Tag: memory

How to Get a New Bathroom

On March 25, I was in the bathroom in front of the sink, innocently brushing on brown mascara, and I missed. I usually do. I stepped across the bathroom to grab a tissue from a chest next to the commode. I don’t know why I didn’t use the cotton pads I keep in a pink carnival glass powder box on a mirrored vanity tray, or, come to think of it, a makeup sponge behind the medicine cabinet mirror. Vanity tray. I haven’t thought of using that description in how many years.

When I turned to walk back to my sink (Dave’s sink is closer to the tissues,) the second vanity drawer between our separate bowls slid out in front of me. Here we go with “vanity” again. My split-second brain said, “Get out of the way.” It’s a puzzle to me, but I didn’t hear any instructions on the correct way to step aside. My right foot went over my left and caused me to stagger four or five feet across the bathroom.

First, I hit the wooden door with the left temple of my head. I know from my foray into serious brain study that the left hemisphere controls the right. At that time, my left brain told my right to use some of that “spatial awareness,” so I bounced self-protectively off the door, turned to the right, took one step, and hurled myself into the glass shower door.

This was a big fluke, RB (Right Brain). I broke that shower door with the back of my head. Everybody knows that when it comes to who controls that section, both components collaborate. I think both of them raided the liquor cabinet in the bar and were shindigging on margaritas in my best crystal.

It was a large shatter, but very little of the tempered glass fell out, and that was inside the shower. There would be no blood.

Dave was there in the best hurry he could manage, calling, “Are you alright?”

I answered him in the loudest voice I could muster, “No.”

As he stood, bending over my body on the floor with my neck still holding my head against the etched glass, he offered his hand and asked if I wanted help getting up.

Again, I answered, “No,” and added, “I can get up by myself.”

I did, hunching up like a lazy bear. Dave tried to assist my walking, but I outran him, and plopped down in my La-z-Boy in the living room. Actually, our open-concept room is also a bar, a dining room, and a music room. The grand piano barely fits into its assigned space. I’d like to sell it. Pianos are difficult to sell. Grands may get more attention than others, but it’s still hard.

I don’t know how long I sat in the recliner. I had a headache, not a bad one, and I almost went to sleep.

Dave and I discussed the emergency room. I turned down the opportunity, probably not the best idea I’ve ever had. We have this Republican woman running for Governor, and she’s devoid of a good mind and has never come up with an idea of her own. She’s been quite successful, first running for U.S House Representative and then the Senate, sailing merrily around our government, and I suppose doing everything she can to ruin all my long-held notions of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I could be successful too as a half-wit, which is what I wound up with after the crash.

The day of this event was a Thursday, as I recall, just after my writing group’s two-hour discussion, mostly about the half-wits running everything these days.

I drove myself to Dr. Bonvissuto’s office on Monday. She has been my primary care physician for about twenty years. I love her nurse, Heather. She can answer just about any question I have. When I called that morning for an appointment, she said, “Well, yeah, you need to see the doctor. And you didn’t go to the emergency room, Ms. Revell?”

Before I could answer, she asked, “Why not?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t want to.”

She alleged with certainty that I really wasn’t operating on all cylinders when I made that decision.

So, yeah, I got a concussion, a small one, they said.

A few days later, when all the symptoms hit at once, I wanted to ask these professional football players, who make big money banging each other’s heads, how they could get back on the field and operate with a large one.

I survived dizzy spells, nausea, left- and right-side brain fog, and generally feeling like a dog turd in the hot sun. Sometimes I couldn’t walk without weaving. I didn’t drive unless it was urgent. Dr. B and Heather had spoken frankly with me about driving my old Sienna van. I tried to cooperate.

***

We welcomed the American Home Design representative into our home and gave him a seat at the dining table. He recommended removing the large Jacuzzi, creating a large shower there, and using the old shower area for a closet. The garden tub was useless, and I was glad it would be gone. We (I) chose colors and materials for the order. And got that puppy happy and done.

We have a new 72-by-48 shower. Everything works right after two weeks of installation and four service calls following. The last of the tweaks and corrections happened shortly after my phone call with the curt, maybe rude, Installation Manager, who thought he could mansplain. Uh-uh. My brain is unruly, both halves.

It’s beautiful, with faux grey marble walls, a large picture window filmed with the stuff you can see out and they can’t see in, and shiny chrome accessories. There are lots of bars and shelves to hang onto and a built-in bench. We’re still wallpapering, painting, and adding shelves in the closet and other handy places.

So we have a new bathroom. The walls are a delicate, soothing pink. It’s not girly, just comfortable. I’ll post photos when the room is finished.

*

You can have a new shower, too, although I can’t recommend my method. I might suggest a sledgehammer to the shower door and just tell your husband you broke it with your head.

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.”