talk and song. She is snowballing toward catatonia, and all I can do is watch.

Last week, I spoke gently to one of the girls about calling her "McGoo" This week, the girl over-emphasized (you know, too much, too sweet), "I love you, DORIS!" as she left the room, no angle at the head of mom's bed, no pillows at her knees, mom started at the sudden yell, that I knew was done for my benefit. I was really nice about my talk, too. Told them if it made my mom laugh to call everybody "McGoo," then, by all means, continue it, as there is not enough laughter in this world. But they took offense...I should have known...

I wore my sunglasses into the nursing home to shield my migraine eyes from the light and took them off in Mom's room. I walked Jan to her car, came back & they were gone. I know darn well the sassy little aide has them, but was too weary to make an issue out of it. Sweet janitor kid, Dustin & I tore apart the room looking for them, my mother so confused at what we were doing & looking for...I saw the little aide in the hall getting into an isolation gown on my defeated trudge out & she stopped me to "look at my angel wing necklace." She is "giving one just like it to her mother who is dying of cancer, except hers has a diamond in the tip..." she was trying to deflect guilt...I did not feel up to accusations and denials. I just wanted to go home.

Earlier, our favorite nurse had come in while we were waiting for this aide to come and lay Mom down. Norma lay down on Mom's bed for a minute or two, with tears in her eyes. She told us that she had spent the previous night changing her dying husband's medication from Oxycontin over to Morophine, and that it was no easy task, and finally when she left for work this morning his pain was a 3, which was great news to her. End stage cancer. Pre stage Catatonia. And my mother's room mate shied away from our hugs and greetings for the first time, as did Faye, across the hall. And Rita, the bilateral amputee who is very much together in her head, has just lost her second room mate this year. Depression and withdrawal, abounding with the harvest, depending on how and where you look.

It was a tough day. I cried myself to sleep last night, and when I woke up at 6:30 AM, & could not get back to sleep, I found myself crying again. This does not help a migraine that has been flirting with me the better part of a week, so I am venting, and then, trying to move on.

OOOh Dear God in Heaven! It is so hard! Here is that pain in my heart back again as if it had never begun to heal. Well. I have vented. I cannot dwell. What to do? I know it is contributing to the pounding in my head. I'd go for a drive & waste gas, but that's self defeating. Thursday, I just ran from my sister's car to my MD's office to get some medication they were holding for me & ran back & my head thundered from the minor exertion. You are dog-gone if you do, &
dog-gone, if you don't.( I will call my dogs in here to comfort me, maybe!)

At Jan's interview, they asked her what she would do if Mom died, and Jan was on shift or scheduled to come into work that next morning. Jan told me that she got tears in her eyes and said "I honestly do not know what I would do." I did not tell her that I though they worded the question kindly...it would be more accurate to inquire "What will you do when your mom dies, if you are working here?" Because if Jan gets the job, the rest is inevitable...we never know what we will do, except, I will think I will grieve deeply, and then, try to be busy...and pray, not fall prey to yet another debilitating migraine.

I hope we can save the Stream. I hope the $75 posted in donations received by Pioneer in his service notice has amply multiplied.

I hope a great lot of things, but have not the time to go into them now.

Today, I just hope it is a good day for my mother. My sister is interviewing for a job as a receptionist/part time girl Friday at Mom's nursing home. It is too far away for me to consider. She really wanted the job when she applied for it two weeks ago, then as a belated birthday surprise, her husband brought her home the most adorable Beagle puppy. Neither one of them are convinced (in spite of my urging) of the joys of crate training, and seem to figure little Emma Ruthie will be housebroken in another couple of weeks. She called the vet when Emma ate a stray grape. Jan cries a lot for joy, and for worry. Her husband insists "it's just a dog," but to Jan, it is a new baby to go with her other older house trained Beagle, Sally Jo. Jan really does not want the job at the nursing home, anymore. Not right now, anyway. We will meet & visit Mom after her interviews.

So, I best put on my best tie dye and hit the road. I only make the 70 mile round trip visit once a week or so. I've had migraines off and on all week. 2 Zomigs each and every day. Lots of ice. It may ease up, and hide around the corner, but it is always there, still lurking somewhere in my head. Just the cards I have been dealt. My other sister Kathy has Fibromyalgia...she tells me it runs in the same family as the Rhematoid Arthritis that sent my mother to bed some 10 years ago. I dunno if you can have a distant relation of those afflictions occur in your head or what...I have had migraines & severe headaches for as long as I can remember, with no known origin. They just are... So I "gotta know when to fold 'em, know when to walk away, and know when to run".

Today, I'm just easing on down the road with Santana's instrumental & bluesy, easy tunes, wearing my cheap sunglasses indoors & out...this too, eventually shall pass.

Look out Mom, here I come- softly, and quietly with mirrored, dark glasses...Everyone there tells me that I look just like my mother...the great circle of life.

I honestly do not know. I am sick and unemployed. I start Physical Therapy tomorrow & I see a shrink every so often. What is a good sum to donate to blogstream? I do not have a lot, but I can spare a little, but I do not want to be insulting, but I have to be frugal, but the site has meant a great deal to me over the years...gotten myself in some nifty jams, too. cyber adventures... Is it rude to even ask this question around the stream?

cyber politics, cyber manners-I mean who knows this stuff? certainly not I...and is the Blogmaster looking for periodic donations? Geez, I so have to get healthy & get back to work! and I so do not have a clue as to what is needed here...maybe, because I barely have to offer what I fear might be needed here...these are some tough times for us all...

23 days and counting... I am a "border-line anemic," I catch most any virus that comes my way, and Labor Day Bubba brought home a dilly.

I am still so sick from that nasty bug...Sick, sick, sick. Bubba is much more ill than I, even, and Walking Pnuemonia comes to mind for him, as he gets up to go to work each day, and hacks each evening away.

There are so many things I want to say, so many things I need to do, and my fatigue factor hits me below the belt by the noon hour, and if I have accomplished anything the day before, I pay for it dearly, the day after.

I went to the VA shrinks yesterday because I cry all the time lately. I cry at commercials, blogs, TV shows, memories, e mails, angry people who hurt me when they know I do not deserve their anger...I cry a great deal. I was not planning to go, because I felt so bad, but in the nick of time, saw the folly of that reasoning, and snagged a ride with the van the 85 miles up, and the 85 miles back. It wore me to a frazzle. I cried away most of the afternoon away after my return. I detest feeling so weak in so many different ways.

One shrink adjusted my medication. OK...worth a try...anything to stop this crying...I am freaking Bubba out, and he is so much more ill than I...he does not know what to do when my eyes water over, and my heart is so very broken. So, good, lets try this.

The other shrink, I dunno. We had to agree to disagree. He told me I was mad at myself. I do not think so. I think I have been attacked & abandoned unfairly, when all I have ever done is shown love and kindness. I did not think I was mad at all, just hurt. A great lot. But by the time I got home, I was so fatigued,and, belatedly, I was mad. I have done nothing to deserve these attacks-what? I do not love enough all of a sudden? I do not fawn and admire to suit? It was the fatigue talking, and this morning, I am somewhat more complacent, but no less hurt, and no less sick. I coughed until I threw up twice, and I do not smoke...anything, anymore.

"Oooh, she may get weary, young girls they do get weary, wearing that same old funky (tie dye) dress..."

There are things I want to do, things I feel that need to be done, but few agree with me, and most agree, myself included, that this is not the time. I am on the defensive. I will say something that will be misunderstood, when all I want to say is, "Don't you love me, anymore?"

No, I want to say more than that, but I am sick, sick, sick, and I fear that I will get it all wrong. The timing is wrong. But time has a way of getting away from you. I fear too much time will pass.

I dwell. I have to stop this. It is bugging me so.

My head aches-nothing new there, not what I would call a news flash. But it does not lessen the pain... the fact that it is nothing new.

"Leave them alone, and they will come home, wagging their tails behind them..." do you really think so? I do not. I fear not. I want to fix this. My shrink says I want to control this. Oh...I never thought of myself as a control freak, and he says, "We all are to a certain extent. You cannot control this person's anger. You have to let him be angry. You have to trust that you will not lose him."

I can do that, I think. I think that I can trust him. He is not angry with me, says the shrink, he is angry with the stock market, the politics, things in his life that only he can control. Things in his life that are out of his control". I have to control the things in my life that only I can control.

I CAN control these tears. I can start taking Mucinex again and get a handle on these coughing fits. I can rest more & drink more fluids. I can concentrate on the sunny side of life instead of those who hurt me so callously. Brush out my dogs. Clean my house. Love those who allow me to love them. Control what bugs me. Work on controlling all kinds of bugs. I can do that. I have to do that. Right now, I have to think of me, first, because thinking the way that I was thinking, was, well, it was stinking thinking. It got me nada, nowhere, zilch, just more pain. And some occasional righteous outrage-which feels nasty to me, I am not the type.

"It's a beautiful morning (Ah ha!) I think I'll go outside for awhile, and just smile..."

because, if I work on it and do not let things bug me, that is something that I can do...for a little while at least.

Looking over the Stream, I spy, with my little i:

Ice miraculously preserved from 1937.

A quizzical peevish optimist.

A missing silver moon.

A long lost lad suddenly returning, and shoveling it on thick.

A maddening midnight insight to our troubled economy's money madness.

Raindrops and butterflies that are breaking my heart.

Haulin' Oat's out of Little Ricky's mother's place.

A second chance to breathe in the sea salt in the air near Dallas.

Taps for a mill brother lost in 5/4 of the time.

Healing apple butter from the Creek, in the midst of autumnal glory.

Persistent faith zooming in a Disney auto. abounding in hope.

Echoes of aging (part two)

Mother in skirt knows best.

Lookin' into homespun Celestial inspiration.

Man of La Mancha tilting at windmills, scaring off good folk.

Frustrated wit trying to fathom the unfathomable.

Eye popping art pointing out the view.

Lost sweet rat on the Ohio.

A wonderful world playing "Skip to My Lou, My Darling!"

A tenacious, loyal pup, fighting the good awesome fight, tooth and nail.

Daisy, Daisy, give me you answer do, where are you?

A Palin supporter who cannot spell Sarah or 1/2 of the angry insults contained in the pro-Palin blog-how funny is that?