Friday, February 26, 2010Tonight's picture was taken in March of 2009. Mattie is in the hallway of the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit. He just completed a race with Meg (one of Mattie's favorite childlife interns, and his racing buddy!). Mattie used his walker, and literally walked the entire fifth floor of the Hospital! His prize for winning the race, was a gold medal, as you can see pictured around his neck. These racing moments were a riot to watch and participate in. Meg hammed it up, and really worked hard at encouraging Mattie to keep walking to beat her in the race. Naturally Mattie ALWAYS won, and in the process he was beaming and inspired to race more. My joke to Anna (Mattie's physical therapist) and Meg was that I was going to take them home with me because Mattie was far less inspired to move his body without their presence at home.
Poem of the day: Memories by Lana Golembeski
All that remains are the memories
Of your laugh, your smile, and you.
Faded photographs remind me of happier times
I look at your pictures
I touch your face
Your hair
But it isn’t you.
Those are just pictures that bring back the
Memories
I can see your love of life
Your love of friends
Your love of living
In each picture of your life.
But those pictures end
Too soon for someone like you.
I long to touch your beautiful hair
To hear your wonderful laugh
To give you a big hug
To hear your stories of your life.
I want to take you shopping once again
And to lavish you with silly
and wonderful things.
I have no one to spoil anymore;
No one to call me “mom;”
No one to tell me that they love me.
And I long to hold you once again and
To whisper in your ears how much I love you…until the end of time.
The winds are absolutely horrible in DC today. So much so that even flights are being cancelled. Though I am not fond of the wind, the wind does produce one thing that I absolutely love. It brings to life Mattie's wind chimes. They were outside twinkling away, as if to be singing a message to us. I think even Patches misses Mattie. I have found her the last couple of days on top of Mattie's bed, sitting on a pile of his clothes. Typically (prior to Mattie's illness) Patches would go to Mattie's room, jump on his bureau and look out the window. But she is no longer interested in the windows, all she seems focused on is sitting vigil on Mattie's bed. I think animals are much smarter than we give them credit to be. Patches senses something is just not right in our home, and I believe she is sitting with Mattie's things to understand exactly what has happened to our family.
I went to visit Mary (Ann's mom) today. Ann is away on a Girl Scout skiing trip with her family, and when Ann goes away, I try to spend time with Mary. The image of Mary's roommate, Florence, has been bothering me since yesterday. Florence is very frail, has trouble breathing, and has NO family. No one ever visits her. So before I came to visit Mary, I went out to buy both of them hot soup, bread, and cookies. I was determined to get Florence to eat today, since she usually eats nothing that comes to her room on her food tray. Persistence does pay off. Florence ate everything I brought her and even Mary took notice of this, and seemed happy to see her roommate finally eating real food! It brought me great satisfaction to help Florence, and to let her know that someone out there cares about her.
I spent several hours with Mary and her assistant, Shayla. I did Mary's nails and shared with her my pictures from our Caribbean vacation. Later in the afternoon, Shayla asked to see pictures of Mattie, so I uploaded some pictures for both of them to see on my computer screen. As Shayla pointed out, Mattie looked healthy and happy, and from his pictures no one would have guessed he would have developed cancer and even worse, later died. I could see Mattie's pictures affected Shayla, and then Mary said to me, "I don't know how you live each day." Right! Mary is sharp and astute. This is a question Peter and I ask ourselves each day! The difference between Mary and other people in my life is that Mary has no problem stating the obvious, whereas others may be too frightened to state something so bold. Shayla then asked me how I became friends with Ann. As I explained to Mary and Shayla how Ann and I knew each other and how our friendship grew, I could see Mary beaming. Once a mom, always a mom. All moms like hearing positive and glowing things about their children. Mary was ALL smiles today, and it was very special to see!
Tonight, Peter and I are headed to the Kennedy Center to see Jerry Seinfeld. Ann gave us these tickets, and I suppose the goal is to get us to laugh and forget our problems for a few hours. I will let you know how successful Mr. Seinfeld was at achieving this goal!
I would like to end tonight's posting with a message from my friend, Charlie. Charlie wrote, "I think about aging a lot and how life changes as we get older. Like the subject of death, most of us avoid thinking about how our lives will be as they draw to a close, whether we will be well enough to take care of ourselves or need assistance; will we be alone or cared for? I took a workshop in "end of life" issues and people were asked how would you want to die and most said "no" to cancer or stroke which means that they would continue on to be much like Florence, fragile in old age until finally passing on. It used to be that people lived with their children or relatives in old age (although old age did not go as long) but now aging seniors are isolated from others who are younger (either their families or their communities) and they are dependent on the care (and sometimes kindness) of strangers. Not a happy thought. So given all that, Mary is very lucky to have Ann and you are incredibly kind to add your presence and concern to the care of these seniors at the facility. I know they welcome and appreciate your presence as it has to be terribly hard to be in this situation. I hope the many kindnesses that you do come to "balance" the scale as you continue to look for a way to live with your grief. I hold you gently in my thoughts."
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