A Post In Which I Take a Long Time to Get to the Point.

Do you remember the early days of space travel?

How when the space craft took off and again when it landed it went through a period of time when all radio contact was lost?

I felt like that today.

My dad needed an x-ray. I'm not much good at moving an incapacitated 6 foot man, so my brother-in-law drove all the way from 'up north' to bring him to have his foot x-rayed.

The trick was in coordinating all of this. Neither he nor I have a cell-phone.

I had to call the doctor's office when they opened to ask for an x-ray appointment. I called at 8:00 and actually got through at about 8:35. Monday mornings and doctor's offices do not mix well.

The nurse sent the request to the doctor, but I had to wait for her to call me back with all of the details.

My brother-in-law decided to take his chances and come in, hoping that the x-ray would actually be today. He is 45 minutes away, in good weather.

Meanwhile, the nurse called. I believe it was about 11:00. The x-ray order was sent, and he could have it done anytime today.

I call my dad. He is ready, and will be waiting. He is working at getting mom ready. This is harder to do than one would imagine. My mom's 'hurrier' is broken.

My brother-in-law arrives at about 12:30. He brings my mom over here, as I no longer think it would be possible to take my dad who cannot walk and my mom who cannot remember things like 'stay right by the bathroom door' out together with just one other person anymore.

By this time I am hoping that I have remembered everything that needs to be told. Things like how to get to x-ray, wait for the x-ray to be read, don't leave until follow-up is scheduled...stuff like that.

Mom and I had lunch. Mom thought that my sister had the day off and had gone shopping. In actuality, my sister was at work, about an hour and a half away. I was communicating with her by e-mail all day. Mom also thought that my brother-in-law and dad where off doing something mysterious. When she first got here, she kept saying, 'why did they plan this without telling me?' Dementia is horrid.

Well, mom calmed down nicely. After lunch we stamped Valentines. My mom and I used to stamp a lot. She gave it up years ago. Today, she had a grand old time stamping Valentines for my dad. At one point she turned to me and said "Why did we ever quit doing this? It's so much fun! We have to start doing this again!" ( Oh, we will mom, we will.)

Now, across town my brother-in-law and dad are playing the wonderful game of 'hurry up and wait'. Thankfully, my brother-in-law is not a shy unassuming guy. He would have no trouble at all finding out all of the whys and wherefores and ins and outs of navigating the complicated system called health care.

Meanwhile, back at MY house my mom is still 'in focus'. After stamping, we moved to the couch where we indulged ourselves with very chocolaty hot chocolate and extra fudgy brownies to which I added even more chocolate chips. She told me that she likes to come to my house. That she can relax when she is here. I told her what she REALLY liked was that we had turned into Viv and Bea (her mom and aunt) who were both ample-lapped diabetics like the two of us who at times spit in the face of modern medical knowledge and feed our inner child the sweet nectar of forbidden carbohydrates.

I'm quite sure we had more fun today than 'the boys'.

The x-ray showed that dad does indeed have a broken foot.

"Houston, we have a problem."