Chapter 579 - Learning Lessons Late in Life

 Without describing my personal embarrassments and stresses entertaining at home and dining at restaurants let me mention that my first meal at a restaurant was when I was aged 20 (or was it 19?) when I celebrated saving 100 pounds in a bank savings account by taking her to a trendy place in the Haymarket area that served "chicken in a basket" and I first experienced the stress of being a "dinner host" in our own home was in the first year of marriage to which you would say "So What?" without realising that, in my formative years, I rarely experienced even being a guest to a meal at someone else's home. Boarding house meals hardly count. And in my early teenage years while still at home such meals never happened. So even now, over 60 years since I escaped from "home" I remain terrified of entertaining at home because I sense my gauche behaviour; perhaps guests fail to do so out of politeness. Until recently I have relied on her to smoothly organise and arrange food stuffs, table preparation and such like while I kept mostly in the back ground. Except for BBQ activities which really cause me stress because the majority of males believe in their own expertise, offering unasked for advice and assistance such as flame hight, time required to seal each side of a piece of steak, how rare was rare, pricking sausages, whether to have smoke pouring from the meat, techniques for cooking onions, and numerous other fads, all of which I resolved by telling each male to cook his own food , the way he preferred. And that meant, being the host, I was the last to use the BBQ. The very worst device was the so called George Foreman devices requiring ages of preparation time and hours to cook legs of animals; woe was me when all the guests had arrived ages before the food was ready. And now, so late in the time of things, the need to play host on my own, yet not really physically on my own, is an uncomfortable experience I prefer to avoid the closer the planned date and time approaches. Am I alone in fearing such social gatherings? I feel as though I am.

So with all the above in mind yesterday, from about 0600, as well as my usual medication chores, commode transfers and breakfast preparation I cleaned the public areas of the house as best as I could before setting out crockery, eating utensils, cheese and nibbles,  cans of soft drink (only one can was used) and a bottle of charders, prepared the coffee percolator and selected a bottle of merlot and a port. Our guests brought the main meal of cold meat and salad. Prior to them arriving, and for the first time ever, I took a little tension  reliever in the form of a small glass of Cointreau. She had been in her sewing room rewinding lengths of ribbon onto frames, to what purpose I do not know. During the meal she sat in her wheel chair at one end of the table, hardly taking part in the conversation, probably because I waffle excessively to compensate. Although, as I have probably noted in other circumstances, she seems to become invisible, not included yet not ignored, as conversation passes her by, or is this observation of mine due to my own discomfort? And after they drove away I realised I had not asked whether any one wanted a cup of coffee and I had not turned on the percolator anyway. They had arrived with take-away coffee so perhaps mine was neither needed nor wanted. Neither of us needed an evening meal and in consequence I forgot to take my evening medications, again.

Good news last week; a call from the person trying to arrange a visitor for her, except that only a person has been found willing to speak to her on a tablet (provided free of charge).

She recently spent several days pulling threads out of squares of a loosely woven fabric. Although she must have had some artistic idea in mind, she was unable to bring its application to conclusion so after tangles of threads were all over the floor and around the wheels of her wheel chair the whole lot was binned.

As mentioned above, a few days ago she began rewinding lace onto cardboard frames. Coming upon some lace with a tatty end she began pulling at the threads until she had long lengths separate from the actual lace. I'm unsure whether  that has been binned.

She found a small embroidered Xmas tree that had a backing glued on its rear, the whole probably had been part of a Xmas card. For a reason she was unable to explain to me, she needed to remove the backing, whereupon she found loose threads requiring removal and guess what? The Xmas tree embroidery was demolished in the process.

The strap of her Duodopa pump bag had irritated the side of her neck which required a band aid. I found the pump bag which was on a belt around the waist . Although in the past she had found this one uncomfortable she began wearing it a little over a week ago. I began noticing that her stoma was inflamed and after a day or two thought that may be caused by the belt around her waist which positioned the pump directly over the stoma. Rather than her insistence of bending forward to scratch and rub blemished areas on the wooden floor or fluff on the carpet. There is slight discharge from the stoma, although that has been worse and recovered. The last time there was any redness in the area was possibly 2 months ago.

I am wondering whether some of what I call "dyskinesia" may be "Restless Leg Syndrome" from which her maternal grandfather suffered. A video clip in a Great Courses series about "Sleep" shows a patient in bed asleep with legs thrashing beneath a sheet, in very similar manner to the action I see her doing. Some research or questions are needed.

I find that she has a better day when she has concentrated on "sorting" objects such as putting away washed clothes. However, she is not interested in sorting objects just for the sake of sorting, as in sorting a box of leggo into shapes or colours.

Lunch time and she has just finished the planned weekly call from the Wild Dog nurse.