Life story

Sister L, Daughter A, Son E, me
the night before the funeral

I found one of my many scribbled notes just now. It's dated February 7, 2014, maybe the very day Mom moved into St. John's. We were about to go to a meeting with the big head nurse for an evaluation, to see if Mom qualified to live independently or should be in the assisted living section. She was crying, she said a quiet prayer, said she was afraid, said, "I wish Daddy was here. This is so hard to do alone."

She knew no one. Her AA home was empty and on the market. Her stuff was all over.

She did qualify for independent living and they were having her stay in a guest room for a few days while a better, bigger apartment was fixed up for her. She wandered the halls, trying to strike up conversations. A man who lived down the hall from her was often in the corridor escorting his blind wife to meals. She tried them several times, but they were cool to her, too preoccupied with their own problems to say more than hello. She visited the one person she knew, Samantha, the nurse in the little clinic upstairs, several times a day, until the nurse said she was busy, Mom really couldn't just hang out there.

I was blind to the depth of her need. I thought we could just plug her in there and she would be fine. She called me again and again and I came when I could, but sometimes I had to say no and fight down my guilt. So most of the time she was alone, out in the halls, bravely trying to connect, never giving up. Even now I don't know what I should have done, short of bringing her to my home, but JV and I would have been gone all day, and she would have been even more alone.

She declined quickly. Her walking became more unsteady. She had quit cooking back in Ann Arbor, and so she ate cereal or heated soup or noodles in the microwave. She called and called and called. Within a few weeks, even before the nicer apartment was ready, they moved her to Canterbury -- she called it "Cranberry" -- assisted living. The residents ate together around big tables there, and she thrived and made friends with Dar and Carol. But over the months Mom declined and couldn't keep up. Dar and Carol were good on their computers and did things like send their DNA for testing. They  enthused about their heritages. They included Mom less often. She was hurt and, really, I don't think she had ever suffered a social failure that stung like that.

Then she fell and broke her hip and moved to the full care wing.

Before the end, everybody we passed in the hall knew her and greeted her, everybody said how sweet she was. One woman said she must have been "a great beauty." They would take her hand and she would smile and make a whispered, half-articulate response. And at the end, the chapel was full, and if she could have seen it, she would have been pleased. But she would have tried to hide her pleasure, because it was better to be modest.