I pretty much don't have to say any more than that. But that would be unlike me so maybe more specifically, don't take IN your demented mom, to your house and your life, if you ever want to spend any coherent time with your children again.
We had to go to SB to look at an apartment for Emma who is heading to College in a Pandemic, and last time we left mom for over 4 hours she was chasing her babysitter around with a broom, scarring her for life and obviously not getting any sweeping done.
So what we did then was sit on a razor's edge of mood for the hour and a half there, while there, and then hour and a half back. And layer in please the incredible ability of nonstop talk that my mom could always do, just now with this new superpower of notmakinganysense and extra topping, paranoia. I'm pretty sure my mom might murder me if she thought I took her 14 quarters that she keeps counting. Good news is she can't figure out knives and really the ONLY thing that receives her constant unflagging attention is fallen leaves.
She will not leave a leaf on the ground. She could be on FIRE, hobbling from a burning house, and she would stop to pick up that leaf.
I like to think that she is in transition from earth to spirit, that she's somewhere in that place we straightforward serious thinking people don't have time for, aren't in need of yet, that's why it's so annoying, what is she talking about, why has her body eaten her brain, is she describing with her chatter the steps to the place she is going, is it mossy with slippery grass, the ladder twisted with flowers, I hope she will fall into a soft bubble and float up the rest of the way, her feet draped out like she does in the pool
I miss my mom, the way she used to be, and who I got to be when she was here
I told my daughters, both of them still here, out in this outside land that I barely get to visit right now, in the Land of Function, I told them it is still important that the bigger one is going to college, and that it is a huge thing for any family, the preparation of feathers for the first big launch out of the nest, and here our whole experience has taken on this horror movie soundtrack but have to STOP, we can't let it get in the way of these moments, the big love of all our babies, these we have raised for this very moment happily
So we're trying to keep our eyes on that very bright floating planet, that Emma, the Jupiter right there that we can see in the night sky right now, tiny next to the huge moon, but steady just the same.
I am following my mom around scooping up the loose brain that is getting all over everything and trying to tuck it back in like the goop in those farting putty jars, endlessly just stuffing it back in like the brain waitress. But I'm still here for them. My little flowers I love so much. My eyes are on that star.
