Still Alive

Yes, I’m still alive. It has occurred to me that some readers may have taken my long silence as an indication that things were going badly up here on the crazy farm. As far as my personal and spiritual health and well-being that is not the case–if I am fit to judge myself. The last several months have been, for me, perhaps the best since I have come to live with, and care for, Grandma and Grandpa. That is not to say it has become easy street. There are good days, and bad days, and the health of both Grandma and Grandpa continues to decline. I guess a change is that I have come to feel that I have finally found a small bit of equilibrium in a world continually out of balance.

Perhaps this is all just a set-up for the next event that will send everything pin-wheeling into a tail-spin again. In any case, for the present I feel that I am not so much just a rag flapping in the wind of the crisises blowing through the lives of the people around me. As a result of that, I finally have been able to take stock of my own life, and–with what little time I have to do as I please–set a course and labor toward goals. So, I haven’t been in the pits of despair–I’ve been busy.

Many months ago I learned a particular fact about my current life: Beyond the regular routine required for sustaining normal daily life, I can only work on one thing that I wish to do each day. Depending on the day I may only be able to work a half hour, an hour, or maybe two hours. On a rare day (like a good Saturday) I may somehow manage to do two things. On a bad day (like most Fridays, which is grocery day) I don’t find time to do anything that I wish to accomplish. But as a general rule I can only work on one particular thing for myself each day, so if I am wise I think very carefully about what is most important that I wish to see done each day.

And so for some time writing a post has not been chosen as the one thing I will do in a day. It isn’t that I have been swallowed in some swamp of despondency, or some other bad thing that perhaps some of you have wondered. There are posts I would like to write–but then, there are a lot of things I would like to accomplish also. So I have simply been busy doing other things.

As it is the new year, and things have happened, and are happening, I thought to make time for a quick update.

Grandpa

Grandpa still has intermittent problems with chest congestion, but as it comes and goes I presently don’t make much of it. Otherwise, physically he remains much as when I last wrote.

As far as his mental health is concerned, it is beginning to feel like he is starting to turn some type of corner. I’m not sure exactly what, and I’m not saying we’re going to be around that corner in a month or something. But it does feel like his mental symptoms are starting to progress to another level and the nature of things are in the midst of a colossal shift. He is growing increasingly demanding and needy and is more often in a state of mental shambles. Right now, as I type, he is sitting on the couch calling names–mostly for “Mother” (Grandma). He isn’t calling because he wants anything real–it is just what he does increasingly, now. He wants. If you answer he may say nothing at all, only to call out again in thirty seconds. Or he may spit out gibberish.

I could go on at some length, but I will leave writing about Grandpa’s furthering condition for some other post.