Barbara

   The card players assemble. Pat, Bonnie, Sue, Anna, and me.The donation table is full tonight.  Rice Krispies, eggs,  Campbells Noodle soup,  tuna,  bread, a watermelon.

As she scoots her chair in,  Sue looks at the food, shakes her head. ” Barbara’s son  been shopping for her again?”

“Yeah He wasn’t gone a half hour when she brought that stuff down.”

"Was she angry?"

"She was muttering."

"Is this the son who was dead last week?" 

No one responds, general soft laughter.

Sue shrugs, “I’m taking the watermelon. Anyone want half?

Tonight will be Sue’s last night. She has been accepted by Medicaid and is moving to  an assisted living residence tomorrow. They have meals. And a bus trip every day. Sue is excited and the other players are excited for her.

The elevator bell rings and Barbara gets off and heads out the front door.“Anybody got a roll of quarters?  ““I do,” Bonnie says. “And I’ll take half the melon.”

“Is she okay? Should she be outside?” Pat asks.

“She’ll be back,” Anna says, “If not, I’ll go get her in a minute.” Melon and quarters are exchanged and set aside.Bonnie deals. Sue finds a Hershey bar behind the cereal. "Eureka." she whispers, grinning.

In a long conversation on a bench out front years ago, Barbara  told me her life story.  She was friendly and welcoming and I, still new and feeling like an outsider, basked, and began to feel more at home.She had been married to a minister– divorced, maybe dead. She said she had eight kids and none of them spoke to her. I didn’t ask questions then, just listened. In the last two years Barbara has mourned the deaths of two different sons, Both later turned up alive to visit her.

Barbara comes back in the front door and heads off down the B hall. The  women at the card table pause, silently watching Barbara.  “She needs to be somewhere more structured,” Pat says.

“She’s probably better off here than anywhere else they might send her.” Bonnie says. “With us.”  No one disagrees. Barbara returns from the B  hall and rings for the elevator.Play resumes, silently.Before we quit Pat decides to take the cereal and the crackers. “Well, I feel bad for Barb,” she says, “but if she won’t eat it somebody else ought to.”

Sue pats her on the back as they head aross the lobby. “Bye, everybody,” Sue calls to us as she turns into the C hall.

Pretending I have someone to chat with. Totally superfluous crap.

Today I read about someone turning off their algorithm and decided to do the same. Turns out I'd have to get on instagram in order to have an algorithym to turn off and so far I had avoided those newer "social aides". I wish that power  was available on search engines. (Does wish in this case force were rather than was?)  I do recall that when Bobby fixed my search engine to avoid AI, all my feeds were FU and I couldn't access things I wanted. So, Big shots win again. Also, reading only the headlines on the Guardian is more than enough information about what the press considers news today. The Guardian seems to me to have the most informative headlines rather than clic bait. Yeah, I know. Not!  Added benefit, at least I get a daily,  at least I read the news, hit. An addiction I acquired as a child sitting at our lime green formica topped kitchen table reading the morning newspaper from cover to cover. That's all. Just more meaningless chit chat. 

  I soon realized I had nothing to do with the gel prints, just pile after pile of colored tissue paper or what ever kind of paper I print it on. That was truly depressing. I thought I had found something to interest me all the way to the end.  The first thrill was gone. I sat around on the couch desperatly reading. Kindle and the library, my saviors. Anything. Someone else's words to focus on so I don't think and ruminate and get scared. That was over a week. The lobby is closed, god knows when it will open again. I have to go outside and in another entrance to get mail or do laundry. Mail is okay, but balancing the laundry on the walker while going up and down curbs is hard.  I have yet to do it. I may just buy new underwear. I have no idea where the card players have gone and no energy to go hunt them.

I let myself be and sort of waited. Suddenly, this morning I realized what to do with this new toy. I have organized my supplies accordingly and have begun. * I feel like I felt when I was covering the boxes with magazine pictures. I have finished with one of the canvases Kelly brought me. I am on my way. Phew. Glad that period has passed. Thoreau was wrong. The admonition should read, "Never begin a new enterprise before rearranging the furniture."

The Scot girl artist plays in pastels

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bMojA4WHYxU&t=356s

Mary

Mary had a tiny dog. It was called Peanut. Mary loved her dog, as old ladies do.  Peanut was old too and he sickened and then died. Mary was friends with Larry, who lived in the C hall. Larry had a car. He and Mary ate out together a lot. Larry had diabetes and ate anything he wanted–mainly doughnuts– and his diabetes worsened. Larry’s diabetes got so bad he had to move away to a nursing home. He possibly had an amputation of one leg, but we aren’t sure about that. Mary was sad. Before long, Mary decided to move back to Mississippi, where she was from and where one of her daughters still lived. Mary had other children living in other places. Mary left messages on the phones of all her children, announcing her plan to move back to Mississippi. Mary told us all that she would be moving back to Mississippi. 

 

At the card table we discuss Mary. 

“I wonder why she decided to move away. I thought she was happy here.”

“Maybe because Larry moved away.”

I said, “and because her dog died too.”

Anna, “definitely because Larry moved.”

The talk moved on to the new woman with the long blonde hair and Sue won the hand and the quarters.

Juanita, who was a close friend of Mary, was sitting in the foyer alone, so to start conversation, I said to her, “I bet you are going to miss yor buddy, right?” She knew I meant Mary.

“If she goes,” Juanita muttered. Nothing fazes Juanita, who turned 92 last month. Juanita is also from Mississippi. Maybe that’s why she and Mary bonded.

“Has she changed her mind”, I asked.

“None of her kids called her back”, Juanita sounded angry. 

I understood the anger. And the sadness underneath it. Poor Mary.

Time passed.

At the card table Sue said, “I guess Mary won’t move then.”

“No, None of her kids called back.”  Anna the realist spoke.

We agreed it was very sad, and that day was another of Sue’s lucky days at cards. She won a second hand and the quarters. 

Mary didn’t mention Mississippi again. She stayed in her apartment for a week or so, then began to come out. She and Juanita were soon a regular sight in the foyer again.  

The lady with the long blonde was called Ada. She had started going around with Ronnie. 

We had to skip cards for a week because Pat’s sister-in-law, Bootsie died and Pat went to stay with her brother for a few days after the funeral.

From Wait, But Why

The fun thing about being a blogger is you can write about whatever the fuck you want.