Parkinson’s

Parkinson’s Help

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I had a long conversation with a member of our Parkinson’s support group today. She called mostly to talk about her husband who has Parkinson’s disease (PD). And the struggles she was having as a caregiver with Parkinson’s disease care management. We talked for a long, long time. Maybe half hour, 45 minutes she was on the phone. She was pretty forthcoming, with lots of things that she was dealing within her life, I was surprised by the call and I don’t know why but I am glad she reached out and I was able to give her an ear. Afterward it made me feel good. It made me feel sad for her.

It made me think…

Think a lot about Cheryl and how I dealt with helping her deal with her disease. She had a lot of the same issues Bev was talking about. Her stories were remarkably similar to my memories of that time in our life.
Bev is dealing with it (Parkinson’s in her husband) right now. With her husband her description is very, very similar to where Cheryl was maybe 2 years or so before the end of her life. The parallels are really striking. Bev was telling me that they moved into the condo that they are now living in about 5 years ago. (Same for us.) Mostly because it was getting harder and harder for her husband. He always, you know, mowed the lawn. And he did the maintenance kind of activities that you have with the house.

She went on and on to tell me lots of stories about things and I think I’ll have to think about them for a while. But the but the whole story line is so remarkably similar and so sad and well, maybe not sad, but but frustrating, you know, the disease just kind of consumes your whole relationship with with your spouse, they’ve been married a long time too.

They’ve been married about 35 years. They were together 3 or 4 years before that. Cheryl and I were married 53 years and we had been together for 4 years before that, it’s just incredible how similar the stories are.

Anyway, I needed to take time away from what I was doing here in my class management at the Mason campus of Sinclair College. I had to go have lunch somewhere where I could sit quietly and think about things and grade papers and take my mind off of that phone conversation and the memories it conjured. That was such a debilitating part of my life and Cheryl’s. It was so all-consuming. I think that’s what gets missed when people talk about care. Giving it is so all-consuming, slow moving, frustrating and then people will still say, “Well you’re blessed to have her or your blessed to have him. There’s no fucking blessed going on in that whole Parkinson’s/dementia thing.

Just.

Not.

Happening.

Bev did tell me one other useful thing. Her family doctor told her that she needs to go outside and take a walk everyday. No phones, no music, no nothing, you need to go out and listen to the birds, enjoy the sunshine. If there is no sunshine, enjoy the rain, if there is rain take an umbrella, but for 30 minutes a day, you got to just walk away from everything, get rid of the stress, let it go. That is absolutely the best advice I’ve ever heard anybody say to anybody else about this horrible disease of Parkinson’s. It truly is a horrible disease. I remarked to her that it was the best piece of advice I had ever heard. (I got away to ride my bike whenever I could.)

Not only does PD make it so that you can’t get around easily. It’s a brain disease, so lots of times the brain goes wacko. He or she becomes a whole different person. Bev was actually talking about that too.

She and I commiserated for a bit; they like us have been married a long time. All the early on things that they and we had. They had a really good life up until just a few years ago, when she thinks he really went downhill in a hurry. But that kind of story is just so common, and somehow doctors aren’t able to describe the signs to the care partner. It seems almost like you would need to have a psychiatric version of Parkinson’s doctor. PD is a movement disorder, so one seeks out a movement disorder specialist but probably one also needs a brain specialist or its psychiatric personality disorder specialist, in other words, a brain guy to to talk about some of these issues. The sad thing is the person with Parkinson’s disease doesn’t recognize what is actually going on. The person helping a person with a dementia issue, of course, is struggling to do the right thing to get the best care. Those around him or her (the family) without the lived experience, those that aren’t dealing with it on a day to day basis, they think that everything is generally okay, because the PD person the demented person is able to actually keep it together for an hour or 2 or whatever it takes to get through the party or the social activity, and so, those people, that part of the family who is not living there does not get to see the whole picture.

They think everything is fine or mostly fine.

Whoever it is, is obviously ill with PD and can’t move so good. Maybe they look old and got arthritis…

So many things are invisible. They cannot be seen. Or we choose to not see.

Carpe Diem

It is Easy to be Bitter

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That thought popped into my head as I looked through stories on this blog and thought about the past couple years with Cheryl.

I do not want to be bitter. What I want is to leave it all behind for a while.

Hind sight is twenty-twenty as wisdom has written but the view is also distant and wider. It can be more scenic. Much sweetness is visible with the bitter.

Looking forward has greater appeal.

Carpe Diem.

The Walk and Fundraiser

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On Sunday September 8th the Rev It Up for Parkinson Walk/Run/Bike occurred. My daughter contacted a friend of hers who does silk screening and had special T-shirts made.

This year has been special in many ways.

At the beginning of the year Cheryl was in a memory care facility and was also being cared for by Queen City hospice. On April 22nd, she left this life for another.

She missed her 75th birthday by a couple weeks. I made no note in my journal about her birthday. I was down on that day. It was only a few days after I buried her.

I think about her often. Little things will go by in the day and my first inclination is to look over where she should be – in her chair at home, on the passenger side of the car, in the kitchen – to ask her about what she thinks or how she feels about it. Whatever it is.

My birthday came and went. I went to visit with my sister. I wanted to see her but I also think I did not want to be without someone on my birthday. Birthdays were a big deal to Cheryl and she made everyone around her understand why that day was important.

Our wedding anniversary came and went. I wrote her a letter. Writing it seemed to help me a little.

This walk/run was a favorite fundraiser of hers. I felt a little lost on Sunday. Last year she was unable to get moving to be there for the walk. Our family went without us. Over time Parkinson’s disease will peter you out.

I purposely work to remember her before the disease petered her out.

Afterward I used part of the afternoon to ride my bike for a bit. I thought about how she would have wanted to be with everyone. I thought about what a loving and kind person Cheryl was. I thought about how she would try to (her words) make sure everyone was satisfied and doing well.

I think that I was not doing well. I had not thought about that until my sister called in the evening to chat about how it all went. We talked for a while. I told her it was good and it was fun. I was at my son’s house and he had just asked me if Mom had ever actually walked the whole walk. I said no and was in the midst of memories of us walking when we used to hike. I had some videos of Cheryl on my phone and was looking at her Parkinson stride when my sister called.

Thanks, Joyce. I needed you right then and did not know it.

Carpe Diem

Music – Nostalgia and Healing

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Lately I have noticed how the residents at the Harbor at Bridgeway Pointe seem to perk up and take part in the music that gets played occasionally either as a part of Hospice care or BP’s effort to provide activities for them. Most residents have some physical inability to participate fully and yet they do their part. Music has this effect on everyone.

One day when I returned to my little condo I looked at our old stereo and drug the two plastic tubs of LPs that had made the cut to our new place from the old one. Once before Cheryl and had done this but it has been a few years now.

I have played several old albums during the past few evenings. We have quite a collection of stuff. She tended toward Johnny Mathias and the Four Tops. I tended toward the Iron Butterfly and the Doors but intermingled in the tubs with those are Carly Simon, Crosby Stills & Nash, Peter Paul & Mary and Linda Ronstadt (another parkie). Growing up in the late 60’s and married in the early 70’s, I was very tuned into the Vietnam War and the associated commotion that it stirred up in my generation. So, there are a lot of folk singers in the tubs.

Listening and not listening to Crosby, Stills and Nash this morning, Steven Stills started singing, ” Helplessly hoping her harlequin hovers nearby awaiting a word.” I quit working the quordle for a minute and listened carefully. The refrain, ” They are one person. They are two alone. They are three together. They are for each other.” made me cry and think about Cheryl.

“Wordlessly watching he waits by the window and wonders at the emptiness inside.” – Steven Stills. 1969 Gold Hill Music Inc.

I needed a bit of nostalgia. This song and these words have a different meaning to me today. I will spend some time thinking about this today. I think Cheryl is getting close to the end and it breaks my heart. It is hard to find good in any of this situation.

Carpe the damn Diem and keep looking.

When I Visit Cheryl

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When I visit Cheryl which happens everyday I notice things. Some of these are after I return home. I am not so concerned about where I put my shoes after I take them off for example. When Cheryl was here with me I was constantly concerned with trip hazards lying about in our condo. Occasionally we would argue about things like doormats and trow rugs, all of which I had removed from the condo over time as her ability to move and walk and balance became worse.

I notice how the staff interacts with the residents. They are generally kind and attentive. They are, I imagine, acutely aware of their own staffing levels.

I notice how the residents interact with the staff. Helen, another resident in the Harbor with Cheryl, is awake and alert and talkative today. Last night the Super Bowl went into overtime. It was not won until just before 11 PM, so, I imagine that several maybe most of the staff sat up and watched it until the end like I did. The difference being that I did not have to get up at 5 AM to make the 6:30 AM staff meeting. Some of the staff have that combination of Monday morning sleepy grumpy going on. I get that. I used to be a service/engineering manager. Mondays were often unnecessarily busy while we picked up all the stuff that fell on the floor over the weekend.

I notice the level of staffing. It is less so on the weekends as one might expect it to be. If there is one single area that I could suggest could be improved it would be weekend staffing. The world in general revolves around folks not working weekends without some sort of extra incentive which is often money. Rewarding altruism and empathetic caring for folks who cannot care for themselves is hard work for the administration and work life balance is strained when the work and life are similar. Conjuring useful rewards for weekend work like appealing to their sense of altruism is probably tough.

I notice the changes when the shift ends. The next group comes in. It is generally a smooth transition.

I hear the little discussions between the staff – what’s important to them.

I also find that if I am not the full time care partner I was when Cheryl was home with me I am able to have opinions about how others do the same task. I wonder about how I might do it differently. I keep those thoughts to myself. Juggling the needs of a dozen people at different stages of Alzheimer’s, Lewy body, Parkinson’s and other forms of dementia is more complicated than I had to deal with at home. My personal dilemma was remaining kind and thoughtful with lack of sleep but a lot of love. Love is sometimes hard to find if you are Mr. Lack-of-sleep-cranky-pants.

All of this wandered though my thoughts today as I visited with Cheryl and sat with her while she dozed in her chair. She was slightly awake but sitting with her eyes closed. She was uninterested in having company. I just held her hand for a bit and it seemed like she relaxed and fell into a nap. I miss her daily company.

Carpe Diem. ( Carpe Somnum when it is time.)

Stream of Conscious – Touch

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Two days ago when I sat with Cheryl in the common area of where she is staying, I noted in my journal that she seems to need touch. I think I do too. On these occasions when she does not seem to be in the present, somewhere in her head she needs to feel, manipulate and touch.

It seems to me that these days Cheryl has to have more touch. That is just my thought in my observations when I see her. I am just sitting with her and seeing how she’s doing. But that is what I see and think. I think also that I need the same kind of touch. I sit there and turn the chair so that I can we can be side by side and I can hold her hand. Doing that action is important to me. I observed that about myself today. Today for awhile, about an hour or so, we sat holding both hands. She was holding my left hand with her left hand and I was holding her her right hand with my right hand and we sat that way for a long time.

I am writing this using an app that I downloaded that transcribes spoken words into printed words. I will see how that goes. It looks like I can write in a crude fashion. I can just send this text to myself via email and then paste it into a document and then spend some time trying to figure out exactly what I am trying to say.

It is hard to describe. What I see and and I mean as I think about what I am internalizing when I’m touching her or feeling as I am feeling her knee. Cheryl has gotten very skeletal over the past few weeks.

Even as she looked around at things in the room and told me some story that I could barely hear because her voice is so soft. There is a lot of ambient noise; television in the main room, television in one or two side rooms, Bluetooth music and the occasional phone call, she would simply just sit holding my hands. She was okay to sit that way. Every now and then I had to move my hand and scratch my nose or whatever and every now and then she would let go and you know touch something else or scratch her nose or whatever. It is fascinating to me as this goes on how much it is important for the both of us to touch each other.

The whole thing about touch is sort of interesting to me. I think we have always had that throughout our married life but as I as we get further in this Parkinson’s journey, the sense of touch is is important to me and I think I really do think it’s important to Cheryl. We are communicating our presence to each other through touch.

She does not resist it. She does resist things that that bother or sometimes hurt her. Her sense of pain can be strong. I am sure she feels pain because every now and then she says stop doing that, it hurts me or something like that, or maybe she’s having a cramp in her leg or whatever the deal is, but simple touch is very different. She will also grimace if something causes pain.

I have been exploring the nuances of touch in my head and I don’t really know how to describe differences of instance. It is interesting to me that it is important to her and me at the same time.

Now if she is sleeping or she’s very tired or trying to doze or she does not feel quite right or she is hungry or she needs to go to the toilet or needs to move, then touching gets in the way. When she was still home here with me, it seemed like we would fight (not the right word) when I was helping her with one of these activities. She would be dissatisfied with any any help that I would give her.

I sometimes just reached over to touch her leg to see whether or not there is anything left there. And I realize that I am holding on to her thigh bone, for example without hardly any any any meat. She used to be a much bigger woman. She used to be a lot fluffier. Just a year ago, I would have had a very hard time picking her up and holding her up and helping her into and out of bed. These days, in some book somewhere, I read somebody describe somebody as a bag of bones, that is a pretty good description of Cheryl. She still has a lot of muscle strength when she decides to squeeze and grab something, but she really doesn’t have a lot of mass. There is little subcutaneous fat left on her body and that too makes me want to touch her just simply so that I know in my own mind that she’s still there and she’s still alive. Without touching her she still in my heart. I think about her all the time but somehow there is a physicality that happens when when I actually touch her.

She is very skinny. Touching helps me to understand.

Carpe Diem.

Guilt or Grief?

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Is it guilt or is it grief?

This morning as I looked for pictures and other small items to turn Cheryl’s room at Bridgeway Pointe into hers, I cried again. I have been doing that more lately.

I feel a wide range of emotions as I think about this next phase of our lives that begins tomorrow.

My son and daughter-in-law visited her new space over the weekend after we moved furniture into it. I asked my daughter-in-law to look around a think about what pictures and wall ornamentation would be appropriate. I think that really needs a woman’s eye. (It is a stereotype. I know but it is what I think.) She and my son made a list and over the past couple days I have been stockpiling those items in Cheryl’s office area in the extra bedroom we have here.

While doing that, selecting pictures and reading old notes that Cheryl wrote to herself, I had several crying jags. Looking inward for a bit, I may be an emotional wreck for a time while we transition. Just writing that on paper makes me think about our life. It was great. It is less so these days with her disease being a focus for everything.

So, is it guilt that I feel unable to take care of her as I want to? Or is it grief that we have come to the end of a part of our time together? It is my anxiety. Is this best for her? And me? How will I do when she is being cared for by others? A wide range of emotions wash over me.

Is it grief or is it guilt? Why do I use the term guilt?

There is much to meditate about.

Carpe Diem.

Free Falling

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The Traveling Wilburys or some other group recorded song many years ago with this title. There are many days when I feel just like this. We are free falling through life with Parkinson.

There are days when I wish I could see the world through her eyes. There are days when I wish I could sense the world through her jumbled senses. There are days when I wish I could understand why it was important to stack the Kleenex just so.

It is exhausting.

This morning as I think about Cheryl’s disease and how it is affecting her and how it has changed our life my emotions about it all are jumbled up in my thoughts.

Love is carrying us through it all but a few more scientific facts would be useful.

Some evenings go smoothly and she is calm when she goes to bed at night. She sleeps. I sleep. Those facts may have little to do with outcomes of the next day. Last night I lowered my expectations of her and suffered along. Eventually about 1 AM sleep happened.

Today we have donuts for breakfast.

Carpe – this – Diem. The next day may not be.

A Day that will Live in Infamy

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Looking back from the afternoon towards the morning I have to laugh a little.

Cheryl’s doctor is still adjusting her meds. Trying to sort out sleep issues, depression issues, hallucination issues, movement issues and other Parkinson dilemmas takes time. In the meantime sleep is illusive. Last night I got the message – quit taking the quetiapine for sleep. So I did not give her the quetiapine.

This morning I got the message, the doctor has communicated with the neuropharmacist and reviewed all the other stuff she is taking. Start giving her the quetiapine 75 mg for 5 days and then 100 mg from then on. The nurse practitioner will check back in two weeks to see how it all turned out.

That is counter intuitive. 75 mg is twice the original amount of quetiapine that she was taking. After I finished reading all that I went to check on Cheryl. She was awake as she had slept poorly but quiet enough that I slept like a stone or at least a stone with a two-teaspoon bladder capacity. Overnight I sensed that Cheryl was awake but she was not talking gibberish which happens sometimes when she dreams out loud. I fell asleep easily after getting up a couple times. (God, I hate old age.)

We decided on waffles and fruit for breakfast. She ate her pears and part of a waffle and disintegrated into a coughing nausea fit which caused her to quit eating anything else for awhile. As that died down a bit, my cousin-in-law called with a long explanation about why she was unable to participate in Pizza Tuesday tonight.

Linda told me a story about her upstairs neighbor’s incompetency, water leakage and associated repairs. I started to think my life was not so bad at least my building wasn’t falling down around me.

Cheryl decided that she wanted to lay back down for awhile. I helped her back to the bed room and the bed. I then returned to the kitchen to finish assembling a new pot of coffee and wait for the next activity. I turned on the kitchen tap and a tiny trickle came out.

When I had the kitchen remodeled a few years ago I opted for the super faucet that I only need to touch somewhere to make it come on. It was a $300 option but it was extremely handy over the years. It is a battery powered system and the problem that presented itself told me the batteries needed to be replaced. Alas! I found new batteries and did that. Still no water! I called the plumber. Micky listened and told me that they have had a couple failures but she was sure mine was still under warranty and would check to see how long to get parts and call me back.

I took my coffee pot to the sink in the utility room for water. The sink in the utility room was running very slowly. WTF? Did we have a water main break? I called the Greater Cincinnati Water Works generic hold number and the robot answer-er asked if I wanted to discuss my bill. No! I replied. and eventually was connected to queue manned by a single human. This is similar to going to the post office to buy stamps at the wrong time of day. While on hold i decided to go look for my Amazon package that the driver had beeped my door buzzer about earlier. The package was leaning on my front door which led me to look into the front lobby of our condo building. The front door was propped open by a plumber who was working on the new neighbor’s condo up stairs. I tapped on her door and grumped long and loud about turning off the water to the building without warning anyone. — Turn about is fair play; she grumped loud and long about someone stealing her ladder when she was moving in which did not happen. The painters thought it was theirs and realized their mistake and put it back in the incorrect spot.

Someone had mismarked the main water supply which comes into the building as the cutoff for the second floor condo not realizing what they were doing. Our new neighbor’s water shutoff valve was hiding behind the water heater. The plumber figured out where it was after we complained about the water being off. He got bad information from a resident that was not here. Who knew?

I later apologized to my neighbor about raising much ado about nothing.

In the meantime Cheryl’s head is off in lalaland.

Sleep would be a good thing for her.

It is Pizza Tuesday.

Carpe Diem.

Sometimes You Find Things

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Cheryl throws little away when it comes to cards, letters and other written communications. Those include decades old information about house buying, information about her mother Elaine’s finances and letters to Cheryl while at Oldenburg Academy. Old pictures are a treasure and are these days mixed in at random. Recently I was searching for a story I had written some time ago about my mother. While searching for this on many thumb-drives I discovered several note files Cheryl had made a few years ago when her mother passed away. These are thoughts about comments for a eulogy about Elaine.

These days Elaine is very much in Cheryl’s thoughts. Elaine is present and real to her. She often says, “I want to go visit Mom.” Here are some of her memories from a few years ago.

Eulogy for Mom, an Excellent Seamstress

The first example of Mom’s sewing skills took place when Janice and Cheryl were little girls, maybe Cheryl was 5 years old and Janice was 3. Anyway Mom made each of them a new winter coat and leggings and a drawstring purse… she may have also made each of them a bonnet… we’re not sure because we cannot find the photos. However, part of what made this so special is that these clothes were made out of the fabric of 2 adult coats that were no longer needed… we don’t know if they were old coats that belonged to Grandma or Grandpa Moeller or someone else in the family. But Mom carefully took apart the seams in the adult-size coats and made these lovely warm outfits for Janice and Cheryl. Cheryl’s coat, leggings, and purse were made out of a light gray fabric, and Jan’s coat, leggings and purse were made out of dark red fabric. Mom had a lot of patience and skill as a seamstress.

The second example of Mom’s sewing skills is best told from Cheryl’s perspective:

This story took place when we were making plans for Nancy and Ron’s wedding. Mom and I were making the bridesmaids’ dresses for Nancy’s wedding. We had purchased this lovely, soft fabric that had a light blue background with a multicolored floral design. We bought the last bolt of that fabric at the store… there was no more anywhere. We knew that we might have trouble getting all the dresses we needed from that fabric, but we were determined to make it work. Finally we came to the last dress, which was mine. As we were cutting out the pieces of the pattern, we realized that we did not have enough to cut out both sleeves for my dress. The sleeves were what I would call poofy sleeves with an elastic cuff at the elbow. We did have a couple of fabric remnants, but none were large enough for the sleeve. Mom came to the rescue! She sat there at her kitchen table and moved the 2 largest remnants around until she matched up the floral print; then she sewed the remnants together, and you had to look really hard to see that seam. I finished making the dress, and I was extremely proud to wear that dress in Nancy’s wedding.

More stories about Mom

Travel — Mom was never afraid to fly anywhere. She often flew to Florida to visit Janice and her family. She also was friends with a couple who lived in Virginia Beach. Mom would fly to Virginia Beach to visit this couple… Mom’s friends would usually have to go to work while Mom was visiting, but they would give Mom access to the nearby beach. And Mom enjoyed the sunshine and walking the sandy beaches. These thoughtful friends gave Mom a place to relax, especially during the years soon after Dad died.

Jobs — Mom worked as a dispatcher for the St. Bernard Dial-a-Ride for 15 years, beginning in 1991 when she retired from her job as a receptionist in a doctor’s office. Mom loved the part-time Dial-a-Ride job. It allowed her to keep up with activities in her beloved St. Bernard. Everyone knew her and loved her. The only reason that she quit the job when she was 80 years old was because she was losing her eyesight due to macular degeneration… so she had difficulty writing in the dispatcher’s log… other workers had trouble reading Mom’s handwriting… even Mom had trouble reading what she had written. She thoroughly enjoyed working at Dial-a-Ride. She said that, if her eyesight had remained good, she would have continued working there until the end of her life.

Picnics in the county parks with our Krause and Moeller cousins when we were little.

Attended Mass at St. Clement Church on Sundays and during the week.

Reading stories to any and all grandchildren, even when her eyesight was fading.

Bowling team with Evelyn Schulte, Marian Kistner, and Marian Kahlis — played at Brentwood Bowl.

Eulogy for Mom, 2 Special Men in Mom’s Life

Mom had a really good relationship with Dad. They were devoted to each other and to their children. Mom and Dad liked to go dancing… sometimes at the Eagles Hall… sometimes at a wedding reception… any place that was playing music written by the likes of Glen Miller, Johnny Mercer, Henry Mancini, etc. Dad also loved to spend time with his children, even though he worked so many hours at his gas station/auto repair shop, that we didn’t see him as often as we would have liked to. When Dad would come home from the gas station, he usually had some accounting work to do after he ate some supper. If it wasn’t too late, he and Mom might sit at the kitchen table and play cards. In fact, when he had time, we played a lot of card games with Dad, such as Rummy, 7Up, Crazy Eights. Dad loved automobiles… he liked to shop for cars. An evening out with Mom and his children would often consist of visiting the used-car lots in the Carthage and Hartwell areas of town. We would often leave home in one car and come home a few hours later in a different car. Mom and Dad also enjoyed celebrating Christmas. In preparation for that holiday, weeks ahead of time Dad would begin setting up the train and train tracks in the living room and in Mom and Dad’s bedroom, which was next to the living room. Imagine having to step over train tracks to get to your bed! Dad also created many small buildings for the train stations and train neighborhoods out of old shoe boxes. The train layouts that ran around our Christmas tree were always magical.

We never wanted for anything… Mom and Dad always saw to it that we had plenty of clothes, food, toys, etc. Unfortunately, Dad died too soon. Lung cancer ended Dad’s life on April 11, 1977. This was devastating for Mom and for all of us. During the years before his death, Dad would often be admitted to the hospital for radiation treatments to shrink the tumor in his lung or to treat his chronic bronchitis or pneumonia. Whenever Dad was in the hospital, Mom was always there at his bedside. Mom devoted her life to caring for Dad.

Mom had started working part-time while Dad’s battle with lung cancer progressed. After Dad’s death, she began working as a receptionist at a doctor’s office in Clifton. There, a couple of years later, Mom met a gentleman by the name of Bob Roller. Bob invited Mom to go out with him on a date, and so she did. Pretty soon Mom and Bob became companions. Bob was not a dancer… he may have been a dancer at one time, but due to diabetes, both of his legs had been amputated at or above the knee, and he wore 2 artificial legs. Bob had other interests… he was a history buff… he liked to visit historic sites. So Mom and Bob would go to museums and air fields like Lunken Airport or the Air Force Museum in Dayton. Bob also liked to play Scrabble, and he and Mom would often sit at Mom’s kitchen table, playing Scrabble all evening. Bob was a very kind man… he loved Mom and Mom loved him. They were companions for about 16 years, until Bob died. I don’t mean for this to be a sad story. I think that it is remarkable. Mom enjoyed the company of 2 very special men in her life. Even Bob Roller’s children recognized how special Mom’s relationship was with Bob. Members of our family attended Bob Roller ‘s funeral. Bob had been in the military and so there was a flag ceremony at the grave site. The officer presented the folded flag to one of Bob’s sons who turned and presented the flag to Mom! We all shed many tears that day.

As I read these this morning in the background on television the news folks were reporting on the 9/11 ceremonies going on in New York, Pennsylvania and Washington D.C. I did not notice the TV until I was reading this last commentary about Bob Roller. Bob had been a bomber pilot during the war years. That was his interest in planes and flying. Somehow the background of names being read at ground zero seemed apt.

Reading these notes of Cheryl’s a few years ago touched me. I can hear her normal cadence and volume of her voice. I can hear and see her pre-Parkinson train of thought. Little of this is present these days. I miss simple conversation with Cheryl

Carpe Diem.