Involuntary Simplicity: 50 First Dates with Mimi

There’s this perpetual bit that I’m forced to run through anytime I happen to speak about my mother. It’s truly uncanny. I could actually write down people’s lines for them before they deliver them. It’s like I’m in a continual rehearsal for this one scene and it plays out every time almost word for word, gesture for gesture, no matter who is playing opposite.

LEHS Stage - home sweet home.

Lights cue on a blank stage.

SARAH: Well, my mom has Alzheimer’s…”

SYMPATHETIC CONVERSATIONALIST: tilting their heads, Ohhhhhh, IIII’m soooo soooorrrryyyy.

SARAH: No, it’s fine.

SYMPATHETIC CONVERSATIONALIST: lips pulled in over teeth, head nodding on its tilted axis.

The role of the SYMPATHETIC CONVERSATIONALIST is played by friends, colleagues, family acquaintances, new acquaintances. This character is generally a nice person.

I always appreciate their well meaning gestures, people do care, and do their best to be supportive of the situation I have just somehow uncomfortably delivered, “Yes, and…” I am always grateful for kind words – I’m no dummy; I take what I can get at this age. It is however interesting to reveal to my partner in the scene that Alzheimer’s, although structurally, is yes, technically a tragedy, some of the scenes? Pretty damned funny.

I did not ask for this.

For example: My mom flashes me her boobs. A lot. How many of you can say that? It’s like a perpetual Mardi Gras, and I’ve unwittingly been put in charge of the beads. Actually, I’ve seen a lot more of my mom’s real estate than I am particularly comfortable admitting in a public blog. The reason being was she stopped wearing underwear about two years or so ago, citing that everything I bought her, or all of her older support bras, her big cotton underpants, were, “Way too tight. I don’t think these are mine,” she would whisper conspiratorially.

Hanes Briefs, roughly enough fabric to properly outfit the mast of a Sunfish.

“Oh?” I would reply, raising an eyebrow.

“Are they yours?” Holding up an expanse of white cotton cloth with the elastic stretched tight, I was unable to see past it to her upper body and torso to answer to her face.

“Iiiii don’t think so,” I would say to the fabric in my face.

“Well, they’re not mine.”

PRO TIP: It is pointless to argue with a person who has Alzheimer’s Disease. They are stubborn once they have glued onto an idea. Plus, you will come away from it shaken and upset, and a few minutes later, they will not even have a clue as to why you’re clenching your teeth, “Oh honey, you must have had a bad day. Come sit, and have some chocolate. But not too much, your underwear will get too tight. I don’t think these ones are mine, by the way.”

I take the giant underpants, “Maybe I can check to see if any local sailors lost some  yardage on their ships. No? Perhaps a local balloonist?”

Thar She Blows!!

            She would laugh.

            It didn’t always go like that, but I usually could end it the same way.

Usually.

It was and still is hard to see her when she falls into her head, whispering to herself as she tries to feel her way back up through the fog to remember some tiny little idea, a name? She just had It, and why won’t it come back? I can see her struggle, watch it plainly appear and play out on her face, unaware, her eyes search inward, her fingers find her lips, touch her nose, her breath just hitting over the palm of her hand. The scene is wrenching, but what is wonderful about it is, she – my mom - can forget it.

She can forget it. I don’t, my brother and sisters don’t. My husband and children don’t, but she can.

She lives in the present. Not saying that it is always positive, but it is always fresh, and has the possibility of being wonderful. The days when I bring her hot chocolate, or play her The Songbird Album on the constant wonder that is my iPhone, my mom always has the potential to smile, to sing, to look at me and tell me how beautiful she thinks I am.

I'm singing "A Woman in Love" as I type this.

The next moment may not be good. The next day could always hold disaster. I know that, I lived with the constant threat of it in our house for the five years that she was with us: What if she trips? What if she wanders out? What if she tries to heat up her coffee over the toaster again? What if she threatens Pete to call the police again when she doesn’t recognize him or the children?  

I lived and worked in a constant pace in which I had to rush home to make sure that she was okay, or that I had to relieve someone who had taken on her care while I was driving the kids to practice, or had to teach or take a class. I had no time to waste, my mother was home and I need to be sure she’s safe. She is safe now, and I visit her, and she is happy to see me, even if she is not quite sure how I belong to her, but still somewhat aware that I do. She still complains about her waistband of her underwear, usually greeting me with her pants half around her ass, like the boys in the middle school where I teach. She thinks it’s funny when I tell her that. And from there, her mind can go anywhere.

I’m not saying Alzheimer’s is a blessing. The eventual ending is what people are responding to when I say that my mom has Alzheimer’s Disease, The “Oh, I’m sorry,” lives in the final act. And yes, I’ve read the spoilers. But for now, as the scenes play out, and the lines are sometimes spoken through tears, I can take a beat, talk with my mom, and still laugh.

Murphy, Pete, Mimi, Anna, and Fay.