Author: Diana Blair Revell

With both parents gone, we’ve left the Compound and moved to a smaller setting that we refer to as The Cottage, On the Ravine (I swear, there is a gulley creek bed.) There was a sadness, but now we love our new digs. I used to be a healthcare executive. I don’t miss it. Before that, I worked in radio and cable TV. I miss radio most of all. Radio has to be the most hilarious and fun place to work. Now I do some writing and give my attention to Dave and Dixie, our five-year-old Shih-poo. My parents were with us for thirteen years. Dad passed away November 19, 2018, and Mom died June 24, 2022. We miss them. I garden, cook (a lot), clean, play anything with a keyboard, and believe in the power of Love.

Irritation and Ablation

Some things irritate me so much I feel skin pulling loose from my bones. This is an asthma story. It may bore you. I’m sorry it’s so long. Don’t let it irritate you.

I’ve visited allergists and specialists so many times. When I was in high school–Go, Pirates!– my mother took me to my doctor because I kept breaking out in hives. One time, the cause seemed to be canned ham. (Remember canned ham? In my younger years, I sent one to every friend or family funeral.) Next, it was green beans from a can. Really?

The doctor(s) finally concluded it was, indeed, a food allergy, but could never pin it to one food. Maybe it was something used in the canning process of meat and vegetables.

Looking back, I wonder if it could have been stress. The doctors asked my mother if I was upset about anything. She said no. She didn’t ask if my algebra teacher, Sullenberg, could have finally irritated me so much that I developed red bumps all over, from my scalp to the soles of my feet.

The hives case seemed to just go away when I moved from 11th grade to 12th grade and no longer had to deal with the mathematical chaos in my brain. No algebra, no geometry, no calculus, and, thank the heavens, no trigonometry, even though the recommendation for academic students was to study trigonometry. Or was it calculus?

As a young mother, I was a magnet for contact dermatitis, the kind that peels off layers until there’s blood. On my physician’s advice, I was to wear gloves all the time, especially when peeling potatoes or changing the bed linens. (Yes, really.) I’d already begun to wear brightly colored latex when washing dishes, so I grabbed them every time I touched root vegetables or washed the sheets. But my hands were still so raw that the FBI could not have lifted a thumbprint.

The next doctor advised that I was probably reacting to the wet latex when moisture leaked through the lining of the gloves. He ordered some neoprene gloves. They were vast and magical, lined with a knit cotton and wouldn’t let anything seep through to my hands, but I couldn’t master changing sheets or peeling a spud.

He also sent me to the radiologist to have X-ray treatments on my palms and the inside of my fingers twice a week. Those were the cure. I never had contact dermatitis again after ten treatments. Now, AI tells me that X-ray is not the first-line treatment for contact dermatitis and is even considered to be highly ineffective.

Then, one day much later, the hives reappeared. The doctor gave me Valium that I took once a day, every day, even through my pregnancy with my second son and a couple of years after, until the experts decided we really shouldn’t be taking Valium.

The hives were gone, really gone, until my sons were in fifth and eighth grades and I was in a marriage gone to Hades and smoking like I was already in hell. I kept telling my doctor that Valium did the trick some years before, and he said, “Oh, I bet it did!” (He wouldn’t let me take even a smidgen of Valium.)

This time it was Elavil, but I was only to take it when I felt hives coming on. It worked, but it also knocked me out for two or three hours, which was highly unpopular in my profession. That would have been the case in any sort of work, I would guess.

More than once, my assistant would knock on my door to check on me, only to find me with a throw pillow under my head on the desk, bleary-eyed and drooling. I learned later that Elavil is an antidepressant sometimes given for headaches. My mother suffered from migraine headaches and was prescribed Elavil in the 1960s.

Years later, after the second divorce and marriage to Dave, I contracted a virulent case of bronchitis. I coughed and wheezed for weeks, until a doctor I worked with said, “Diana, you’ve got asthma.”

I said, “Surely not, at my age.”

He assured me that he’d seen several cases of adult asthma and referred me to a pulmonary specialist at Vanderbilt, one Elizabeth Willers.

“Yes,” she said, “this is cough variant asthma. The first thing we need to do is send you to ASAP to find your allergies.” ASAP is the Allergy, Sinus, and Asthma Program, operated by Vanderbilt.

I said, “I don’t think I’m allergic to anything.”

Dr. Willers answered, “You’re allergic to something or you wouldn’t have asthma.”

The testing involved tiny pricks on the inside of my arms with various allergens. After testing, I reviewed my results with a Nurse Practitioner.

“Good news and bad news,” the woman said. “The closest you come to an allergic reaction on this test is cat hair, and your reaction was not very high on that, certainly not high enough to be called an allergy.”

“Cat hair,” I said. “I’m not close to any cats.”

She nodded. “So you’re not allergic to anything. But you are highly irritated by a lot of things.”

I sighed and told her, “You have no idea.”

*

It was back to Dr. Willers, who was surprised by the results.

She said, “So you may be allergic to something that we can’t test for. The main task at hand is to treat you for asthma. She prescribed a new medication called Advair, a small disk-inhaler filled with two kinds of medicines combined.

Advair did a strange thing. It made me cough worse. Dr. Willers changed it to something else, then something else, and something else, and treated me for a couple of years until I had to make traffic and parking easier. Willers was leaving Vanderbilt, too, and she gave me a recommendation.

Laura Hunt was, and is, a fantastic specialist at a Vanderbilt-associated clinic at Williamson Medical Center, about fifteen miles away. (The traffic and parking were so much better! Hunt was not her last name then, but she got married. Now I can’t remember her other name.) She and I clicked right away, and we charmed each other with humorous stories. She was fun.

Dr. Hunt ordered some serious testing and, sure enough, I had asthma. For some reason, she wanted to try Advair again. Once again, the cough became severe.

“Why didn’t you tell me you’d tried Advair before?” she asked. “I’m supposed to make you well, and I’ve actually given my patient something to make her feel worse!”

We sampled every inhaler known to medicine, some I’d already taken, until Alvesco seemed to help more than anything else. I took it for years. Dr. Hunt also ordered a nebulizer, several rescue inhalers, Singulair, Zyrtec, and Asmanex, some of which I was already taking. And I got to experience that rapturous asthma test every other year. I flunked that test time after time.

The cough would reappear. Prednisone would kick it in the butt, but oh, the joys of steroids, and in a month or two, I would start coughing again. I was in and out of the clinic so often, I knew every employee by name, even following their marriages, births, divorces, and children.

I decided I needed to find a pulmonary specialist closer to home. All of my physicians (and my mother’s and father’s) except for Dr. Hunt practiced at St. Thomas West. It seemed logical to have them all in one place. Dr. Hunt agreed with me, citing having my parents’ physicians and mine at one place, given they’d moved in with us recently. I was managing their health and mine.

*

My primary care doctor’s nurse sent a referral to St. Thomas Pulmonary Group and handed me a card with the appointment date. I wasn’t sure which physician at the group I’d be seeing, but the nurse told me I’d be seeing one of the new ones.

At the pulmonary desk, the receptionist said, “You’ll be seeing one of our new physicians, Dr. Willers.”

“Elizabeth Willers?” I asked.

“Yes, she is not a newly credentialed doctor,” she said. “She comes to us from Vanderbilt.”

I did not tell her that I already knew Dr. Willers, but I thought, “What a full circle.”

When Dr. Willers came into the room, she said, “Long time, no see.”

“They told you I was with you a few years over at Vanderbilt, didn’t they?”

“Yes,” she said, “but I think I would have remembered you in a few minutes. I remember your voice. Weren’t you the one who told the ASAP nurse you were irritated by many things?”

We both started laughing. She asked me if I was doing well on the current medications.

“Okay,” I said. “Just okay. I’m still coughing.”

“And you’re taking everything we can give you,” she said. “How often are you using your ProAir?”

“Maybe once or twice a week,” I said, “but I don’t have acute attacks when I can’t breathe. I have coughing attacks that last for months, it seems, until I take some Prednisone. I hate that stuff.”

“Prednisone is a double-edged sword,” she said. “It works, and pretty fast, on these conditions we prescribe it for, but there are those side effects.”

“Yes,” I said, “sometimes nothing else helps.”

“Diana, if you ever feel like you need a tapered regimen of Prednisone, just call in. By now, you know when you need it. Just call and I’ll send in a prescription.”

“Okay, are we going to do anything else?”

“I would think about keeping that nebulizer close. Use it twice or three times a day when the coughing starts to get worse. Let’s set you up to see me in three months. Do you need some Prednisone today?”

“Yes,” I said, not admitting that I wanted to keep it on hand for the worst fits.

She said she was happy to see me, that I had been one of her first patients, and was looking forward to working with me. I told her I was delighted to see her again, too.

On my second visit with Dr. Willers, I told her, “I’m coughing constantly. I’m exhausted.”

She leaned back against the sink and informed me of a new biologic to treat asthma where no allergies are positive. She said she had heard really good things about this treatment for eosinophilic asthma. She referred me to an allergist who would determine what kind of asthma I had and if he would recommend Fasenra, a relatively new biologic administered in an injection every other month.

The allergist confirmed my situation with eosinophils and prescribed the biologic. If you’re not on Medicare, you can give the injection yourself via a pre-measured pen, but since Medicare thinks I’m old and decrepit and incapable, I have to go to an infusion center.

After the first injection, I stopped coughing. I only saw this allergist one time. When the nurse at the center told me that my prescription would run out in a couple of months, I called his office. No one answered the phone. There was no message. No message, no letter, no nothing.

I called Dr. Willers’s office to get a referral. I received no reply to the message I left, so I called the office again a week later and then the week after that, and finally spoke with the office manager.

“He closed his practice,” she said, “and has gone to work at the VA hospital.”

“What do I do?” I asked. “Could someone at your office refer me? My prescription is about to end.”

I don’t remember her exact explanation, but the answer was that you need to see your provider.

“I don’t have an appointment with Dr. Willers until two months after my prescription is null.”

I knew how difficult it was to get an appointment with the St. Thomas Pulmonary Clinic. I said, “I guess I’ll just miss a couple of months.”

She answered, “For your next appointment, you will see a new doctor. Dr. Willers has left our practice. Let me see who I put you with.”

I stood there looking both ways for Sunday. I’m sure my mouth was open.

“You will receive a letter this week,” she said. “Ah, here you are. You’re going to see Dr. Ashley Clark. Is that okay?”

“I guess so,” I said.

“And, I’ll put you on the list in case someone else cancels.”

I think I thanked her.

*

After a little over a year in the practice, Elizabeth Willers had left St. Thomas Pulmonary. She didn’t know where she was going, but the practice allowed her to compile an email list. I received the letter announcing her departure and also invited those who wished to stay in touch to send an email to a dedicated address. I sent a fun note, but I haven’t heard from her.

I think she was trying to make a decision about retirement.

“Meanwhile,” as Stephen Colbert says, I went to a routine checkup with my primary care doctor.

When I told Dr. B the story, she said, “Oh yeah, Dr. T went to the VA. I wonder why he did that. Well, we can get you a new allergist.”

She typed a little on her laptop, “Oh, let’s see if we can get Keegan. He’s not accepting new patients, but let me go to my office. I’ll call him.”

Dr. B re-entered the room, carrying her laptop. “We got him,” she said.
“They’ll call you and make the appointment.”

Yeah, I thought, they’ll call me.

Well, they did, and I saw him the following week. I talked to him about my prescription, and we talked about my asthma and the coughing. I was disappointed that he didn’t do something different for a biologic.

*

My new physician for breathing is Ashley Clark. I like her as much as I did Dr. Willers. She’s shared some laughs, especially about my journey to get a new set of Fasenra injections. I laughed with her, even though I told her it wasn’t funny.

I also asked her why the Fasenra didn’t seem to be working as well as it did the first few months.

“Maybe we should switch you to another biologic,” she said. “There are a bunch of them out there. I’m going to see if we can start you on Dupixent.”

*

Can you count the number of irritations in this story? I could, but it might join the “many things” I mentioned to the ASAP nurse.

Today, I’m irritated that it took me so long to write this epistle. There really is no need to add to my irritation list. The world is full of them these days.

***

Memorial Day

This is the second year we honor my brother, Denny. He was named for our Uncle Dennis Smallwood, who was killed on Iwo Jima. Today, we memorialize all those who died in service to their country.

Back in 1967, my brother’s number was up. Yes, young men’s lives were auctioned off by chance. But Denny held a religious deferment as he declared he would be a Christian minister.

Some months passed, and my father initiated a severe conversation with his son. Was he serious about becoming a minister? If not, was he being truthful with the Draft Board? Denny joined the Marine Corps.

I held nothing in my mind as to what each of them thought at the time. I wonder now if Dad ever regretted that conversation or if Denny would have reacted differently had Dad not challenged him.

Here was a guy who gave all of his body and mind in Vietnam and came home to deal with that loss. He built a radio station there and had a show. He counted bodies. He sent out endless letters as a public relations soldier. He led his men on countless patrols, and too often, he returned to base without some of them. And while he was out in the jungle-like terrain, the U.S. Military sprayed a killer defoliant. It was called Agent Orange. Denny got some of it.

Back at home, he was sent to Hawaii and then Arizona to serve as a recruiter. I never understood how he could do that. One time, when he was telling stories, he asked me, “Can you imagine being so scared that you literally climbed into your helmet? That’s what all of us felt.” It’s still a mystery to me why anyone would volunteer when there was a good chance they’d wind up in horrible conditions with guns pointed at them.

After he left the Corps, Denny suffered physically and sometimes mentally. He met periodically with a psychiatrist.

Denny was poisoned by his own country. He developed tumors in his back. He was born with only one kidney, and that one failed. He developed 5-minute seizures. I know his wife, Bev, could furnish a longer list. He spent half of his life in a wheelchair, one he could maneuver around in. In the end, he developed cancer of the esophagus, and it was untreatable.

The Veterans Hospital in Reno was semi-good to Denny. Often, they sent him to other, more suitable hospitals for treatment not available at the VA. Bev fought the bureaucracy with bear-like fervor to get him the care he needed–and deserved. She was strapped to help load him and his chair into an ill-fitted van, put him in his chair, help him to the toilet and back, and act as his 24/7 caregiver. Was she able? Not entirely, but she did it anyway.

A few months before Denny made the choice to discontinue dialysis and die, the VA declared him 100% disabled.

It took dying to get it done. Today, my brother is on my mind. He gave all.

The day after Mothers Day…

Grief comes in waves, but it lasts forever. It changes, but it’s still there. Mom died in June 2022, but for the past few months, I’ve missed her more than ever.

Some people say I look like Mom. Sometimes, when I’m dressing, I catch just a glimpse of that. In her later years, Mom got a perm every four months. Shortly before she died, my hair began to curl. At first, I blamed the anesthesia I got when I had my shoulder replaced in the spring of that year, but it kept getting curlier. Now, it seems to kink more by the day. It takes on a look that resembles my mom’s just after I’d arranged it before she began her day.

Without my ash-blonde highlights, my hair would look like Mom’s — almost white in the front, with a sprinkling of silver through the rest. I’m afraid to let it go because I’d scare myself every time I passed a mirror.

I’ve started blowing my hair straight.

I’ve gone to my jewelry armoire and taken out pieces that meant something to Mom. I have my great-great-grandmother’s wedding band, a tiny little yellow gold band with inset diamond chips, two of them missing, and Mom’s original engagement ring and band. My oldest great-niece wears her upgraded set from the 70’s. Mom’s eternity band fits my right hand. I wear it sometimes. I hold her gold bracelets in my hand to warm them. I can’t wear them until the clasps are repaired.

Most of Mom’s never-ending collection of costume jewelry was sold in the estate sale after I removed a few pieces and sets that I remembered from childhood, things that she continued to wear until her passing. A blue and light blue rhinestone brooch and earrings set, another with settings of various hues of gold, and her Christmas brooches are safely tucked away.

I have some of her dreamcatchers in the kitchen window, and I’m thinking about hanging the rest of them. She strung them in the apartment windows and on the arms of her Rollator, Dolly.

I often shower with Mom’s favorite fragrance, Pure Grace by Philosophy, which our dear friend Neil gave her for Christmas in 2019. Sometimes, I spritz with the half-bottle left of her Pure Grace body spray.

She dressed in coordinating pants and feminine tops, and when there was a special event, she made a spectacular new dress. She chose jewelry to match the outfit, whether she was dressed for a day at home or a special event. She looked terrific in royal blue. I’ve been wearing blue a lot lately.

I told my nail technician how Mom’s nails were so beautiful and that she even did them herself until her last year or so.

Then we discussed how the older ladies knew how to dress, apply makeup, and accessorize themselves with jewelry, even when they were only getting their toes done. I told her how Mom would get up every morning, do her hair and makeup, choosing which red lipstick to wear that day. She was never without red lipstick. Oh, she tried deep coral and fuschia and all shades in between, but Revlon Red was her standard.

Mom had the most magnificent walking stick that she used before she had her knee surgery. I can’t remember where she got it, but I do remember that she told me. It was handmade by some man in Gainesville, I think, or maybe it was Cookeville. I don’t know where that treasure is, but I think of Mom every time I grab some sort of stick to walk the rock path downhill to my fish pond.

I think of Mom every time I see trout on a restaurant menu. She always ordered fish. I try to cook green beans like Mom’s, but they don’t taste the same. Mom made a banana cake every year for Christmas. She even baked one for my son Jade’s birthday. I’ve made banana cake, but not like Mom’s, using a recipe from my dad’s mother, Effie Blair. Mom’s actually tasted like Mammy Blair’s, and that was a hard thing to accomplish. I may try to bake one again.

Mama loved to sing and play the piano. She thought she and I sounded great together. I’d be the soprano, and she the alto. After years of asthma and inhalers, I am now the alto. I have never parted with a music box my mom bought for me, so I have an extensive collection. The one I wind most often is the one that plays Wind Beneath My Wings.

Mom was always so proud of me. If I sang at an event, she was there to quietly cheer me on. I played the lead, Sgt. Sarah Brown, in our high school’s production of Guys and Dolls. Mom and Dad had moved to Billings, Montana, to shepherd an old Baptist Church there. I tried to talk Mom and Dad into coming for the production, but they said they could only afford to go once and that they intended to be there for graduation. I wish I had insisted they come for Guys and Dolls.

I did so many things that Mom didn’t get a chance to do. She married at fourteen (almost fifteen) and gave birth to my brother Denny a year later at fifteen (nearly sixteen). She was eighteen when I was born. Her whole life was given freely to support Dad, facilitate his goals, and encourage him. She was somewhat militant in her role, especially as a pastor’s wife. She was never sorry for her early start, but she told me once she missed having girlfriends like I did.

Mom’s best girlfriend after she and Dad moved back to Tennessee was my Aunt Bessie, Dad’s youngest sister, nine years Mom’s junior. They talked every Saturday morning, sometimes for hours. My Aunt Bessie started to decline in the months after Mom was gone and died soon after. Things just weren’t the same.

We laughed a lot.
Mom and Bessie

She did not neglect her education. She had graduated from 8th grade at thirteen, and when Mom and Dad married, she taught him to read. When he attended high school at Harrison-Chilhowee, she helped him with his homework. She studied and passed her GED exam. She studied alongside him at Tennessee Tech, Cumberland, and Belmont colleges. Meanwhile, she enrolled in night business classes, taking Denny or me with her, whichever one was available. Her first office job was at an insurance company in San Francisco. She commuted across the Golden Gate Bridge from Mill Valley, where we first lived, and later worked in several Sears locations in the West.

And when Denny and I were both out of the house, she owned her own business.

She was always an avid reader and kept up with news and current issues. I loaded up her Kindle with romances and literary novels. And God love her, she kept a diary.

I believe I was Mom’s best friend. I think she loved me more than she loved herself. But I never had a one-on-one relationship with her until my father died. She became my most vocal supporter, my most learned elder, and a girlfriend who loved to go on drives to pick up items I’d bought on Marketplace. Oh, the places we would go!

And the laughter. Every day, we found something to cause us to bend over, wipe joyful tears, or pee. Mom wore Depends, but there were times I didn’t make it to the bathroom.

I don’t wear red and don’t want to look like Mom. In personality, I have never been like Mom; I have always been much more like my daddy. Maybe it took us a while to bond one-on-one. And now I’m somehow empty without her next door.

Maybe you miss your mama, too.

***

Years ago, I was the assisting minister on Mother’s Day and wrote this prayer.

Father, we praise you on this special observance of Mother’s Day. We thank you for showing us your creative, nurturing, loving side, which we naturally associate with motherhood. We are reminded that while you do seem to bless our mothers abundantly with those special gifts, you offer those same gifts to all as we learn to live by your example. 

We give you thanks for our mothers, and we know that the unconditional love they give us could only come from you. We ask your special watch over those soon-to-be mothers, and we beg your healing and comfort for those who struggle to conceive. We invite your wisdom and reconciliation for those who find themselves with children and aren’t truly ready to be mothers;  in your wisdom, bring them to a true soul-blessing through whatever path you design. We are grateful for adopting mothers. We thank you for “stand-in” mothers, the ones who are just like mothers to us. We pray for your guidance for mothers in difficult situations, and we ask for consolation for those who have lost their mothers, whether through death or separation. 

All these things we ask in your name,

Amen.

The Other and the Others

I am “the other” in the State of Tennessee. It hurts.

We were poor growing up. My mom always said we didn’t know we were inadequate and that we had fun anyway, and we did, but I felt it every time a school event required the purchase of equipment or special clothing.

In preparation for a school festival that involved every sixth grader rounding the auditorium in couples to dance to folk music, the girls were all told to wear a gathered (dirndl) skirt and white tennis shoes. I had it made for the gathered skirt. I had a closetful. But I didn’t have white tennis shoes, and I knew my mother would not go out of her way to get some for me. We just couldn’t afford them.

On a Saturday, when I walked downtown, I saw a big bin of white tennis shoes at Kuhn’s Dime Store. I knew they were women’s sizes, but I was sure I could dig through them enough to find a pair that almost fit. The shoes cost $1.00. When I got home, I asked Mom for a dollar. I told her I needed it for school. She didn’t say much; she just took a dollar from her beige clutch purse and handed it to me. I would take that dollar to Kuhn’s the following Saturday and get my shoes.

When I got to the square and hurried into the store, I noticed the bin was almost empty. There were no size fives or sixes. I found a size seven, and fortunately, the sales lady told me she would pay the tax from her pocket.

My outfit was complete, but Donna’s was not. Donna was a mousy little girl with glasses who never said two words aloud. When the teacher asked the girls to raise their hands if they didn’t have a dirndl skirt, Donna raised her hand halfway. Mrs. Robinson then wondered if someone could loan Donna a skirt for the show. No one volunteered, so I raised my hand and said I would bring it the next day.

I have never comprehended why Mom would have made me a solid brown cotton skirt, and I hated it. I asked Mom if it was okay if Donna kept it. I laid it out on my bed to remember to put it in a grocery sack to take the next day.

Dad glanced into the bedroom I shared with my brother and said, “Is that the skirt you’re taking to the girl at school?”

“Yes,” I said, “And I’m letting her keep it.”

“Isn’t that the skirt you’ve always disliked?” he asked.

“Yes. I’m glad to get rid of it.”

“Didn’t your teacher say you all should wear colorful skirts? Maybe you should consider giving Donna a prettier skirt she would love wearing after the show.”

I was ashamed. I knew what Dad was saying. When he left the room, I folded the brown skirt and put it in a drawer. My gathered skirts were in the small closet, hung by wooden clothespins and wire hangers wired together to hold more than one skirt.

I took down a red floral, folded it, and put it in a brown grocery bag. When I gave it to Donna the next day, I told her she could keep the skirt. All she whispered was, “Really?”

“Yes,” I answered. “I have plenty.”

My teacher had paired me with Steven Cantrell, a slight boy who seemed to weave when he walked and had a bit of trouble speaking. At times, his hands flopped around. Needless to say, he was not the most popular kid in the class. We didn’t talk much when practicing, but I was not shy about pulling his right hand over my right shoulder, grabbing his left hand, waving around in the air, and clasping it to meet the dance form. I could still feel the motion of his left hand, even when I held it tighter. 

On the morning of the festival, I chose a blue flowered skirt and a white blouse with puffed sleeves and pearl buttons, both homemade by my mother. I pulled on two pairs of bobby socks and tied the three-sizes-too-large tennies as tightly as possible. The toes still had plenty of room, so my feet slid around a bit. I took my new shoes off and stuffed the toes with newspaper. Maybe this will do it, I thought.

My teacher told us how proud she was of our class in our colorful skirts and shirts. She said we had practiced the dance, so we knew it well, and our program would be great. We lined up for the auditorium, girl-boy, girl-boy.

I loved singing all the songs the music teacher chose for that particular day, but I couldn’t tell you now what we sang. But I could do that dance by heart today. “Put your little foot, put your little foot, put your little foot right down. To the left, step and turn. To the right, step and turn. To the front, step and turn. See how quickly we learn.”

Stephen caught up with me after the festival, and we walked back to the classroom for celebratory cookies and punch. He pointed his left hand to my feet and said, “Your feet aren’t really that big, are they?”

*

It hurt when my piano teacher, Mrs. Gwendolyn Gwaltney, kicked me out of her studio for telling her that John F. Kennedy was just as good as she was. I had to. She had just said that nobody in their right mind would vote for a Catholic for president. Indeed, my family was different in our corner of Lebanon, Tennessee, but we were not crazy. We supported JFK. I had to represent!

My dad got in trouble at Belmont College the week after the piano incident. He was in a music appreciation class taught by Dr. Helen Midkiff, a professional and well-recognized organist. She started the class by saying she did not think JFK had enough grey matter to be president. Dad’s friends and colleagues on both sides of him knew what was about to happen. They both pulled on Dad’s jacket and coat sleeves and shook heads. He stood up, lifted his briefcase from the floor, and said, “Dr. Midkiff, when you are ready to teach music, I’ll be back.”

Dad was called to the President’s office (the President of Belmont), where Dr. Gabhart told him his lack of respect might cause his expulsion. Dad acknowledged Dr. Gabhart’s statement, saying, “If I have to go, I’ll go.”

I’m unsure of the rest of the conversation, but Dad did not get expelled. He told me he visited Dr. Midkiff and apologized if she felt disrespected. It was one of those times he didn’t admit he was wrong. He suggested I call Mrs. Gwaltney and do the same. I went back to piano lessons that week.

*

After Dad graduated from Belmont College in June 1960, we would move across the country so that Dad could attend Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary. We made a four-day cross-country trip in our ’57 white Plymouth Belvedere to Mill Valley, California, pulling a small U-haul. Our Route 66 journey was educational and fun. We had no air conditioning, just this funny fan that fit in a window and blew air over a pan of water. Every time we stopped for gasoline, we refilled the water container. Wisely, we crossed the desert at night. It was the Summer of 1960.

We unloaded the few pieces of furniture and clothes we brought to the seminary’s married student housing. My brother Denny enrolled at Tamalpais High School, and I registered at Mill Valley Junior High.

I didn’t know what to think of teachers and students. I was an alien on an alternate planet. The school was new, but it had no cafeteria and no auditorium. We ate lunch that we brought from home in a courtyard on picnic tables or, if it rained, on our desks in our homeroom classroom. Every group activity took place in the courtyard. It appeared to me that all the students were white. There were few chances to really make friends. 

One girl was kind to me. I don’t remember her name, but I remember she was in love with Cherry Vanilla lipstick. It was a Revlon shade discontinued decades ago. Today, I see a Cherry Vanilla from Lawless on the internet. There are even photos of Taylor-approved reds; one is Revlon’s Cherries in the Snow.

I’ll call her Cherry since I can’t remember her name. Cherry gave me a taste of her orange creamsicle that she bought from a small trailer in the courtyard. (Now we call those little stands kiosks.) My accent did not put her off. I’d never known anyone to talk about an accent until we moved to California. If you had a Southern accent, you were an Okie, a slur to name those who migrated to California during the Dust Bowl.

The music teacher chose me to sing a high soprano solo at the Christmas Choral Presentation, so named because we didn’t have an auditorium. The janitors helped the choir director roll a piano to each hall for our Christmas concert, and we sang our program while the other students listened from their classrooms.

I remember a section of that song I sang. No Candle Is There and No Fire.

…But the moon gave a radiance divine, and the stars an effulgence bright. And the only sound to be heard was the lowing of kine in the night. Then, the blowing of wind through the trees and the flapping of angels’ wings.

After the first two hall concerts, a girl several rows over in my homeroom stood and announced to the whole room, “Your accent really showed.”

A boy in front of me turned around in his seat and said, “I thought it was beautiful.” He had black curly hair and wore a red and black striped shirt.

The girl who shamed me continued to be a problem. She said, “That white stuff on your crackers is slimy. Is that what Okies eat all the time?” She referred to my cherished saltines, peanut butter, and marshmallow fluff sandwiches.

And later, “All your clothes look alike. I guess your mother makes them all from one pattern, huh?” Californians ended a lot of sentences with huh, but it didn’t turn the sentence into a question. It was more of a statement.

Most of the time, I just ignored her. But one time, she went too far. While we were waiting for the bus, I realized my sanitary pad might not make it all the way home. I told a bus rider, “Don’t let it leave without me. I’m going to the restroom.”

Bully Girl asked from two tables away, “Are you on your period or something?”

I told her no and hurried into the restroom stall. I quickly exchanged the pad with one in my book bag. I heard a noise and looked up. I saw the girl’s face as she was jumping down from the toilet in the next compartment.

When I finished and ran to the courtyard to my assigned bus table, she stood on one of the benches and said, “Yeah, she is.” Then she skipped across the courtyard and propped herself on her elbows in front of my face.

“You’re not feeling so perky, are you?” she asked. “Something is slowing you down, right? It’s that time of month, huh?”

I looked her in the eyes and said, loud enough for all to hear, “There is something seriously wrong with you. You need a psychiatrist.”

And that was the end of our relationship. It occurred to me that she was already getting help for some mental condition. I did not feel bad for her, but I didn’t feel exactly right. 

I was lonely in Mill Valley. Every night, I listened to the fog horns in the Bay and felt lonelier. Sometimes, I sang Stranger On the Shore to myself.

Here I stand, watching the tides go out. So all alone and blue, just dreaming dreams of you...Why, oh, why, must I go on like this? Shall I just be a lonely Stranger On the Shore?

In November, my dad got a call from Temple Baptist Church in Pittsburg, California. We would move there during Christmas break, and I would attend Hillview Junior High starting the first day after break.  At the time, Pittsburg was an industrial place named for Pittsburgh, PA, because the two cities shared steel and mining industries. The population at the time was about 20,000. Dad said he thought I would like Pittsburg. He said there were people of all colors in Pittsburg, a true melting pot, he called it.

In early December, I asked my Mill Valley math teacher to give me any quizzes or homework she had graded so I could take them to a new school. The first words out of her mouth were, “Oh, yeah, you’re the seminary kid. You know, we don’t like the seminary kids. They’re always leaving for points unknown.”

She handed me a folder of my work, and I said, “Thank you, Mrs. (Whoever),” and left.

My first class at Hillview was physical education, or “gym,” as most students said. We lined up in alphabetical order, sitting on the floor. The teacher passed out locker assignments on small pieces of paper. We were to find them, put our street clothes in them, and return to the lineup in our required gym suits.

When I opened my locker, I found someone else’s (from another class) clothes carefully folded inside. I went to the restroom, changed into my gym clothes, and returned to the lineup, leaving my first-day school outfit on a bench in the locker room.

When the teacher called our names, we were to give our locker numbers so she could put them in a chart in her roll call book. 

“Well,” I answered when she called Diana Blair, “it’s 36, but my locker has done been possessed.” 

I don’t know why I answered that, but the teacher and the whole class laughed.

“Diana, you’ve hit on something I’ve never heard,” she said, laughing some more. “We’ll get you another locker.”

From all the laughter, including the teacher’s, I knew I’d be okay in this new environment. These people were not put off. They were entertained. I laughed with them, feeling joy in the seventh grade for the first time. 

I noticed there were few African Americans at Hillview. There were Asians, Filipinos, Hispanics who identified as Mexican, and many Italians. Someone told me the black students were at Central Junior High. Still segregated. 

During roll call every day in gym, we answered “X” if we were menstruating so that no shower was required. No one cared. It was nothing to be ashamed of. 

I met Dorothy Valenzuela, and we became fast friends. Dorothy taught me Filipino cooking. On my first day in gym class, I met Jean Snyder, my lifelong friend. I call her Ja, pronounced like Jay. We were Ja and Dee, or Dee and Ja. Sometime during the sixty-two years since, she became my sister, not just a friend. She still is.

I joined the choir, played with the jazz band, and sang with Jeannette Bartimioli in the talent show.

Don’t they know It’s the end of the world? It ended when I lost your love.

*

Hillview offered a summer school session during which we could take elective classes or make up for class failures. I learned to type and studied art. A ninth grader in art class called me an Okie. He taunted me, “What’s your favorite song, Wolverton Mountain?”

I said, “No,” feeling no great need to tell him my choice. I knew he was making fun of me, but I didn’t see why Wolverton Mountain should be such a bad thing.

When I arrived home, my dad was there. He stirred his instant coffee while I sipped red Kool-aid. I didn’t even bother to tell him about that Italian guy calling me an Okie. I just asked Dad to sing the song to me.

He picked up his guitar from the couch and said, “Okay, now, harmonize with me, Sis, on the chorus.”

They say don’t go on Wolverton Mountain
If you’re looking for a wife
‘Cause Clifton Clowers has a pretty young daughter.
He’s mighty handy with a gun and a knife.

Her tender lips are sweeter than honey
And Wolverton Mountain protects her there.
The bears and the birds tell Clifton Clowers
If a stranger should enter there.

All of my dreams are on Wolverton Mountain.
I want his daughter for my wife.
I’ll take my chances and climb that mountain
Though Clifton Clowers, he might take my life.

Her tender lips are sweeter than honey
And Wolverton Mountain protects her there.
The bears and the birds tell Clifton Clowers
If a stranger should wander there.

I’m going up on Wolverton Mountain.
It’s too lonesome down here below.
It’s just not right to hide his daughter
From the one who loves her so.

Her tender lips are sweeter than honey,
And Wolverton Mountain protects her there.
The bears and the birds tell Clifton Clowers
If a stranger should wander there.

But I don’t care about Clifton Clowers.
I’m gonna climb up on his mountain.
I’m gonna take the girl I love.
I don’t care about Clifton Clowers.
I’m gonna climb up on his mountain.
And I’ll get the one I love.

Source: LyricFindSongwriters: C. King / M. KilgoreWolverton Mountain lyrics © Reservoir Media Management Inc

I still didn’t see anything off about Wolverton Mountain. It was a good story in a song. But I suspected the bully guy might not be a country music fan. At the least, he was ignorant about the South—and me. I wondered how he even knew about Wolverton Mountain. 

*

Pittsburg High School was the genuine Melting Pot. The multitude of tones enthralled me, and I couldn’t help but stare. I also noticed that race, ethnicity, and color mattered.

Students from three schools fed PHS: St. Peter Martyr (almost exclusively Italians and Mexicans), Central Jr. High (where most Black kids attended), and Hillview (primarily white, some Filipinos and Mexicans, few Blacks). 

I had all these different classmates, but kids of differing ethnicities usually found others of the same to hang with. My coloring was a bit rare: very white, blonde (helped along by Nice’N’Easy), and blue eyes. More than once, a classmate would stop me in the hall and ask if they could look at my eyes, even more so when I got blue contact lenses. My main categorization, though, was one of the Smart Kids. 

I felt like the other, being so white and Smart, but I saw clearly that others were more other than me. For all of the Civil Rights Movement and living in the progressive State of California, we were still divided by race and origin.

My few Filipino and African American friendships were formative; we are still in touch. They probably don’t know how much they taught me then and how much they teach me now. 

Race and origin never seemed more important to me than the race for Miss Pirateer, PHS’s version of Homecoming Queen. Clubs nominated girls, and the student body voted for several on one ticket. I’ll never forget my friend Ernie, who told me why I would not get a spot on the Miss Pirateer Court. He said, “Diana, you don’t have a big group behind you. You’re popular, but not real popular. You’re one of the smart ones, and they don’t have that many people in their group.”

Many years later, my choir teacher, Jack French, asked me to accompany him to a class reunion. I graduated in ’67 and was in town for our reunion, but he had been invited to the Class of 65’s event. We had a splendid time. He was eighty years old and enjoyed telling our tablemates and anyone who would listen that I was his all-time favorite student.

I told him about my favorite student in our choir. Her name was Jacqueline Griffin. She was gorgeous, black as the night, with a huge bosom that produced a low alto voice like I’d never encountered—and I still haven’t. She would open her mouth, and her message shook that choir room and boomed in the multi-purpose room. Sometimes, I wanted to stop singing to listen to Jackie. I asked him if he remembered Jackie. He did. We wondered together where she was and what she was doing. 

We danced a little and reminisced about all the good singers at Pittsburg High School and the spectacular performance of the musical Guys and Dolls. 

I asked him if Jackie had a part in Guys and Dolls. Neither of us could remember. It was a massive production with two sets of dancers, one dancing in NYC and the other in Havana. It seemed to me at the time that everybody at PHS was in Guys and Dolls. Thinking back, there were no Black speaking parts, but all the Havana dancers were people of color. All of the Hotbox Dolls in NYC were white. The yearbook supplement only gave two scant pages to the musical, and the participants are not listed, so it’s almost impossible to reassemble a cast. 

My mind drifted back to our first musical in my junior year. The show’s name, which was written for youth, was Through the Hedge. It was about a boys’ school separated from a girls’ school by a hedge. The lead girl part was a student who sang, “Everybody goes through the hedge but me, and I know what they’re going through the hedge to see. Someday I’m gonna (do something or the other) and go through, too, And then I’ll have some fun just like the others do.”

I knew I’d get the lead of the girl student because no one else wanted it! However, there was an African American girl whose name I can’t remember who auditioned for the part of a teacher in love with another teacher at the boys’ school. Her name might have been Mary. I remember she was timid and had dark red hair. The song she had to sing was the teacher’s solo in the play. I don’t know why we had to sit to audition, but she took her wooden seat, held the sheet music in her hands, and began a slow, rich, soulful rendition, similar to Etta James. Her voice smacked me almost as much as Jackie’s. 

“Now we’re together, together at last. Let’s live for each moment, forgetting the past.” 

Mr. French stopped her and asked, with something of a smirk, “Now, do you really think she would sing this song that way?” 

Mary nodded quietly and smoothed her skirt.

Mr. French said, “Thank you for auditioning.” 

She walked into the wings of the stage. 

I still see her face and feel the pit in my stomach that I felt then. I thought, “If she got the part, that teacher would sing that song that way.” I didn’t share my feelings. What a choice that would have been in 1966. I wish I could find her in the yearbook. 

A regional newspaper posted a favorable review after the 1967 Guys and Dolls show. Whoever wrote that piece was astonished that a high school could turn out such an excellent production.  I have a copy somewhere. It’s a shame we don’t have a better history of our showing of Guys and Dolls. 

That night at the reunion, between dances and strolling around the room, Jack French told me he had demanded a recount for the 1967 Miss Pirateer Court. I had been sixth in the voting, and there were five on the Court. I told him my Ernie story. We laughed until we cried, but no one else at the table understood it. The Miss Pirateer in 1967 was a beautiful girl named Beryl Holmes, one of two African Americans on the court. The remaining three were Italian. 

*

I am among the others today, especially in the South, but my minority brothers and sisters keep me going. We won’t be silent. We will continue to support each other and the many leaders who speak out. We find ourselves in good, solid company. We’re with Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde, who bravely spoke truth to power.

In the name of our God, I ask you to have mercy upon the people in our country. We’re scared now. The people who pick our crops and clean our office buildings, who labor in poultry farms and meatpacking plants, who wash the dishes after we eat in restaurants and work the night shifts in hospitals. They may not be citizens or have the proper documentation, but the vast majority of immigrants are not criminals. They pay taxes and are good neighbors. They are faithful members of our churches and mosques, synagogues, gurdwara, and temples. I ask you to have mercy, Mr. President, on those in our communities whose children fear that their parents will be taken away and that you help those who are fleeing war zones and persecution in their own lands to find compassion and welcome here.

Today, in 2025, I’m still among the others, but I see that all the different others are so much more other than I am. I pray, in my own way, for every person named in this Inaugural sermon.

I pray for all immigrants and their families who fear deportation and disruption to their lives.

I pray for my darker-skinned friends, colleagues, and neighbors. Their battle is far from over, and their struggle is mine. I’m still learning the history of Black Americans, things we did not learn in school. Black history is American history. 

I’m praying for all those who lose jobs in the current administration’s purge of Federal agencies.

I didn’t watch the inauguration; I couldn’t watch the news at first, but I’m working on it. We need to be informed so that we can use our voices. We elders must support young people in their work for change. 

I have decided to pray for President Trump daily. I’m going to call his name. I’ll pray for the administration and that its collective intentions and actions will serve mercy and justice. I know that such a change will require a conversion.

I’ll pray for courage for those who let their voices be heard in opposition to oppression and greed. I’ll pray for intelligent and peaceful protests.

I’ll ask my soul for enough love to go around, especially to my unlovable. We can’t hold on to hate; it’s too damaging, reckless, and unproductive. I’m going to meditate on lovingkindness. 

Here’s Martin Luther King on hate:

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

Hatred paralyzes life; love releases it. Hatred confuses life; love harmonizes it. Hatred darkens life; love illuminates it.

I have decided to stick to love…Hate is too great a burden to bear.

***

And so this was Christmas.

I’m a procrastinator. If I took one of those quizzes on Facebook, I’d register as ADHD. I registered as ADHD with a psychologist several years ago–as an adult! I’m great in the immediate. Just give me a human, friend, or animal problem, and I’ll get right to work on it immediately and see it through.

But–I couldn’t start decorating for Christmas because I had to get the boxes down from the attic. My fairy Fixer (let’s call her Brenna) got the boxes down a few days after Thanksgiving, which came late this year. She put up the trees, two of them, and helped me get started. I did most, but she, being over six feet tall, got a ladder from our storage and placed two beloved arrangements on our very high ledges.

One is a Santa with a sleigh, toys, and reindeer I put together twenty-six years ago. Every year, I update him a little. But she lit his sleigh, and it glowed every day for six hours until Christmas Eve. That evening, when I had company, it did not light.

Santa flying high!

However, the lighted PEACE letters on the longest ledge held their prominent position well.

The rest of the decorations took a few days after Brenna’s help that first day. I found other things to do.

The outside decor was not outstanding, but it was there. And I still had the Christmas pumpkins in front of the mailbox. Someone on the NextDoor app just told me that deer love pumpkins, so yesterday, I smashed them in our backyard’s wildlife preserve. I hope I can watch them eat. How do you call a deer?

The Christmas Pumpkins

I wish someone could have been here to help me smash them!

Mama’s Silver Tree

No one even tried to make The Grinch sing and dance.

The Wineglass Advent Wreath still shines today. Some of us say Christmas isn’t over until The Epiphany arrives on January 6th.

The Wineglass Advent Wreath still shines today.

Our family Christmas was on Saturday, December 21. We took presents for the grands and enjoyed each other’s company. We missed the kids and grands in Montana and hope to all be together one Christmas.

The Eve was a highlight. Our guests included our next-door neighbor, V.B. and her son Jacob, three of the John Grahams, and brother Jerry Wong. Christmas Eve is a time for having people in who aren’t celebrating somewhere else. We had a scrumptious dinner (if I do say so myself), told tales, and laughed!

Christmas Day was laid back with Jerry. He and I took some of last night’s dinner to two special temporarily laid-up friends and packed up what I call his food bag for his trip home on Thursday. When we got home, he serenaded me on his portable keyboard.

All of the above is boring. I know that. I’ve been absent from the blog for several months, but I’m making my readers a New Year’s promise to write more often. Actually, I’ve been writing–but I’ve been unable to finish a piece for this place. I have drafts, so stay tuned for My American Native Heritage Month or Of Okies and Hillbillies. But first, you’ll have to get through AFTER CHRISTMAS.

Can you read the sign on the fence? It appears to be quite weathered and faded, but with a closer look, you might be able to decipher the important information it holds. Perhaps it offers some safety guidelines, warnings to keep out, or even instructions relevant to the area beyond the fence. Pay attention to any symbols or markings that could provide additional context, as they might reveal a story or message that is not immediately obvious.

The above paragraph provided by AI. The sign says:

COMING SOON! That could mean anything.

75

It hasn’t been too long since sales clerks, pharmacists, and service people began explaining things to me that need no explanation. When I checked out at my favorite thrift store on Tuesday, I forgot to ask for my Seniors’ Day discount. When I turned around on my way out and said, “Oh, wait, I’m a Senior,” the young woman said, “Oh, I already gave you the discount!” When I glanced at my receipt, there it was, the 30% discount.”

I am seventy-five years old. I’m not in love with it. I just don’t know what to do with it.

Oh, people still tell me I look younger than seventy-five, but the guy at the nail salon said he thought I looked more like sixty-five. He thinks that’s a whole lot better?

Now seventy-five, I estimate that at least three-quarters of my life is gone. If I lived to be my father’s age when he passed, I would only have fourteen years, or if I lived as long as my mother, eighteen years.

I can’t seem to get to the question I need to ask myself, “What will you do with these, [gulp], remaining years?” I get stuck on what if I only live to be 80. Then I am so sad, I cannot find any other questions.

I don’t want to leave this precious, troubled, wonderful, chaotic, green, climate-threatened, beautiful, war-torn world. I want to see change in my well-loved country: less hate, less hunger, less killing. My children and grandchildren would be fine without me, but I’m not finished looking at them, cheering them on, and loving them with this unequaled passion that began when the first infant sounds pushed from my body.

Most of the time, the questions arise when I feed my fish in the early mornings. I sit on the rock wall of the pond and gaze through a dense thicket separating our house from a busy thoroughfare. I note the birdsongs; I hear Cardinals order “Beer, beer, beer” and “Chip, chip, chip!” House finches cheep and warble a trill. Robins peek and tut before announcing, “Pretty, pretty, pretty.” Crows caw and caw louder to warn of a present hawk. Sometimes owls call to each other across the trees.

I am scared, weak, and afraid of the quick passing of time—something most people would never see in me.

I never imagined seventy-five, but the digits are mine. I don’t want to return to my twenties, or anything like that. I just want to be…for longer.

Okay, I’m ready for the question. What will I do to max out my days, months, and years? Or as Mary Oliver says, “What will [I] do with [the rest of] this wild and precious life?”

I’m working on my answers. They’re endless, so I know I must begin the tasks before I finish the list.

I plan to exhaust this endless love inside me, even though I know Love always creates more love. I’ll watch and listen until I need to sleep. Lookout, Beauty, I’m going to catch you and hold you in the Light. And Joy? I’ll choose you every day, even those when you seem far away. If I can’t reach you, I’ll make you.

Watch me, World. Slow down, and let me hug you every day.

The one that got away

Once I had a housekeeper who lost some cleaning product every Tuesday. Some of that tendency might have been related to the six-pack of beer she insisted I leave in the refrigerator the night before she cleaned. She usually drank two beers while she ironed and took four home.

I found Windex in the refrigerator, Pledge on my nightstand, or maybe Tub & Tile cleaner in a closet (and not the one assigned to janitorial supplies). I loved that woman. Her name was Patty. She and her husband raised eleven children, some of whom were in high school when she came to my house.

I have to admit I’ve developed a tendency to lose things. Earrings, photos, flower pots, electronics manuals, books, lipstick, and baking supplies are all examples of things I put in a safe place and couldn’t find. I usually end a search with, “It’ll turn up somewhere.”

I’ve never lost a fish–until a couple weeks ago.

Dave and I had wild-caught cod with the most delightful seasoning, asparagus, and smashed little potatoes for dinner. Four good-sized fillets, semi-breaded with crumbs and pungent herbs, were cooked in my favorite kitchen add-on, the air fryer.

Let me tell you about that air fryer. It isn’t my first one. I sent that one back without opening the box. But the one I have now has two independent drawers, and it is so easy to cook an entire dinner for two or three diners. It’s easy to clean since I discovered those little air fryer liners. I love it and use it almost every day.

The fish was delicious, and there were two pieces left to put away for another meal. The air fryer re-heats supremely, leaving what you put in it in much better shape than when it went in. I’m just saying you can have crispy leftover French fries or maybe a like-new entree.

Dave cleaned the kitchen that night. I knew he would put the leftovers in glass containers or plastic bags for another meal.

We discuss dinner before we finish breakfast. I’m sometimes half-asleep, but at the very least, I can agree with the protein that will be served. We wanted to use the leftover fish promptly to be closer to fresh so I planned to heat it in the air fryer the next day.

That evening, the fish was not in the refrigerator, so we ate a burger instead. I suggested that Diana, who likes her food cold, probably had eaten the cod for breakfast. When she came in later that evening, I asked her if she had eaten the fish.

“No, she answered, “I ate pasta salad. Lots of pasta salad. All of the pasta salad.” (When she eats, she eats.)

The following day, she asked if I had found the fish I sought.

“No, I think Dave must have thrown it away,” I said, even though he had told me earlier that he had not seen the fish. But maybe he did and didn’t realize it. He’s, at the very least, as forgetful as I am.

We looked in every drawer and cabinet in the kitchen. Maybe somebody stuck it in the cabinet.

Finally, we all agreed that the delicious leftover fish had been thrown away. What a waste.

Dave has often reminded me that “fish and company stink after three days.” (Mind you, he was giving me a reason not to stay too long at our friends’ house and not referring to any guests we might have.)

Well, the little pieces of cod took almost six days to stink. Diana came into the kitchen one morning, grimaced, and asked, “What is that foul smell over here?” Dave said he smelled it too. Diana was standing in front of the recycling bin. She took the bin to the garage and emptied it into the receptacle that Metro empties every other week.

“It’s not the recycling,” she said when she returned. “Maybe it’s the garbage can.”

Well, sometimes things start to stink in the garbage if they’re there for a couple of days. She emptied the trash and sprayed the bin before adding a new (biodegradable) bag.

I rarely smell any odor anywhere, owing to the years of asthma inhalers and chronic coughing, which, by the way, is soooo much better since I’ve started the bi-monthly injection of Fasenra.

I asked, “Do you still smell it?”

“Lord, yes.” Her gaze traveled the row of upper cabinets and the appliances on the sideboard. There’s a scale, a slow cooker, and…an air fryer. I can’t tell you what she said when she first opened the #1 pan of my most wonderful kitchen helper, but it was followed quickly by “found the *&$#! fish!”

I jumped up from my chair at the kitchen table. She had donned her plastic gloves and was already headed outside with her quarry when she yelled, “Don’t come out here. And leave that thing alone.”

“Are there maggots?” I asked.

“Yes, and stay away from it,” she answered. “Sit down.”

I did. Sit down.

I thought she had dumped the decrepit fish flesh in the garbage can, but she told me later she emptied it in the common area woods in the back of our house and then blasted it with the garden hose. She put it in the kitchen sink and doused it with hydrogen peroxide and Odoban, a disinfecting product I’ve used for years, especially during the Covid years.

Then she grabbed the #2 basket and put it in the sink, giving it the same going-over as #1. She unplugged the air fryer and furiously wiped the insides with paper towels, both wet and dry.

“Were there maggots inside it, too?”

She lifted her head and just stared at me. Or maybe she glared at me.

She disinfected the insides of that thing so much I was afraid it would never work again. She put the two baskets and their trays in the dishwasher. I put my hands on her shoulders and said, “Diana, you know I would never ask you to do something like that, but I want to thank you. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.”

She mumbled something nice and then announced, “I am going to get in the shower.

I heard her call over her shoulder, “Now that we’ve found Nemo.”

Grafting and Healing Gahhhh

Maybe forgetfulness is part of healing. I know it’s related to grief.

I didn’t remember Mom on June 24, the day she died two years ago, but I had a restless, sad week. I thought I was anxious about the debate between, you know, Him and Him.

The debate passed, and I was a bit nonplussed by the performance of both Hims. Good Lord. However, after that day, I was still uneasy and lethargic.

Friday, I went to the nail salon so Wii could put that powder stuff on my nails. I’m growing nails out under those shells, and I think this week will be my chance to go au naturale. I’m going to the salon where I took Dad three weeks before he died and Mom three weeks before she passed. It took me almost two years to get back there. I just went anywhere I hadn’t been with Mom or Dad.

When Wii began to speak, it came to me. June 24 had come and gone, and I hadn’t remembered that Mom died on that day two years ago. I grieved for a few minutes. I was surprised that the date hadn’t come to me. I think about her almost daily. But it had arrived in the form of almost a week of depression. My condition is better named Sorrow.

The body and the mind managed the grief. After the week had passed, I felt a small healing, and now I can laugh at some of the predicaments Mom and I got into. There were so many.

I’d started this blog piece three weeks ago, and now I felt I could write.

***

In April, my dentist and I decided I might need a gum graft. This is where the surgeon excises live gum tissue from somewhere in somebody’s mouth and then “plants” it in receding gums. It’s not a delightful procedure, but I endured it well with the help of whatever stuff they used to sedate me.

After the first look at my lower front teeth post-surgery, the doctor told me that after the new gum tissue had settled in, I might also need a frenectomy. Another dental surgery, whereby the little thing that holds the bottom lip to the gums is clipped. Yay for me.

I said, “Goody.” This procedure is scheduled for July 24.

I had a frenectomy when I was nineteen years old, living in Lewistown, Montana, with my folks, working for radio station KXLO. My dentist was Dr. Harry Ziolowski, known to most of us as Dr. Z, a man who weighed at least 400 pounds. I liked him but wondered how he could get close enough to work on my teeth. He always attended to my mouth with gentleness and efficiency. And he was funny.

The day Dr. Ziolowski clipped the frenum, I drove myself to the office. He numbed me up, and it didn’t take long. Dr. Z had just received a new kind of bandage for such a task. He explained that this material would feel like three big pieces of bubblegum inside my lower lip. He pressed it to the double incision and told me to pretend I had a wad of chew in there.

I tried to laugh, but he stopped me.

“No, don’t laugh. You can’t pull on that bandage. It’s supposed to settle in against where I did the work.”

Dr. Z had already prescribed some painkillers, and I had picked them up before the appointment. I headed to the restroom to clean up my bloody face and popped two of them before I drove home.

I was drowsy, but I knew Mom had not been feeling well when she went to work, so I fixed the Littles hot dogs, canned chili, and potatoes. Our Littles were the three Wong boys that we were fostering. They were happy to eat as soon as they came in from school.

“What in the world is wrong with your mouth?” Johnny Wong, the youngest at age nine, asked.

“Had surrrrzhy,” I said.

“What’s surrrzhy?” Jerry asked.

Johnny answered in a low tone, “They cut something out.”

“Her tongue?” Jerry asked.

Johnny huffed. “No, probably a tooth.”

I didn’t bother to correct him. I just wanted to get that bottle of ketchup on the table and make it to my bed. The numbing was wearing off.

Jimmy didn’t acknowledge his brothers’ conversation. He just said, “Good, Dinah,” as he pushed a large piece of chili-laced hot dog into his mouth.

“Oo eyes puh disses in dihwahher,” I said, turning toward the hall to my room.

I didn’t hear Mom come in. My mother was plagued with migraines, and I knew the worst of this one was on its way when she left for the bank. She was seeing an aura. I assumed she would go to bed early after talking to the boys and saying goodnight. She always read to them, but maybe not that evening, and Dad was away from home for some educational reason. She did go to bed, I found out.

At about midnight, I woke in terror with a giant bubble still attached to my mouth but lying on my pillow. I screamed and jumped away from the bed. Blood from this melon-sized balloon spattered over the whole room, pink bedspread, white ruffled pillows, and the walls. I grabbed a pillow and held it against my face. Mom was in front of the bathroom by the time I got there.

“What’s wrong? What’s happened?” she asked.

“I tink my buhbuhguh boke,” I answered, muffled by the pillow.

“Good grief. I don’t know what you’re saying, but we better call Dr. Z. And go get a towel.”

I grabbed a green hand towel from the bathroom and left the pillow in the tub, then weaved and wobbled back to Mom’s bedroom, helped her lie down with the princess phone, and propped two pillows behind her back. I was right. She was in the middle of a migraine.

I could hear the phone ringing.

“No answer,” she said. She hung up. She dialed again. It rang and rang, and finally, Dr. Z answered.

“This is Ethel Blair,” she told him. “Something’s wrong with Diana’s mouth. There’s blood everywhere.”

“Okay. Okay,” he said, half asleep. “Meet me at the office.”

“Alright,” she said to him and to me, “Honey, put some clothes on.”

I grabbed a yellow sweatshirt and a pair of wheat-colored jeans from the chair where I’d left them and staggered down the hall and through the kitchen to the garage. I jumped when I realized Mom was behind me. She was wearing her bank uniform skirt, a blue chenille cotton robe tied around her waist over her pajama top, and red fuzzy house slippers.

“You on’t hah tuh doh wif me, Ma,” I said. “You toh tick.”

“I’m in better shape than you are. Get in the car.”

I was in my seat by the time she made it to the driver’s side, holding onto our co-owned sixty-six Mustang. She backed out of the garage and handed me a brown grocery bag.

“Here, hold that in case I vomit,” she said.

We knew we’d probably make it to the doctor’s office before he did, as he and his family lived farther out of town.

We sat in the car in the dark. Mom held onto the steering wheel. After a few minutes, she said, “He’s not coming. I bet he fell asleep.”

There was a phone booth between Dr. Z’s place and the Dairy Dip.

“I doh cah him,” I said. “Do oo how caynzh? Doh hab pursss.”

Mom grabbed the paper bag and heaved. She leaned back against the seat, sighed, and said, “While you do that, I’ll throw this away.” Then she handed me her purse. I lifted her wallet and was glad to see she had a zippered pouch full of coins. I took it with me as I made my drunken way to the phone booth.

I knew his phone number. I dialed.

“Ethel? Is that you?” he asked.

“Dr. Z, ‘s Dinah. Dat baddash bust.”

“Oh no,” he answered. “I thought I was dreaming when your mom called. I’ll be there as soon as I can. I’m sorry.”

“‘Tay,” I said.

Mom had driven across the parking lot to the Dairy Dip. She was hurling into their big garbage can.

“Ma!” I called. “I tumih.”

I was beginning to gain control of myself, although I’m sure I staggered a little across the lot to the Dairy Dip trash can. I held Mom. She turned and said she thought she was feeling a little better.

“Oo dit ih duh sigh, an I dwibe,” I said. I pushed her into the passenger seat and rounded the Mustang, balancing myself against the vehicle with my left side.

She looked comfortable in the car. “Is he coming?” she asked.

I nodded my head.

“I’ll just stay here,” she said.

I drove slowly over a couple of bumps between the lots and parked as close to the door as I could.

“Whah if oo bahf?” I looked in the back seat. Nothing there to throw up in. I got out and opened the trunk. There was one of Dad’s leather book bags. It was sturdy. I emptied the books, papers, pens, paper clips, and whatever else was in the bag. I handed the bag to Mom and saw Dr. Z’s big truck with its bed cover-camper shell coming down the road.

I leaned against the car and waited for him to park and get out. He was wearing yellow and brown striped cotton pajamas, a matching plaid robe, and a bowler hat.

“Oh, Diana, I’m so sorry. Come on in here. Where’s Ethel?”

“Ih duh cah,” I said. “Siht. My-way.”

“Oh, gosh, I remember she gets migraines. Let me get her out of this car.”

He ran to the vehicle and opened the door.

“Ethel,” he said, “You can’t stay out here in the dark. Let me help you inside, and I can give you something to calm this old headache. “

Never mind me, I thought, moving the towel to a dry place.

Mom held his forearm with both arms, Dad’s book bag dangling from her left, as he carefully ushered her up the steps to the door. I held the wrought iron banister, glad to be a bit more with it than an hour ago.

“Diana, go on back,” Dr. Z said as he turned on the hall lights with his right hand and held onto Mom with his left. “Ethel, can you curl up on this sofa? I can give you a shot of Valium. I think it would help.”

Mom nodded. The sofa was a red velvet Victorian loveseat. It looked odd compared to the rest of the chairs in the room. Mom scrunched her knees up on the sofa as Dr. Z pushed her into place. She looked like she belonged on the short couch.

“I’m going to give your mother something for that headache,” he said, rambling around in the hall closet.

I climbed into the dental chair in the back room. It was dark.

I heard Dr. Z say, “Ethel, I’m going to pull your sleeve up. I normally give Valium in the buttocks, but I’d have to move you.”

Footsteps in the hall.

Dr. Z turned on the task light. I was nearly blinded.

“Where’s Rev. Blair?” he asked me as he prepared a tray.

“Pihwins,” I said through clenched teeth.

“Ah, Billings. I bet he’s at the State Teachers’ Conference. I thought it might be in Great Falls this year.”

“Es,” I answered. “Oo dib Ma sot?” I wrapped the white towel he gave me over my chest and under my chin. still holding the bloody towel against my mouth.

“Yes,” he said, “She should be feeling better in a few minutes. Okay, now, open up. Just a little. “

I opened my mouth and pulled down my lower lip.

“Oh my God, this is a mess,” he said. “That stuff…It’s not supposed to do THAT.”

He paused for a minute or two.

“After I numb you up, I’ll pull this bandage out and temporarily replace it with a stack of gauze. Then I’ll get you to hold it. You can be my assistant.”

“Here comes the numbing,” he said as he pushed the needle into several points on my lower gums. I remember seeing stars alternating with pitch black.

“Now, while that’s setting up, I’ll get that stuff out of there. Open just a little more.”

He lifted some instruments from the tray and started gently pulling on the rubbery mess. I held the gauze against my cheek.

“Okay, it’s almost out. Give me the gauze.”

He pressed it between my lips and my gums. “Hold that pretty tight,” he said. This was a bigger wad than the bubblegum.

“Oh, good lord,” he said, dumping the messy lump from his other hand onto a stack of paper bibs, which he carried to the waste can in the hall, along with my bath towel.

Blood ran from my mouth and filled the gauze. I kept holding. He gave me a second stack and left the first on the tray.

On his way back into the room, Dr. Z said, “Diana, I may have to cauterize this thing. You just keep holding for a minute.”

He went into a storage room across the hall and started grabbing equipment.

I didn’t care. I just wanted the whole thing over with.

I heard a thud closely followed by, “Oh, no, Ethel.”

I jumped from the chair, still holding the gauze, and followed Dr. Z.

Mom was on the floor, and this big man was going to try to put her back on the sofa.

“No, no,” I yelled. “Eeb huh oh tuh foohr.”

I rushed around the two of them, pulled a cushion out of a side chair, and pushed it under her head.

“You get back in there, young lady,” he said. “You’re going to cause that mouth to bleed.”

Like it’s not already bleeding, I thought.

He was back in the closet in a couple of moments, and called out to me, “I’m getting her a blanket and a towel in case she vomits.”

“See otay?” I asked.

“She’s good. She’s just sleeping.”

That’s what they say when somebody dies, I thought, and I got up and down the hall again.

“Mom, Mom,” I said, leaning over her on my knees. “Tan oo heeh me?”

“Yes, Honey,” she mumbled. “I hear you. I’m okay.” She put her forearm over her eyes.

Dr. Z. pulled me up and said, “Come on, let’s go.”

He followed me to the exam room. I climbed back into the chair.

“Leaning you back,” he said. “I’m going to stop that bleeding now.”

“I’m going to put this over your face,” he said, “and then you just let me lift your lip off the place, and it will only take a minute.”

Something heavy lay across the top half of my head.  Dr. Z. pulled my bottom lip out and started to remove the heavy gauze. I instinctively put my hand to my chin, thinking I would help him, I guess.

“No, no,” he shouted. “Get your hand back!”

I immediately heard a small sizzling. Then the smell hit me.

“Uhhhhhhgg,” I said and shivered.

“One more time,” he said as he touched the wound again. It did not hurt, but I heard it, and I smelled it.

“I doh be siht,” I said and wretched.

Dr. Z. fanned me with something, probably a magazine, and said quietly, “One last small one, and we’re done.”

He probed the third time and fanned me again.

“Wait, wait, wait just a minute.”

I did…wait. And then I threw up. All the blood I’d swallowed all night, and for all I knew, all my insides.

Dr. Z. helped me out of the chair. I stepped into the bathroom. I’d wet my bloodied jeans, and my yellow sweatshirt was a sickly-looking brown. There was blood in my hair and on my white tenny-runners that would never come clean.

“Diana,” he called. “You may want to shower yourself off before you go home. Is there anyone that can pick you up?”

“I tan dwibe,” I said. “I doh hab kwobes.” I hadn’t known there was a shower.

“You can wrap up in my bathrobe. It’s still clean.”

I opened the door. He was a mess, standing there holding out his bathrobe. “I’m going to throw your towel away. Is that alright?”

“Es.”

“How about your clothes?”

“No. I hab to tate dem ho.” Even in my sad condition, I wanted to save my favorite jeans and sweatshirt.

“I’ll find a bag or something,” he said.

“I nee tet oh Ma,” I said.

“I just did. She’s fine. Get yourself cleaned up a little.” He opened the door to his office and led me to his personal bathroom in the corner.

How about that? I thought. Corner bathroom with a corner shower.

“All I got is Lifebuoy. There’s a towel and face cloth on the sink,” he said. “Leave your clothes in the shower,” he said. “You can get the mess tomorrow.”

“Now,” he said, “I’m going to close my office door, and you can lock the bathroom door if you want.”

I closed the door, locked it, and turned the water on in the shower. I pulled the sticky sweatshirt over my head and unzipped the jeans. I decided to rinse them out. It took me longer to give the clothes a bath than my shower. I wondered what LifeBuoy hair would look like in the morning.

It took both Dr. Z and me to get Mom in the car. She was fairly limp.

“You sure you’re okay to drive?” he asked.

“Es,” I said. (I had a big gauze wad in my mouth.)

When we pulled into the garage, I realized I was not okay to get Mom into the house by myself. I was uncomfortable waking a neighbor at that hour of the morning. I leaned her seat back as far as it would go and went into the house to get blankets. She wouldn’t need a pillow, but I would.

The boys were all sound asleep.

I tucked a red bedspread around Mom, scrunched up in the back seat, and pulled a blanket over myself, still in Dr. Z’s bathrobe. I hope those boys set their alarm, I thought. I smelled Lifebuoy soap.  

***

***

Snake-handling

I’ve been working on my fish pond lately. I thought I had the waterfall fixed. It is not fixed. It’s still leaking. However, the pond seemed to be holding well, so now I have fish! My son Jade brought me six fish from his pond on Mother’s Day and the most beautiful bouquet that’s still going strong.

He said his wife Anjie bought him the special bucket for transport. They all arrived in good condition and still are. I bought some bullfrog tadpoles a couple of weeks ago to help clean up debris in the water and PondStart to condition it. These fish are about four to six inches long, and one of them is a Shebunkin, a pondie known for its koi-like tail.

There were eight koi gracefully swimming around when we moved here. About three months later, something tore through the netting and got them all. We’re blaming raccoons. I could not bear the expense of koi when raccoons and blue herons love them so much–and so often! I decided when I got new fish, they’d be just regular goldfish or pondfish or whatever anyone calls them now. Jade’s pond regulars had had too many babies, so he was happy to give me some.

I told him about my tadpoles and snails. He said that sure is a good way to clean up a dirty pond. I said I hoped nothing got my frogs.

“Well, now, Mom,” he said, “where there are frogs, there are going to be snakes.”

Uh-oh. I was too late. The bullfrogs–and others–were already hopping around and croaking. I knew what was coming.

Monday morning, I went down to the pond to find a snake caught in the netting over the water. She was about inches inches long. I touched her with the can of fish pellets, and she moved. Her middle was free, so I found a stick, pushed it under her loop, and pulled. Oh no, she had a fat place a couple inches from her head, probably half a frog in there, I thought, and an even fatter place where she’d caught the rest of her body, no doubt with the rest of the frog in that half. The stick broke.

Cybil. She almost twisted herself into a knot!

I sat on the side of the pond for a few minutes and studied her, trying to figure out how I’d get her out of the mess she’d created. I named her Cybil–and don’t even ask me how I knew she was a female. She wasn’t poisonous. I can’t imagine trying to free, say, a copperhead. I took her photo and enlarged it so that I could see her problem up close.

I finally decided that the only way this creature would be rescued was by my own hands. I carefully held her belly loop with my left hand and peeled the net away from the back half of her body with my right. The next trick would be to get her head free and back her out of the netting.

If a psychic had told me twenty years ago that I would become a snake handler, I wouldn’t have even laughed at such ridiculousness. But, hey, here I was, inching the net away from her head, freeing her body, and laying her down on the rocks to slither away.

Now, Cybil, I thought, just stay away from the frogs, and you and I will both be happier.

***

My neighbor, VB, maintains a pond just a bit smaller than mine. She’s been interested in sharing her fish with me. She asked if I could take some of the larger ones and some water plants with little rosemary-like spikes that reach for the sun while the fish feast on the roots.

“Oh, yes,” I said, “I’d love three or four fish.”

Yesterday, she pulled out some plants and put them in a big bucket. We peeled back my net to shove it in the water and tried to arrange it to hide the pump and pipes. We did the best we could, using a long pole to push it into place before she took my net to get me some big ‘uns out of her pond. VB and I love to admire each other’s gardens. She was saying how good the waterfall looked with the moss-covered rocks and its long flow into the pool of animals at the end. I was telling her that I thought the waterfall was leaking again.

Then she gasped. I ran to her side, just knowing she’d seen a snake, and said, “What is it? What is it?”

She said, “S-s-snake.”

Here was yet another of these hapless creatures who had poked his head through the net into the waterfall. “Oh, for crying out loud,” I said. “Here we go again.”

“Oh, Di, be careful; I think it’s a copperhead!”

“I don’t think so,” I answered, trying to get a closer view of this one I’d already named Cyrus. His head looked twisted and smushed by the net’s grasp, but he wiggled his body to let me know he was still with us.

“Get a stick,” VB said. “Or maybe a pole. It’s a copperhead. It has a triangular head.”

“No, come look. It’s not. His head is just all wampused (my word) from where the net is. He’s some kind of rat snake or water snake. He’s harmless.”

She gave him a side view. “I can see now, but you know,” she said,” if it has slanted eyes, it’s poisonous.”

“Hmmm,” I said, “I’m not sure I want to get to know him well enough to look him in the eyes.”

“Let me find you a stick. Or maybe we could get that pole we were using.”

“VB,” I said, “That won’t work. I tried it on Cybil, but it didn’t work.”

“How did you get her loose?” she asked. “Did you have to cut the net?”

“No,” I said, “I just pressed and pulled on the net until I could get her free.”

“With your hands.”

“Yes.”

“Di, you make me laugh.”

“Why?” I asked as I reached for the middle of Cyrus.

“Because I can’t think of another woman that would pick up a snake.”

“Well, that’s the only way old Cyrus is going to make it. He’s slowed way down already.”

Cyrus. His head was twisted in the net and he sort of looked dead.

VB said, “I’ll get the net and go get some fish. You work with the snake, but now, I’ll help if you need me to. I will.”

I’m not sure how she would have helped, but I told her to go fishing.

Cyrus had wrapped his tail under a rock, and I could not pull it loose. He was still. VB showed up with some fish. She came over to the waterfall and said, “You can’t get him loose.”

“No,” I said, “let’s just leave him alone. I think he’s just going to have to die that way. Let’s put the fish in.”

“Well, it’s just one. They’re so big I can’t get but one in the bucket at a time.”

We lifted the net again and dumped the orange and white fellow into his new habitat. He took off to join the small ones, and pretty soon, they were following him everywhere he swam.

VB said, “I think he likes his new digs! Okay, I’m going for another one.”

I stepped back up the gravel path to the snake in the net. He was moving his bottom half, and his tail was free.

VB appeared. I told her I was going to the garage for some scissors and maybe a grabber. “I’m going to have to cut him out of this net.”

I cut around his head and neck–if a snake has a neck. He was still moving when I laid him on the path.

When we had successfully re-homed eight of her fish, we checked on Cyrus. His head had improved, and jaws lined up together. He wriggled when I touched him. A half-hour later, he was gone.

I like to think he went home to Cybil.

While I was snake-handling, VB brought at least eight big fish and a couple small ones.

My pond is full…and it’s leaking again.

Help, Help, and Help.

Diana is a helper. I’m not talking about me, Diana, but the other Diana. We call her Diana, and I answer to Di. She has been our housemate for almost a year. I have permission to write this story.

We tell people Diana’s our Resident Aging Consultant or the Adult Caregiver, and sometimes, well, just our friend. She’s nestled in our house’s lower level (walk-out basement). She shares the space with many plants and my corner office-of-sorts, still in disarray from moving to this house over a year ago. She agrees that we are making progress, though.

When her daughter became ill and was hospitalized after Baby James arrived, Diana was away for several weeks. We missed her, but we knew she was perfect to stand in for Mama and help Daddy.

James is her first grandbaby, and she has poured out all her love.

Now she’s here. She misses that baby but says she is ready to be home. She’s baked muffins, re-potted plants, and helped with my messy corner. She also maintains the hot tub and takes me on shopping runs, even taking my Amazon returns to the UPS store. She has always done dishes and cleaned in the kitchen. She even cooked most of my son’s birthday dinner last night. I did put those artichokes in the Crockpot, which is the very best way to cook them, in case you didn’t know. I also chose the recipes Baked Orzo with Seafood and Ricotta Cake with raspberries.

It’s uncanny how Diana can simultaneously side with Dave and me in a discussion, and it’s delightful that the three of us laugh about that and almost everything else.

Our sweet friend downstairs is a recovering alcoholic. She is learning to live a good life with integrity and grace, but aren’t we all? Perhaps her background gives her a one-up in caregiving. The job she took leave to care for James (I really want to call him Jack) is CNA (Certified Nursing Assistant) in a memory care ward at the assisted living facility just a half-mile down the road.

Her time with us is anything but boring and, most of the time, a lot of fun, and I know that the days and nights she spent with her grandson are etched on her heart with gratitude.

But now, her most interesting, rewarding, and funny moments must be those at the Cloverland Assisted Living Community memory care level. She said I could share her stories if I changed the names, something about HIPAA. (If you don’t know HIPAA, you haven’t visited a doctor’s office in several years.) I’ll use nicknames, and I’ll choose ones close to what the staff calls them.

The first patient I heard about was Tootie-two-step, the last two words describing how she walks. She’s a practiced thief, picking up anything loose and sometimes moving it to unsuspected places. If it’s food, she eats it. Sometimes, she even eats something that is not food. Someone on staff always calls after her, “Tootie, Tootie, you give that to me!”

Sheila never knows what she wants. She might yell, “Help! I want popcorn,” and then not eat a bite. She might ask to go to bed, but when Diana starts to help her into nightclothes, she cries and says, “I don’t want to go to bed.” When she asks for water, she frequently dumps it on the floor.

Nancy Ann is sinister and only talks mean. Diana thinks she picked up a malevolent spirit as a nurse with Doctors Without Borders. Nancy Ann’s mother lives upstairs in the assisted living section. She is not mean at all, and she frequently visits and brings pastries.

One resident’s husband visits daily and neatly arranges his wife’s room, even color-coding her clothes. He’s vocal and picky about everything. No one is fond of him, but he seems not to worry when Diana’s working. It’s like he says, “Diana’s got this.”

Kitty is teensy-tiny with an acerbic sense of humor. When her assistant helps her dress, she says, “Oh boy, now we’re having fun.” One day, Diana told her, “I like your bird shirt.” Kitty answered, “Yeah, we’re all gonna fly away.”

Mr. Bernardi was a restaurateur. His daughter is often belligerent and hostile when she visits and doesn’t believe that he gets sexual with the staff and other residents.

Napoleon is always pissed off, maybe because he’s tiny? Guitar Joe can’t remember what he can sing or play. The Keebler Elf’s husband visits every day. His nickname is Grumpy, but he and his wife are not demanding. Mrs. Elf gives hugs.

Ron, the Chicago cop, will take his tray, put it on the rolling cart in the hall, and then say he did not get dinner. He often gets another plate. He also asks questions like “Where is my checkbook? What is this place? Why am I here?” and tells whoever is close, “Listen, that person [he points] told me I could go across the street any time I want, so I’ll be leaving here tomorrow.”

If he did get loose to go across the street, he’d be in John and Vicky’s (son and daughter-in-law) driveway. It wouldn’t be the first time a resident has appeared in front of their house since the center was built a couple of years ago.

I’ve told my sons I do not want to live with them and that if I can’t care for myself, they should just install me at Cloverland Park. I mean, it’s right across the street from John and Vicky’s house. Jade and Anjie, Darrin and Dana, and the others could make a brief stop when they come this way. All the kids could meet up at John and Vicky’s and discuss Grammingo before visiting!

Diana, the provider of help, help, and help, says there’s no way I will live at Cloverland Park.

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