Tonight's picture was taken in November of 2008. As is typical at most hospitals, if you are stable enough to be discharged close to a holiday.... they do! So after Mattie's second limb salvaging surgery, he was released to recover at home for Thanksgiving. I will NEVER forget Thanksgiving 2008. It was sheer hell. Mattie was miserable, in constant and severe pain, he was traumatized to touch and sound, and I frankly felt 100% helpless. Because Mattie was not allowed upstairs, we had a hospital bed, commode, and IV pole in our living room. As you can see Nurse Patches reported for duty! She was an amazing cat, who knew when her family needed her love and support. Though this photo was taken years ago, I will never forget how overwhelmed, anxious, and stressed I felt. I can't think of anything more devastating than watching your child suffering before your eyes and being unable to make things better.
Quote of the day: I try to do something positive – I socialize more…But deep down I know the truth. An entire world of people can never replace the one that I’ve lost. ~ Ranata Suzuki
This morning was a total nightmare. Each morning, when I get my dad up, I never know what I am going to face. The two consistent things now are that all his bed linens need to be washed and the shower clean up process is horrific. Every day this week, my dad has had enormous bowel movements in the shower. No amount of rationalizing with him works. As awful as it sounds, the human spirit can get used to just about anything! Just ask any full-time caregiver! Each day, we take on more and more, and what seems ridiculous or absurd to any other rational human being, seems common place to us. However, this morning's shower scene looked like an absolute crime scene. It was so horrific that I landed up screaming! SCREAMING I TELL YOU! Of course my dad had NO UNDERSTANDING as to why I was screaming. To him, his behavior in the shower is NORMAL! Managing this shower nightmare takes me an additional thirty minutes to my already hour long routine with him. Which means that once again, I got my dad to his memory care program late!
On top of this nightmare, my car dealership called me and the man on the phone said I had outstanding bills and owed them over $1,000! I truly almost lost it! Given all I am juggling, it is quite possible that I did not pay a bill, but it is UNLIKELY! Especially since I keep a monthly spreadsheet! Any case, I was so desperate for answers, that I opened up credit card statements to verify I paid my June and August visits! Any case, turns out this fellow was wrong! He misunderstood what my service provider told him, as most of today's visit was covered under my service warranty. Normally warranties on old cars do not pay off, and most warranties do not cover regular issues! Thankfully my warranty has been a God sent so far.
After I dropped my dad off, I ran back home to meet the person who was dropping off my repaired car and I also checked in on my mom who was in the middle of a physical therapy session. Once I got my car back, I ran chores. One of the highlights of my day today was going to Lowe's! Sounds funny, no!? I rarely to NEVER ever do anything on my own. I usually have one or two parents in tow. But today, I wanted to see if Lowe's had poinsettias on sale. They did and they are LOVELY!
While at Lowe's I got to talking to one of their employees. Lovely young lady and I learned she was from Pennsylvania. I bought my plants and then went grocery shopping. While in the meat section, I saw two women discussing turkeys! They truthfully were overwhelmed by the brand choices and did not know what to select. I literally moved right over to them and introduced them to Empire Turkeys! I told them, forget the rest. Once you have an Empire bird, you will not want to go back to the others. Empire Poultry is kosher. Mind you I am not Jewish, as I told these ladies, but Empire raises their chickens and turkeys from hatchlings and they do every process from raising, butchering and packing their own meats, using higher standards than what is required. All I can say is the meat is tender, the birds are not fatty, and when you unwrap the packaging, the bird is super clean. Any case by the time I finished with both of them..... they bought an Empire Turkey! Perhaps I missed my calling.
Mind you I also returned to Lowe's because I decided to purchase a poinsettia for my neighbor who is recovering from a fall. Don't you know it, as soon as I got in the store, I met up with the young lady from Pennsylvania again. We had a good time chatting, so much so that another customer joined in! Seriously it was a riot. Any case, the customer was asking me about the poinsettias! I told her if she is looking for poinsettias, she has to get these as they look very healthy and the price is right! Typically poinsettias are costly, but they are on sale for $1.98 and $9.98! Again, don't you know it.... this woman bought several poinsettias!
The turkey and poinsettia experiences today reminded me that when I was in high school, I worked over Christmas at the Limited. It was a clothing store. At first when they hired me, I was supposed to work in every job in the store.... front of the store, the cash register, and the back room. Guess what? Within a week, I was so good at selling clothes, they never took me off the front of the store. I literally was helping, advising, and coordinating clothes for customers. I will never forget it, and within that Christmas season, I was nominated as best employee and was awarded a cash gift.
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