On Stepping Forward and Back

Mostly forward, I hope. Although we're still running space heaters more than we should, given our landlord's repeated stinginess with heat that we cannot control (trust me though, a lot of folks even in this semi-ritzy neighborhood have it far worse). But work-wise I'm experiencing a lot of forward momentum, now that I can more successfully ignore the constant worry about Mom in the back of my head. And there is a plan going forward for Mom's care once she's back at the LTC facility, so I'm feeling better about a lot of things than I was a few days ago. We decided to forgo our firm's holiday party as the temps are supposed to be brutal tomorrow and I'd just rather head for home after work. And besides, it's our anniverary so I'd rather it just be the two of us.

Best Birthday Ever

Today I turned 68 years old. Aside from the kick I always get to see around 200 Facebook friends from all my Venn diagrams (Firesign, comics, Rutgers frat, online gaming) wishing me a happy birthday, as well as my work colleagues who gave me two desserts I should definitely NOT eat as well as treating me to a group lunch order eaten in our fancy dining area, I got the best gift of all, a birthday call from Mom. My brother held the phone as she coherently spoke. For someone I'd been convinced was at death's door a few days ago, this was near miraculous. I'm now told she's due to be released back to her long-term care facility on Friday, the infection and sepsis are all gone, and the only stumbling block remains her food intake, which is difficult when you can no longer swallow properly and you don't care for food anyway. But she's not in pain and she's not suffering so, at 94+, she's totally beaten the odds again! Every reason to celebrate! Which we did with a delivered sushi dinner. I refrained from the third birthday dessert of the day included with our order, a bunch of cookie-like Japanese treats in a box which looks lovely on our holiday table. On to year #69!

No News Is

White Rabbits, and welcome to December! No word from my brother about Mom's condition, so I'm going to assume all is the same and carry on with my week as planned until I hear otherwise. My coworkers and the partners I support are aware of the situation, and a couple of them checked in on me via online calls, so that was sweet. Tomorrow is a Manhattan day as well as my birthday, so we'll see how everything goes. I'm assuming I'll get birthday calls from both my brothers so I'll certainly be more clued in then. In the meantime I'm keeping busy and hoping for an easy transition into whatever's next.

Of Steaming and Stir Frying

I ended this chilly day and month by steaming a whole bunch of winter tops and, while I was at it, I moved my summer tops to the closet in the library to make room for all the steamed ones. I can't seem to only do one thing, as every task seems to have mini-tasks associated with it. But I'm task-based, and doing this stuff helps keep my mind occupied as I cannot do anything about Mom's situation (still downhill I'm afraid). I also made the promised stir fry, which was delish except I forgot to add the tofu, which I'll air fry tomorrow to blend in with the leftovers. I feel like I'm making headway and, in case the inevitable happens sooner rather than later, I won't have as much catching up to do.

Productive Pre-Birthdays

As my 68th birthday is on Tuesday, and Robin's is next Saturday, we have already pre-ordered our gifts for each other. My new AirPods are waiting to be charged then paired with my phone and work computer (with any luck the noise cancellation feature will work well enough for me to leave the headphones at home), and his new Huion Kanvas art tablet arrived today, which he integrated pretty quickly into his home office setup in place of his old Wacom which doesn't play well with any of the newer software. We shopped at H Mart (the Asian grocery) and our regular supermarket, and I plan on making a stir fry tomorrow to take us through the worst of the cold weather to come. Meanwhile, Mom's situation has gotten worse, so I'm more grateful than ever that I visited her on Wednesday.

Bubbling and Squeaking

The holiday table is all set up; the bowl filled with copious amounts of sugar-free chocolate goodies we've been buying was the piece de resistance. No card wreath this year since we won't be sending out cards. t's all I can do to keep myself together, between Mom's situation (slowly improving again) and my impending birthday week. But having the fiber optic tree trimmed and festooned does provide some sort of comfort, and between that and Robin (who is always a comfort!) I'm okay at the moment. We got through about half of the Beatles Anthology remaster, and will probably finish it again by the end of the weekend. And the bubble and squeak today was delightful.

Graditudinousness

Yeah, that's how Robin and I talk sometimes. In any case, I'm grateful that yesterday I got to see Mom, who has taken a turn for the worse today so we're back to a day-to-day watch to see if she's going to rally again or face the worst. With sepsis infections it's often this type of waiting game. But she's in the best possible hospital, they've cared for my brother and sis-in-law on a number of occasions, and as I mentioned in yesterday's post they impressed me greatly, so I live in hope. I'm also grateful for a job that allows me to buy food for the Thanksgiving table, and for the wisdon that comes with years that teaches me that less is sometimes more, especially when Robin doesn't have the appetite he used to. The most labor-intensive thing I made was the apple and chestnut dressing; the Marmite gravy (surprisingly tasty!) was a cinch, the sprouts were just boiled with some lemon glaze (not worth it, I think they've gone past their best), and everything else was microwaved. The Macy's parade was a bit bewildering, as it is every year when I recognize fewer and fewer celebrity performers, but it led me to check out the K-Pop Demon Hunters movie as at least five of those heavily Autotuned songs are Grammy nominated and at least four are on the Billboard Top 100, so I feel a bit less removed from that now. Tomorrow we start rewatching the newly-mastered now-9-episode Beatles Anthology, which we haven't seen since it first came out as 8 episodes. So yeah, grateful again for my job that allows me to have the money for streaming programs. Lastly, grateful it wasn't that cold today, as the landlord still doesn't provide enough heat, but that's a convo for after the holidays.

On the Road to Recovery

After two consecutive exhausting commute days, I knew I wasn't going to get much rest today what with the drive into New Jersey (on what's always been touted as one of the year's busiest travel days), so I was up around 4 or so, lay back down at 5:30 for an hour, and couldn't stay asleep due to leg cramps. I did what I should have done much earlier, put on compression socks for the drive and the visit to see Mom in the ICU. If you're at all in the Morris County, NJ area and you need urgent medical care, I truly believe you could do no better than the Morristown Medical Center. Everyone there was attentive, professional, knowledgeble, compassionate (which Mom, having been a nurse for decades, took pains to confirm to her nurse today, saying "if you don't have compassion, you have no business being a nurse"), and extremely helpful as we wound our way around the corridors and environs trying to get a bearing. Mom was still pretty out of things, but she's been pretty ill and needs time to recover, and she was able to hold up her end of short conversations. And she's trending better! By the end of the day she had been moved from ICU to stepdown, the next stage before she can be released back to her long-term care facility to continue her recuperation. I could see the relief on my brother's face, which I'm sure matched my own to an extent, and felt good enough to treat Robin to sushi on the way home (Kura currently has great fish & chips!) before I simply collapsed. (Although I must say, I never felt anything near to a "biggest travel day" traffic situation!) I was going to do some prep for tomorrow's Thanksgiving-for-two, but Rob's appetite isn't what it used to be so we've cut way down on the sides and when I woke from my afternoon nap I couldn't do anything more than chop the chestnuts Robin had roasted and peeled. That dish will have to wait to be assembled and cooked tomorrow, when I will have so, so much to be thankful for!

The Day the World Came Crashing Down, and Was Forestalled

So I was getting my work done in the office, just humming along, when I got a text from my brother, who has been Mom's primary care advocate for at least the past decade. She was pretty unresponsive and incoherent this morning, just moaning in her bed, and hasn't eaten in a few days as she couldn't keep down what little food she had tried. Off they went to the ER at Morristown Medical. My sis-in-law said this might be "the final decline." Nobody knew what was wrong. Lots of tests were run, most seemed fine, but her BP kept dropping and I kept panicking. A 94-year-old woman in the ER is never a good thing. I couldn't concentrate, left work early, and told colleagues I'd be taking tomorrow off to visit her for what could quite possibly be the last time. A little while ago my brother's latest text had some potentially very good news. A cause was found; a kidney stone which had majorly infected the bladder. Everything was drained and a stent was inserted to keep the stone at bay until the doc can do an outpatient lithotripsy (that's what I had a decade ago when my kidney stones developed into a similar infection, which someone in their 50s can tolerate a bit better than someone in their 90s). Now that the cause of her alarming symptoms was found and treated, she's still in the ICU, the numbers are starting to trend in a good direction, and she was coherent enough for me to tell her I loved her and hear a response. We almost lost her this time last year as well, so I'm very grateful we appear to have dodged another bullet here.

The 39000 Steps

Some things I'm starting to get the hang of. For the second time in as many trips, the local bus was right ahead of the express and I made the exchange perfectly at the transfer point. I also figured out how to order ahead and use up more money from my Starbucks cards that have been sitting around forever. That timed perfectly as well, and my order was waiting for me, all prepaid, by the time I hit Manhattan West. Work was nonstop, but I made time to eat lunch away from my desk on the other side of the floor, with its cushiony seats and handy tables, and I think I'm going to do that some more and encourage my fellow exec assistants to do the same. I did a bit of mentoring today, lots of helping folks out, and a heaping amount of scheduling. It seems everyone wants something on a shortened work week! Since I was unburdened by my backpack which is stored in my temporary locker at the office (where I'll be returning tomorrow), I decided to see if taking the "E" train to 53rd Street then walking one block west to Sixth Avenue was worth it, as that's what I'd planned for my next trip to the medical center on 51st Street in a couple weeks. Alas, that didn't work. It took forever to even get the "E" train, as I had to walk through a long corridor and up at least two flights to get to the platform (no elevator as with the "1"). But that was nothing compared to the 7th Avenue stop. I counted at least eight flights of stairs on my way to get the heck out of that station. Way too much for me, although I got quite the cardio workout, from which I'm still recovering. So I'm afraid I'm going to allow more time and instead just get a crosstown local bus to a northbound one for my next appointment. I didn't even care for the express bus ride home; the traffic on the Deegan was a mess and the driver was one of those stop-and-go guys. So far the optimal ride home is still the "1" to the local Bronx bus...