is there any more pie?

There is a container of three-week-old coleslaw in the refrigerator.

I have eaten toasted-cheese-with-fig-jam sandwiches at least twenty-one times in the past seven weeks.

Sometime it is impossible to remember when I last washed my hair.

I don’t let myself get out of bed in the morning until I’ve figured out what day it is.

I have worn the same cardigan sweater for seven weeks.  Every day.  There are probably three hundred pieces of thread stuck on it.  I like it that way.

Watching any kind of news on television makes me nauseous.  I still listen to local talk radio, but I yell at it a lot.

I am recording every episode of HUNTING NAZI TREASURE.

We miss our police and drug-dealing friends from five seasons of THE WIRE and we still amuse ourselves by talking like street thugs.

Every single day we count the hours until six o’clock when we can sit on the couch and watch tv.  This is sad, but it’s important to have something to look forward to, right?

I have stopped counting how many rolls of toilet paper are in the basement and have started counting the days until I get on a plane.

After this is over I want to go out to eat every night for the rest of my life.

My mother’s happy place.

Monday was the funeral and I really don’t want to write about it.  Aside from it being a cold, gray, rainy and windy morning, it was certainly not the funeral I’d pictured for my mother.  I’d always envisioned the entire family–three generations– gathered together, along with our special friends, to cry and laugh and comfort each other with funny stories and memories.  I had the photo dvd ready to play in the background.  I knew what music my mother would like.  I thought there would be hugs.  Wine.  Food.  A bittersweet celebration of a life well lived.

Severe restrictions due to Covid-19 prevented all of that.  And let me tell you, it hurt.  A lot.

I feel so sad for other people who have had to bury loved ones during this time.  I cannot imagine the pain that they’re going through.  Not many would have the “she lived a long and happy life” feelings given to an 94-year old woman.  Ours was a simple grief.  While so many others are not.

How are large families coping when only five are allowed to mourn together and one of those is the minister or priest?

How is comfort given and received when people have to stand six feet away and aren’t allowed to hug?

My heart breaks for everyone.  I don’t know how people are dealing with it.  I was absolutely devastated despite my own loss being an expected and inevitable one.

I’m pretty damn sad right now, but I’m sad for everyone who has had to deal with the lonely passing of someone they love.

This is a cruel time.

I hugged my daughter Monday.  Yep.  Flew caution to the wind and hugged her as hard as I could.  

It helped.

The good old days.  Not one mask!   And no social distancing.

Mom and Dad on safari in Kenya.

This picture was on my mother’s refrigerator for twenty-six years.  That’s how long she was without my father.  They were together for fifty years and very much in love until the end.  She never got over losing him.

She died yesterday.  Peacefully.  In her sleep.  The dementia had worsened very, very quickly.  On her 94th birthday, April 9, she had Face-timed with me.  She knew it was her birthday, she knew who I was, and she was chipper and cheerful.

And then it all went downhill.

Death during the Time of the Virus is a very difficult process.  Hospice was called last weekend, but only one Hospice worker was allowed in to the nursing home–and only once.  All recommendations were done by phone after initial assessment.

I was allowed one “end of life” visit, for 30 minutes only, on Monday.  I wore a gown, mask, and gloves.  It’s no wonder my mother had no idea who I was.  But I doubt she would have known anyway.

There are severe restrictions on funerals now, so there won’t be any kind of service.  Only five people can attend any gathering, either at the funeral home or the chapel at the Veterans cemetery.  So Banjo Man, daughter Nancy and I will represent the family and do our best to make sure we honor my mother as well as humanly possible.

The rest of the family sadly has to stay in California and DC and Texas, due to quarantine rules.  This of course is not what anyone wanted or envisioned when it came to saying goodbye.

I’ll end this with one of her favorite pictures, taken a couple of years ago at the beach with the great-grandson she adored.

“Tell me a ‘John Story’,” she’d always say.  Her face would light up as we’d describe his latest antics.

Rest in peace, Mom.  We know Dad is making you laugh again.