Legal Eagle

As I mentioned before, Dad had a secretary named Janet. He loved Janet's efficiency and how she took care of the nitty gritty of his office. I've been helping Dad with his finances and paying the bills, and I'm his new Janet.

On a recent visit he handed me papers he received from the Board of Bar Overseers, forms for license renewal.

"I want to renew my license to practice law," he said. He signed the forms. "Send these out for me, will you? And see that the fee is paid."


"No worries."

Tonight my boss called.

"Did you take care of the thing?"

"For your license renewal?" Dad is sometimes vague about what he talks about.

"Yes."

"Yup, made copies for you and mailed everything out this morning."

"Good. You know this will be my 60th. year practicing before the Bar. I want to keep it up because it will look good in the paper."

"The paper? You mean your obituary?"

"Yeah."

Palm to forehead.

Bottoms Up

Sometimes dealing with the Weebles, I feel like a new parent. How do you handle first time situations? The first time your toddler says "no", the first time they speak in tongues. Dealing with weebles has a lot of firsts and dealing with weebles can feel like dealing with toddlers especially when elders dig in their heels and become stubborn. Terrible Twos isn't just about toddlers.

The only difference is with toddlers is the wealth of information from other parents with older children. With elders, we just don't seem to talk about certain issues and the issues become dirty little secrets.

Ma has been "seeing" men in the yard. They were sleeping in her bushes or the yard in the dead of winter. This all stems from her fear and worry about being left alone. She's called the police twice for them to investigate prowlers.

So what do you do? You can't really agree with her because that just feeds the fear. Though it is tempting. When Ma was singing no one does anything for her, I almost suggested she gets the men in the yard to do things for her. I wouldn't mind a bit if one of them took her to the Mahket.

The men do provide some amusement. Ma had looked out the window and said one of the men had a bed and had a girl in the bed.

"Ma, why would they have a bed in your yard?"

"Hmm," she said in a knowing way and then looked at me as if I was dolt if I couldn't figure out what would be going on in the bed. It was amusing.

You can't argue with her because that just turns into a whizzing contest. I also was accused I was crazy because I didn't see the men.

She's also convinced there are animals in the fireplace. They frightened her so badly, she lit a roll of paper towels and tossed the lit roll into the fireplace to burn the critters. Scary because she could end up setting the house and herself on fire.

I've told Dad he needs to talk to her doctor. The hallucinations could stem from something as simple as Ma being dehydrated, a common problem among the elderly. She's also refused to take a new thyroid medication the doctor prescribed. The new medication is more expensive than the pill she's been taking for the past 50 years. Ma thinks the doc is swindling her. I almost pointed out Auntie Rose is the swindler. The doc is just concerned about her welfare.

Of course, Dad doesn't want to say anything because he doesn't want Ma to go into a nursing home.

"She doesn't deserve that," he's told me on a number of occasions.

Course I think on days when she's really ragging on him, Dad would send her in a heartbeat just to get some peace and quiet. He's worried that if Ma goes into a nursing home, he will lose the house as a legacy for The Brother and myself.

So what to do? Shy of body slamming Ma to the floor and forcing pills down her throat, I can't make her take them if she doesn't want to. Neither of them has authorized me to talk to the doctor on their behalf so a call to him is just stonewalled with a polite reference to doctor-patient privilege.

Guess it's just the usual bottoms up.

Weeblogic

The other day, Ma was enjoying one of her favorite pastimes, spouse bashing. She listed a litany of complaints, most of which had to do with housekeeping or lack thereof.

HE does not change curtains or bedspreads. (Ma used to change these items twice a year, Spring and Fall.)

I laughed and told her men don't really care about those types of things.

HE doesn't do housework. (He does, just not HER way. All of this is really a control issue, the heart of OPD)

HE doesn't flush the toilet!

I laughed out loud. "Ma, he does that to save on the water and sewer bill. If you use less than a certain amount of water, the town does not charge you a water and sewer bill."

"If he didn't drink water, he wouldn't need to use the toilet and he'd save on the bill," she harrumphed.

You just can't argue with that kind of logic.