Melba’s River of Menus

Melba Notebooks, Chapter VII

The notebooks are kept on Melba’s kitchen desk, with her recipe books, notes to her children, writing tablets, compositions, letters, aphorisms, clippings from magazines, and favorite humor and poetry quotes. Bob’s desk is in a bedroom converted into his office: a big drafting table, four filing cabinets holding his projects, proposals, contracts, letters and the like.  Both Bob and Melba are surely aware of the notebooks; one must assume that they look at them on occasion.  Yet Bob’s only entries occur when Melba comes home after her first hip fracture; then, for several months he is the  nurse-engineer and caregiver. His entries end abruptly and never reappear when Melba begins to re-assume direction of her kitchen.  Melba’ notebook entries are very rare. But when she makes an entry it is in response to some query,  or occurrence, timely and appropriate, implying that she reads regularly. It seems likely that both Bob and Melba sometimes read the notes. Yet they never comment, in writing or verbally  even when an entry is pointed or critical. Maybe there is  a silent pact, a way to communicate without direct confrontation.

This old couple’s married life, spans almost  60 year  so far. Melba   has been devoted to her husband, her family, her home; her priorities  are in that order,  and the most obvious way those interests coincide is in her kitchen. The notebooks reveal a consistent and persistent emphasis on food. Melba buys quantities of groceries, cooks up large meals, and stores them in her huge top loading freezer. She  very often feeds her daughters, their families and any stray visitors, drawing from the frozen storehouse.

Two pages of  menus appear . They are typical of those thousands on thousands of Melba’s meals, and they are heavy with the foods Bob prefers. Even now, neither her growing longing for the pastoral scenes of her childhood, nor the powerful forces of motherly love could compare to her primal commitment to Bob. If she angrily expresses a wish for change, it is with the inner knowledge that she will not act. Here, and now, with Bob, near her daughters is as close as she will come during her lifetime to putting it all together. To paraphrase Yhwh*, It is that it is.**  And by inference that ain’t bad, since gods are perfect by definition.

In mid and late 1997 her physical ability to get about has returned, and mentally she is back also. Late in the year, written in Melba’s still fine Palmer hand, precisely like her own mother’s, is an orderly exposition of meals and dates.

Mon Macaroni & cheese. Broccoli, applesauce with raisins.

Tue Baked ham slices with pineapple, sweet potatoes, peas.

Wed Salisbury steak with mushroom gravy, buttered carrots, mashed potatoes.

Thurs Beef hash, with stewed tomatoes, scalloped potatoes, zucchini, pears and prune compote.

Fri Baked fish with tomatoes and green peppers, scalloped potatoes, spinach.

Sat Franks with baked beans, mixed vegetables, peaches

Sun Meat loaf, saucepan potatoes, peas, zucchini

Mon Spaghetti and meatballs, green beans Dec 4 Tue Swedish meatballs, noodles, broccoli, stewed tomatoes.

This page is followed by a second menu list, more hesitantly written and  titled “suggested menus,  as if in tacit awareness that perhaps someone, some day, might need to do the cooking. As always, Bob’s primacy is transparent in the menus. Not George Bush, he.Count the “Broccolies”!

1.         Beef stew, mashed potato canned peaches

2.          Creamed crab, macaroni, mixed vegetables

3.          Chicken chunks in curry sauce, broccoli, rice pudding

4.          Stuffed cabbage rolls, mashed potato, carrots

5.          Enchilada, peas, rice with green pepper

6.          Swedish meatballs, noodles, broccoli, stewed tomatoes

7.          Hamburger stroganoff, noodles, broccoli, cauliflower

8.          Chili with cheese, broccoli, carrot strips, green pepper

9. Cheese omelet & mushrooms, hash browns, green beans

l0.        Country fried steak, mashed potatoes, peas or broccoli

There are no more Melba entries here because she falls again, fractures her other hip, and this time recovers much more slowly. In 1997 he confidence does not return; perhaps her will is gone.  The same days are lived again and again in the Notebooks where the same voices speak the same words. Then abruptly, a recipe from Melba:

4/26/97 Sophie: stopped by w/a pie for lunch. All looks well- Mom is finding it difficult to do things but is in OK spirits.

Melba: Meatballs 2 or 4 slices bread

3 lbs. Ground meat ( beef or pork)

6 eggs

2 tsp butter

½  large onion (chopped)

parsley

grated lemon rind

2 lemons

Broth 2# round steak (or other soup meat)

Celery; parsley

Carrots tomatoes (canned)

Onions, frozen vegetable

Fresh tomatoes, parsley

Lemon juice

Canned consume .

I can almost taste the meatballs, so often did she make them. Maybe she writes for her daughters, reaching out to them and to her beloved kitchen, her beloved life; or is it a last timid effort to take it back, to hold on. Her hand is still clearly her own but shaky. She sets down the ingredients in orderly fashion without any other notation except for “p 521″ written by the broth entry. It refers to a page number in her own voluminous hand written cookbook.

4/28/97 Di: Took Mom for hair appt. changed bed did two loads laundry. Cleaned out fridge.  Make jello cole slaw carrots broccli stew & dumplings.

Dot: Short visit w / Melba.  Dad on phone.  Be back Thursday. Call if you need to. This weekend we’ll see about some size 10 pants. The ones she’s in are awfully tight around the waist.

Despite some improvement, Melba is now uncharacteristically inactive. She moves reluctantly, fearfully, achingly slowly with a death grip on her push walker. Though she was finally given a pacemaker, she isn’t convinced her falls were actually precipitated by cardiac syncope, or an irregular or very slow heart beat. She loses more muscle strength and balance.  She hears well, sees well, but Bob rarely adapt to the using his hearing aid, or aids. Sometimes that seems almost a matter of principle: to be self reliant.

Bob still mows the acre of lawn regularly,  but now uses a power mower. Melba can’t get into the tub-shower. It should be remodeled as a wheelchair   drive-in . But Bob resists, because of the cost to remove a wall and altering plumbing. Though Melba would pay the costs, she is not concerned, and will not over-rule Bob.

Sophie tries not to be too intrusive, focusing her efforts to see that Melba takes her medication, and has as safe physical environment as possible.  She takes Melba periodically for a day at her own home,  and a shower. But even that is met with some hostility from Bob.

Melba turns more and more to that consuming but mindless baby sitter, TV.  Yet she remains contented, and cheerful, as though relieved to have made a decision not to struggle against her finite human condition.  Bob, who was been very insistent and persistent that Melba try to progress, no longer pushes much though he still  frets about her osteoporosis and tries to get Melba to take tums and oscal and fosamax; she resists, as most of these things seem to cause diarrhea, or worse, calcium deposits where no calcium should be.  The  river of  similar entries rolls on  by, when a note from Melba appears:

6/5/97 Melba: Friday-10:00 …10 AM

In the floodwater of sameness is a last cryptic note in Melba’s now tremulous hand. It apparently refers to the fact that something is scheduled to happen. The notebooks don’t reveal what that is. The sameness of prevails except for an occasional event like this  birthday.

1/3/98 Ja: HAPPY BIRTHDAY # 90, MELBA! I thought we could stand a new note-book. When I visit and read your entries, it is overwhelming.  It seems a simple record of things done and to be done, a way to communicate: Yet your notes are each and all, far more than that. These booklets  are a priceless record of constancy, love, and thoughtful devotion.  I am humbled and enlightened when I read them.

Many visitors during the afternoon. Dot made a carrot cake, which we nearly consumed along with a delicious dinner provided by visitors.  All the great food was topped off by a 2 quart pot of boiled yam. Thanks, Bob! they will last for a few days; or will it be weeks?

1/4/98 Ja: New snow one ft deep. Breakfast/ Brunch with Sophie and Wi, after church. The trip to church was exciting, and the journey home more so. After church Dad’s car and I were unable to make it up the slight  (3 %?) incline from the (church) parking lot  to main road.

The house has a 250 foot long slightly up-sloping gravel driveway leading to the side door and another level 50 feet to  a detached  garage.

(That big  grumpy 2 door  Plymouth, from the ’70′s, brown with a peeling tan plastic top, stiff yellowing ivory plastic covered  bench seats, no shock absorbers,  a trunk and  hood that both  collapse when open because of a  faulty support,  has  completely bald tires, making traction on any surface problematic, especially ice and snow.)

So I couldn’t use the direct  uphill approach back to the house,  backed down past the (church) parking lot and slid around further downhill to the next street, and then back by another less abrupt approach to the main road, then swung fast and wide into the driveway,  made it all the way to the side door. We watched some football and then  again contemplated the boiled yams.

1/5/98 Ja: I’ve reviewed the medicine list; what is left of it that is, since dad stopped almost all meds long ago.  It is noteworthy that excepting for prozac, and aspirin, the rest are not typical “medicines”-but various minerals and hormones sometimes scarce in old age.  But she needs less. Taking out Melba’s gall bladder ‘cured’ the cancer, and putting in the pacemaker cured the heart failure & stopping smoking helped the lung problems and ‘pneumonia.’ Modern Medicine, How Great Thou Art!

A several page review of medications and instructions for Melba’s exercise follows.*

1/5/98 Ja: Yams, and a quiet day talking and trying exercises.  Went to restaurant with Dot & Ni, Sophie & Wi, a wonderful outing! Am able to avoid the remaining Yams until tomorrow.

1/12/98 Di: Turned up heat wasn’t even 70 degrees turned on fireplace. Put socks on mom.  She’s sitting at table with dad reading now.  She didn’t want to go have hair done today. “Too cold out” I agree.  Maybe next week.

1/13/98 Sophie: Thought I was going blind. Turned on the light- so dim.  Hard to see food, I suspect.  Milk in ice box. Mother is cold- maybe more lights would help.

1/15/98 Di: Both sitting at table in the dark trying to read. Dad trying to sleep but mom keeps asking him questions.  He doesn’t answer though. Turned up heat again Mom sneezing.

Often it is cold in the house, especially in the mornings, until the airtight stove begins to warm with burning trash, or someone arrives and jacks up the heat.  Bob used to immediately lower the heat again by turning down the thermostat.  He still does, but now it is a fake control; a new proper and functional one has been installed in the basement without his knowledge, and with luck he won’t discover it.

Di may not spell potato right but she surpasses the rest of us in her cryptic, often acid, but astute description of this recurring scene.  Dad going through his mail in his dominant big-bear seat with arms at the head of the dining room table, newspapers spread out widely; the Wall Street Journal, with  many lines of red-pencil-underlined print; a sharp bladed pocket knife at hand to cut out articles that; we often receive in the mail;  Bob-nodding, waking, and nodding off again.  Mom to Bob’s right reading Cosmopolitan or Better Homes, or People, which h Dottie or Sally or Diana must frequently resurrect from the recycle bin or replenish; Mom reading the same magazine over and over.

I remind myself to think about my own life long habits, or rituals. I always read the papers each morning. I tend to turn off the lights and to keep the heat down in the winter, and up in the summer. What part of me is  Bob?

1/22/98 Di: Put laundry in dryer. Cleaned out fridge  Fixed new jello cooked carrots fixed new potatoes, peas onion in mushroom soup  spaghetti with sausage sauce for week end . Both at table again Mom reading about Clinton afair to Dad.

1/25/98 8AM Di: Visited here while Ni watch Superbowl with St.  Mom said Clinton wouldn’t be so stupid as to have O. S. with Lewinsky. She said “How come Dad never told me about that?” I didn’t pursue the matter.

Di: Yes they were still talking about it (while eating lunch-ukh)  when I got here today.  Not too happy with Mr. Clinton.  Who is? Took Mom to Jen for the works.  Hair & feet.   Boy wish someone would do my feet.   Dad just left to run down to post office & bank.  Why does he wait till 4:45 PM to do this?  (It’s getting dark and dinner is ready.)

1/27/98 Di: Talked to Mom about EXERCISES but she doesn’t want to do them.  Tried to tell her how much better she would move if she just did a few each day.  But no go.  Visited and talked about Prez. C.  Fixed dinner put laundry in dryer before it got hung about back porch.

1/28/98 4 PM Di: Dad gone to town (IN CAR OH NO) Mom still can’t understand Clinton ( who can) We talked about this, that & the other.  Got bed made up laundry done. Seem to be more Mom’s laundry lately. Dad still not home.

1/29/98 Di: Dad’s here  today so made it back from yesterday.  He said he had a lot of errons to run.  Just leaving again to go over to church.  Mom still reading about you know who & laughing.  Must be good.  Dad has a dead fish in refridgator for week end. YUK!

1/30/98 Dot. Mom laughed so hard about the dead fish. We wonder where he came from?  Dad peeing in sink- doesn’t hear me go by- Oh well.  Now he’s hanging laundry.  I found a calendar on the hot stove. Dad felt it and agreed it was mighty hot, but seems not to be worried.

2/12/98 Di: Got here thought they had someone here that smoked. No just the tea kettle whats left of it on stove, no water.  Guess the rest. Dad fixing himself cup of tea and forgot. Mom in bedroom cleaning out  things in closet. Dad tried to talk her out of things she was taking to be washed. Did they really need to be washed?  He took something back into his room but I didn’t see what it was.  (next time)  house is cold.  Heat NOT even turned on. Turned it to 72,turned on  fireplace. Got Mom sweater.

2/17/98 Di: Things OK here. House a little warmer Both at table Mom reading Dad going over two days of mail ( I don’t get that much in a month, even with all the junk mail.) Stunk up house putting it all in the fire.  He brought out the scale to weigh mom.   She Weighs 100 lbs she said the scale was wrong she knows she weighs more. (Never heard Someone wanting to weigh more.)

3/10/98 Di:  Turned heat up! Hung up Melba’s cloths.  Looked for Hot Water ( bottler, with lambskin cover)  lamb’s (sheep)  Bo-Bob lost his sheep & I can’t find them. Does anyone know where they might have wandered off to?  (Not under the bed either).  Called Li & left message for her too.  Got dinner scalloped potatoe with peas polish sausage, carrots cottage cheese salad.

3/11/98 Di: The sheep are back. Warm feet tonite.

3/16/98 Di: No hair appt today.  Changed to Thursdays now.  Looks like were getting  new gutters.  Fixed pea soup w carrots for lunch.   Another burnt pan. Dad cooked split peas… Mom puttering  around in bed room. Going threw cloths.  Nothing to wear.  There has been a lot of shitty things in the wash.  Is there a problem no one knows about?

3/19/98 Sophie: Paid Di. One check ruined- one check missing???  Had shower- gave meds for Thursday.  No premarin- asked Dad if he had decided mother didn’t want to have premarin-  He said she doesn’t  want any meds at all sometimes.

3/23/98 Dot: Hi! (Noon)  Just checking on the folks!  Thanks for all the Help.

Di: PM Everything OK here.  Mom watching TV  Dad went out to cut wood.  Cleaned out fridge.  Fixed fryed potatoe- onion with left over corn beef, carrots, cooked cabbage green salad jello.

The tiresome, often irksome sameness continues. One might argue that these old people are starting to ‘get it’ while we caretakers and children keep pushing back at  the river of time which  inevitably will wash away all our lives.

 

The 91st Years

The Melba Notebooks, Chapter XI

3/26/98 Di: 8:00 AM Hair app today.  Mom not dressed yet.  Trail to bathroom so she waited too long again. (Any ideas?)  Got here cleaned up again helped her get dressed wiped up floor.  Fixed soup for lunch.  Dad  got here  about 12:15 from somewhere with a piece of wood.  Got dinner ready while they ate lunch.  Chicken fryed steak with onion in gravy. Mixed veg new jello green salad.

Dot: 5:30 PM Ideas for incontinence of stool:

1. Wear an attends to bed (Depends?)

2. Put potty chair in bedroom

3. Wear an attends during day (Di will get a case)

Paid bills- Made a deposit.

3/29/98 Dot:  9:30 Visit to Mom- Bob is at church.   Church friends came, offered to paint the house- late Spring.  What a great plan. Also- we talked to Dad about putting in a shower.  He agrees & said either Al or K will be fine.  OK to do.  Mom will pay. Since they are “joint owners” should we ask dad to pay half?  Wrote a letter to (Dr) H to ask for a medical review. Diarrhea and incontinence are noted.

Sophie: Yes. ( Dad pay half).

3/30/98 8:00 AM Di: Everything looks OK. Fridge empty.  Boy; must have had a party.  Cooked up what I could find.. will get groc tomorrow.

4/1/98 8:00 AM Di: April Fool’s.  Someone put popsycle in fridge top shelf. Guess what?  Everything on top shelf was green & stickey.  Just  for that left overs tonite.  Cleaned up fridge laundry make up bed. Got Mom to go to bathroom.

4/5/98 4:00 PM Dot: Here to help w / taxes.  Dinner tonight- Saurkraut, carrots & celery & potatoe- yum, yum! – Tryed to convince Dad to let us take taxes to Accountant.  Gave Melba sponge bath- feet swollen.  Did a wash & took taxes in.  Amen!

4/6/98 8:00 AM Di: Everything OK here. Laundry hung all around back porch.  (In dryer now).  Mom reading a story about Clinton & his harums to Dad.  She’s sure still having a good laugh about it.  Dad went into office  but Mom is still reading out loud.  Dad left at 4 PM to walk to Post Office.

4/13/98 1:00 PM Dot: Dad  fussing about taxes.  Still gathering up information to turn in.  Wants Mom to find dividends she has in her name She looked but can’t find what he wants

Sophie: 4:30 PM Mowed lawn- told Dad to get  (tax)  extension-

Dot: 8:00 PM Dad said K estimated shower between $2000 and $1000. Dad will discuss with K.  Dad asked Melba if she could pay for half. He says he will give Kim the OK.

4/17/98 8:00 AM Vj: I was here for bath but you were not home so I will come back tomorrow at 11 AM   Thanks

Sophie 3 PM K here- Dad does not want to change things for new shower.

4/18/98 Dot 10:00 AM:  Read the notes.  I’ll call Vi about the bath. She will come next Friday  morning, I think.  I’ll leave her check on fridge. Paid bills balanced check book.  Dad would like Melba to pay ½ of gutter cost… so I had Melba write me a letter of permission to check about how much cash there is in her account & how we access it.  Dad and I discussed the difficulty of the tax info preparation.  I will keep track of prescriptions in a file for 1998 taxes.

4/20/98 Di 8:00 AM: Mom in TV Room reading Dad at table going threw pile of mail.   A lot of cloths to wash.  Some little elderly lady out raking up grass in front yard.

Melba: (?) That’s Alice L.

4/22/98 Dot 4:15 PM here to get them to 4:30 appointment, Dad hurrying Melba.  I asked him to please relax.  On way to Doctors I offered to mail Dad’s pile of letters.  When I went to turn he yells- Go Left, Left, Left.  We’re in a hurry.  You don’t  trust me to drive & I can’t get out of this crate.  I guess he didn’t want to mail the letters at the drive-up. Oh Well……Now we’re waiting for the family consult appointment. S’s here too.  The questions I have are:

Is help deductible?  What needs are absolutely necessary?

4/26/98 Dot

Di, Dad hopes you won’t cook any more meat. He says it feeds prostate cancer. So Melba has to eat it all or we freeze it.

Sophie: Notes from visit with Dr H on 4/22

Medications: does she need all?

1.    Prozac=  Without it she will be more forgetful.

2.    Premarin= for bones, strengthening. Estrogen helps people

Hold Calcium, helps bones stay strong.

3.  Fosamax = for bones. But STOP because of diarrhea

4. Calcium:  OK to keep for now.

5. Synthriod OK

6.    Daily vitamin OK

The once short  medication list  so nicely slashed  by  Bob, has exploded again. Though the heart failure and asthma-pneumonia drugs are gone, Prozac and fosamax have appeared, and estrogen has been restarted.  Bob has let us all down!

Concerns:

1. Discussion about  walking difficulties, about 1 year ago. (April )

2      Diarrhea stop fosamax.

3.    Fluid intake:  not taking enough liquid. Thirst indicator isn’t working so need to drink on schedule. 4-6 x 8 oz liquid per day.  Water, juice.

4.    Walking.  Left leg pain.  Suspects hip problem. Wants an X Ray asap.  (Di will do it tomorrow.)

4/27/98   8:00 AM Di: Didn’t read notes till after I had already cooked Chicken steaks in gravy “Oh Well”.  ( Cats might eat it next door)

4/30/98 10:00 AM Di: Mom in bedroom naked dad at table no lunch yet. Dad started things for lunch I helped Mom get dressed. Had a little lunch and she was ready to go. (for Xray).

5/1/98 4PM  Dot: Note for all helpers-Please read

Dr H phoned S Wednesday to say Melba has hip necrosis (sp?) (limited blood supply to hip which has caused degeneration), which causes pain when she moves the left leg.  I’m going to tell them tonight.  So will call the siblings to discuss options.  If I understand correctly the choices are:

1.                   Do nothing.  Result = worsening and increased pain and a bed ridden Melba (he said within 2-3 months.)

2.                   Do surgery.  With a well thought out care plan. Now?  June 15? Risks are obvious. Call Sophie with your thoughts . More later.

Li: I don’t have a lot of extra hours but Melba can have them.

Vj: Mom fine Dad making rubarb sauce.  Have a nice weekend!

Sophie: Really enjoyed sitting on front porch. Dad would not join us.  Drank an  8 oz glass H2O.  Says she wants to set on porch each day when it is not raining.

No diarrhea.

5/7/98 Sophie 5:40 PM Dad says that Mom brings up ideas that trouble him such as:  Divorce

Moving

Being a Burden.

Mom didn’t recall saying these things.

Divorce:  Mom doesn’t want one

Dad doesn’t want one

Moving:  Mom and Dad both agree that they don’t know   anyplace to move- where they could own, be near family, have help. They both agree that moving is traumatic.

Being a burden:  Mom feels helpless and dependent. Dad says that is NOT a problem for him.

On to Hip Problems.  Dr. G says. “Seems like your hip has a big problem and will get worse.Necrotic hips get worse. That’s the worry”  Maybe Ja will come here when we discuss the options.

Di: The best chicken we ever ate!!!   Hi VJ  call me — —–

This is a sketch of just one of the myriad discussions Melba and Bob have with Sophie and Dot. It’s not just the physical situation that requires their involvement, but the social and emotional aspects of their life together, and the inevitable approach to the time when life will end, or it can be allowed to end without further sacrifice from it’s owner.

Sophie  lives close by, is a psychiatric nurse practitioner,  and tends to focus on prevention of illness, and injury, as well as psychological problems; she tries to intervene early; to prevent, not cure, to  prepare for problems beforehand.

5/9/98  5 PM Sophie: Knowing that Melba is very frail, I spoke with Dad, thinking to school him. Would he panic?  How  would he handle the immediate situation? What steps should be taken immediately?

After introducing the issue gently, I  asked the key questions:

“Dad, if you just woke up one morning and Mom was dead…  what would you do next?”

“Oh, that’d be no problem.”

“You mean…”

“Well, I have several people in mind, but I haven’t decided.”

“Decided what?”

“Which one.”

Which one What? To Hire? Had he really been looking about?  Did he not understand my question? Or was his the rational voice of the engineer consistent with a lifetime of reasoned responses to challenges?  Yet I think I  knew what he meant-Which woman. It was not clear to me and maybe not to him. I preferred to drop it.

5/10/98 10:00 AM Di: Melba hurting a lot.  Having a hard time getting dressed.  Night gown soiled.  Did wash & hung out.  Put new nightie on bed.

Sophie: 5 PM Mom says there is “nothing wrong with her hip; also dad didn’t say I have to do this, or that there is anything wrong.”  Mom says she has no pain at all in her hip.  She says the only reason she doesn’t go up any steps is because she doesn’t want to.  She says “It only hurts when I move. It is not possible to have four masters.”  Says Dr H isn’t even her doctor.  Dad says he has  to make an apt with Dr G and that He has talked to H about where the hip  operation might be done!

5/13/98 8:00 AM  Di: Melba said she’s not doing too good today but wouldn’t say what was wrong.  Looked very sad.

Dot: 5:55: (Late today- problems at school this week.)  All’s quiet for moment.  Combed out curls-not quite like Jen’s work but pretty cute-  Did nails- Filled the pill box for the week watched a video.

.

Sophie:  8:00 PM I put  tylenol extended 8 hour pill in Mom’s box.   Maybe it will help.  She was in lots of pain tonight.

Dot: 4 PM Dr G’s report:  Left  hip is worn (soft) on top. Cup is in good shape. Looks better than expected.

Options:   1)  Cortisone shots  (by radiologist)

2) Surgery

Risks:  Heart attack

Stroke

Pneumonia

Infection

Ja called.  Talked about lots of issues.

I’ll balance checkbook & pay bills this weekend.

5/21/98 9:00 AM Di: Hairdresser called to see how mom was doing before I headed out.  Not good.  She sounded like she wanted to cry.  I told her I’d wash & set her hair so she didn’t have to go out.  She said OK. Mom an I  talked while I put things away.  She went into bathroom & then sat at table with dad, telling him how her leg hurt & didn’t know what to do.  He said he understood & would talk more to Sophie & Ja.  She said she wanted him to get a SAW and cut it off. He said he wasn’t qualified to do that. Thank God.   She was on the verge of crying so I hurryed up & got dinner going so I could wash her hair so she would think about something else.  It worked

5/25/98 Sophie: 5 PM: At table reading, says her leg does not hurt. Pills filled for week.  Pot Pie- Mom loved it. Brown tone –White pill in yellow boxes is extended acting tylenol.

This chapter reflects the day on day effort required of all caregivers, as Bob and Melba begin a period of slow decline, where days of contentment become scarce by comparison to the many days of tedium and problems. No editorial comment from me can speak more clearly or eloquently than the notebook dialogue recorded above.