The Sound of Memory

 

I've spent a few years volunteering with people who have complicated symptoms of Alzheimer's Disease. We use childhood photos along with favorite music to create movies, digital frames and photo albums as non-pharmaceutical, palliative care tools. I've witnessed the transformation that Therese Steinhoff illustrates in this essay about her grandmother's Dementia.  Sometimes the answers are complicated, but sometimes the solutions are simple, beautifully simple. -BTH

Last summer my 97 year old grandmother who we call Nana was agitated with the progression of her Dementia. She always said “as long as I have my mind I will be OK.” I think in a way she saw that her mind was slipping into a world of confusion and mashed up memories. She kept talking about the past and the need to get home to her mother, father, husband, and son who had all passed on years ago. She was losing sleep over it. She couldn’t sit still for more than a few minutes. It was hard for us to witness emotionally and physically as we needed to follow her around in her walker to make sure she didn’t fall.

One afternoon I was alone with Nana and my two year old son.  It was early evening and his fussy time. I was sitting with him on the couch and Nana shuffled over to us in her walker. It had been a long day and regrettably I was frustrated with her. She was constantly repeating “Oh Lord! Oh Lord! Oh Lord help me.”  She was going to the bathroom every five minutes because she had forgotten she had already gone. She was angry with us for telling her to sit down and rest awhile. I had pretty much decided that the most recent mini stroke she had experienced had taken her farther away from us. It felt like she was a boat a drift that we could see from the shoreline but couldn’t call back. So when she said “Can I sit by you” my heart just melted. I had felt bad for having thought that the Nana I knew and loved had left us until I saw a piece of her sweetness emerge with those words.

As she sat next to us on the couch my youngest started to get cranky. As a mother I knew that singing to a crabby toddler usually soothed them. So instinctively I started singing songs to him. He became quiet and listened and to my great surprise Nana also relaxed her body and sat with us without the need to cry out or get up and walk around.

Before I knew it Nana and I were singing Christmas carols in July. I knew that we both loved “O Holy Night” so the two of us were singing it in tandem. Nana even remembered more of the verses than I could remember. She sang loud and clear. She sang with gusto. We sang together for about an hour. I filed that hour away in my mind as one of my favorite memories of my Nana. It went right next to the memories of sleeping over at her house, secretly drinking coffee with milk and sugar, playing bunco together, watching “All My Children,” walking the streets of Rome together, and one of my earliest memories—playing “airplane” together with pictures of food in ads as our meals.

Music was the common thread that held Nana’s life together so it’s no wonder that it now soothes her. She married a Vatican Choir singer who sang every day of their life together—even when he was suffering with Alzheimer’s. She attended Church nearly every day of her life and sang all of the songs. Her son played piano for her. Her house was always filled with music. Even when my grandparents and father would be in the middle of a conversation they would often break into song. I feel like the music of her life was like the yarn that she used to crochet blankets—many different songs came together to wrap around her and comfort her.

So by the end of that hour both my two year old son and 97 year old grandmother were relaxed and ready for dinner. I felt like I had found the key to giving her comfort.

The next day one of her caregivers came to the house and I had Nana sing “O Holy Night” to her. By the end of the song we were both in tears. Her memory was briefly clear and she was present with us.

Music is a powerful thing. No matter what age we are we are soothed by it. It can make us cry, make us laugh, and make us remember. It brought my Nana back to me when I thought she was lost.

Change of Life Baby

The Athlete traveled last week, which is not the norm, and it was timed perfectly with the kids all coming down with Influenza one, by precious one. We were all vaccinated and didn't get very sick, but because I know lots of people without healthcare and many vulnerable folks, we pretty much didn't leave the house for 10 days. We had some aches and low fevers, but for us it wasn't serious. I know that isn't always the case, more than 60 people have died in Minnesota this year of the flu.

One of the hardest parts of the flu running through the house, was that I didn't see my parents for almost two weeks.  Unless they are traveling this is totally unheard of for me. Since they are both 80 (my mom is still a few month shy, but still pretty close), I didn't want to run the risk of passing it on. Really for the first time, I felt the complication of have older parents and young kids.

Having older parents has been nothing but a privilege my whole life.  My parents were relaxed and settled in by the time I was born.  They didn't sweat the small stuff.  They took me out of school to do cool things, they didn't stress if they missed a meet or game I was participating in. I grew up with parents who knew how to focus on their marriage, who were grateful for their health, who enjoyed being with their kids, and who most importantly, I think, we're comfortable in their own skin.

The Brick told me once that the didn't really grow up until he was 43 and facing the birth of his seventh child (me).  There he was with two kids in college, with four more following shortly on their heals. He owned his own small business, handed down from his father. He was starting to think about working less, traveling more, spending more time on the "fun" stuff. He liked nice cars.  He liked sailboats. He was picturing a day when he could enjoy both. He was a competitive guy - and he saw the exciting lives that some of his college buddies were beginning to enjoy. And suddenly, he was starting all over again. It wasn't a happy realization at first.

Ouch.

I don't know what happened or what changed. But the father who raised me, drove economical cars, traveled sparingly, and the only sailboat he ever owned was a hand-me-down dingy from a friend on at our Northern Minnesota lake. He made a good living and it's been enough (even when sometimes it might not have felt that way to he and my mom) for a happy life.

He bet his whole life on his family. He let quietly go of the dreams of sports cars and scuba diving.  He stopped worrying about the things the college buddies were doing and started seeing the richness of the teenagers he was raising.  He realized that parenting in his case was going to be truly a lifelong career. Diapers and bottles were being re-bought and dreams of pilot licenses and airplanes were put away.

He told me, now several years ago, that my siblings should thank me for coming along, because he thought that my arrival in the family saved him from becoming a selfish man. I laughed at him. Literally out loud. I can't imagine anyone thinking that about him - but it was fascinating to me that in the middle of his life he saw himself teetering on self absorption. A new baby changed everything at that point in his life (as babies tend to do) and so he refocused. Instead of the Caribbean with his wife, he started dreaming about a run down resort, about fishing for walleyes instead of diving for lobsters. He found pleasure fixing plumbing, clearing paths through the woods with his sons, smoking a cigar and listening to the teenagers sing campfire songs. Maybe it was less glamorous, but no less rich.

If he was resentful at first that I was on my way, I never once saw it. He has spent his entire life telling me how lucky he is (frankly, telling ANYONE how lucky he is). I am 37 years old now.  And I wonder what will be that midlife crisis for me?  I tell my husband that maybe we should hope for a baby in our 40s.  He reminds me most people don't plan for their change of life baby. I guess he's right, but I sure am glad my folks found space for theirs.

Defining Parenthood

Guest post by Adam Waud about finding and giving comfort in the ever changing role of parenting. For more about Adam and his thoughts about health, wellness and recovery visit http://renewedu.blogspot.com.  - BTH

As a member of the aptly described generation of “helicopter” parents, I was slightly disappointed when I saw the dictionary definition of the word parent.  I expected it to say more about responsibility and teaching and discipline and lend credence to an authoritarian figure.  

Instead, technically, to be a parent is “one that begets or brings forth offspring.”  It is so simple, so practically benign, and so lacking the authority we parents wield around.  We parents today wear our title on our sleeves with no less clout than a 5 star general.  We use it to characterize who is in charge, who is the one to make decisions, who is the one to protect and care and use physical and intellectual wisdom to care for this child and give them an opportunity for success.  It defines us, gives us purpose, and sets our direction.

Because of its societal weight - this sense of self importance, what happens when the ability to be a parent is challenged or even lessened?   Does it diminish our self worth?  Or does it bring us back to fallible position of humanity?  Does it simply bring us in line with our children and set us as just a member of the family, and it is a collective responsibility to care for each other?  We may have more years on our children but the care, the love, and the sense of responsibility goes both ways.

In effort to not sound too academic, these are feelings I dealt with after breaking my hip on April 7^th of last year.  Perhaps because I am a man and only 37 years old, the fact that I couldn’t physically carry my 6, 4, and 1 year old had a profound effect on  me.   I felt as if my value as a parent was less than before.  I was laid up on crutches for almost 3 months so couldn’t chase them in the yard and couldn’t even bring them a glass of water.  When we moved two weeks after my accident, I could not even carry one box into my newly purchased home.  In my mind, I was no longer a parent.  I was in many ways, in effect, now the child.  I was far from elderly, but on some days I certainly felt just plain old – and I hadn’t even learned how to play shuffleboard yet.  A humbling feeling indeed.

While my 1 year old daughter had little inclination into what was going on, my 6 and 4 year boys reacted in different ways.  My 6 year old took to being the care giver.  He acted on his feelings, as many oldest children do, to take care of me.  In the early weeks after the accident, he would bring me things, open doors for me, and even put a pillow under the foot of my bad leg.

He continued to care for me throughout the summer as I was forced to work from home.  He spent Mondays and Fridays at home with my niece while I worked.  My wife was usually at the office and the younger two were at daycare.  As the summer progressed and I healed, I became less and less dependent on the 6 year old for physical assistance but, it seemed, became more and more reliant on him for a smile or hug and general companionship.  In short, our relationship grew and I came to need him as I needed any other friend.  I simply enjoyed having him around.  When the summer ended and he went back to school, I was in some ways heartbroken.  Seeing him go off to kindergarten was easier; seeing him go off to first grade was a crushing blow.  Circumstances had certainly changed in a year.   As I smiled on his first day of kindergarten, I spent his first day of first grade so melancholy that I broke down in tears more than once.   Several days later when putting him to bed, I told him how much I missed him.  He confidently replied, “At least we had the summer together.”  I smiled at him and was in awe of his youthful wisdom.  And later I cried again.

My 4 year old reacted differently and not just because he was younger.  He is is own person and processed things in a different manner than his brother.  He doled out hugs and expressed his concern but the accident caused him to retreat internally much more than the 6 year old.  He started acting out much more frequently.  He started wetting the bed – which was a shock to my wife and I as he was potty trained at 20 months. And now even 8 months after the accident, he refuses to ride his bike.   The good news is with a little help he seems to be showing signs of improvement and finding ways to better deal with his feelings.  He is very bright kid and in many ways I think he just got stuck.   And as a parent, I just want to fix it and make him better, but as a person who is dealing with his own emotional ups and downs, I empathize.   In truth, the fact that he reacted so deeply and emotionally has drawn me closer to him.  He knows how I feel and I know how he feels.  I know scared and confused.  He knows scared and confused.  I don’t want my child to feel all tied up in knots but, selfishly, he makes me feel not so alone.  It somehow pains me to say that, but it also provides me a sense of kinship that my child and I perhaps feel things in a similar fashion.  It comforts me to just lay with him or sit with my arms around him.  It gives me a feeling of hope.  I know he will be ok and, in the end, so will I.

In some ways, this experience has brought me back to when I was a child.  My own father had cancer when I was in first grade and my memory has small recollections of how it felt to see a parent in pain.  He thankfully caught his cancer early and was able to be treated back to full health.  However, I still remember asking him if he was going to die.  I still remember seeing him throw up after radiation.  I still remember the look in my mother’s eye.  I remember the brief feeling of potential loss.  I remember how much I loved my father as a young boy.   I know now, even as an adult, that I still need my father.  We may live in different states but brief visits or short conversations still mean a lot to me.  He is, after all, my dad.

Now as a father myself, I think I understand how my boys felt.  They worried about me.  They love me and they don’t want to see me in pain.  They need me to feel well because it makes them feel safe.  It makes them feel as if everything is ok.  They need me to be able to stand up and chase them around the yard because it makes them feel like everything is right in the world.   And while no child should be without a mother, boys need their fathers.  They need fathers to be big and strong and carry them up the stairs, even when it hurts.

In the end, though, I learned in some ways it is less important to be a parent and more important to be part of family.  We family members pick each other up.  We care for each other and feel things together.  We live through things together.  I certainly don’t want to diminish how much my wife did for me and the family or how she continues to support me through my recovery.  She is part of our family.  But your kids are different.  Their love is blissful.  It is so unencumbered.  It renews us and strips away all our adult armor.  It stops us from being generals and gets us back to being people. 

And it gives us gentle reminders of the importance of presence.  I know now you don’t have to give children anything more than your time.  My father was a great role model for me.  He never missed a show, game, or practice.  He could have worked more and made more money but he took his role as a parent seriously.  I want to be there for my children, just as they were there for when I was hurt.  I just want to be present and be in the moment.

Admittedly, breaking your hip at age 37 when both parents work, you have 3 little kids, and are about to move could be described as a pretty tragic event.  And yes maybe it was, but I am a firm believer that if we choose to accept our path and learn from events, they do us more good than harm.  For me it helped me take a step back and helped me really feel how much I love my children and how much they love me.  And all the tough guy stuff aside, I need my children as much or more than they need me.   Plain and simple. 

Moreover, I love being a dad.  And while life is a journey of self identity, my role in this world as a parent will never change, even if the dictionary doesn’t give it as much clout as it should.

The Winter Doorway

I took a breather from technology over the holiday season. At first because I felt determined to be more present to my kids during the holiday - to be more prayerful as a family, more focused on making time for quality time, and less distracted by the noise of modern life. We were wildly and modestly successful.

The "I wants" disappeared as fast as they arrived. It was an important lesson on the power of positive parenting. Trust yourself. Your kids are watching and listening more than you think. We baked and made gingerbread houses. We read Christmas stories at bedtime.  We gave unexpected gifts. We ate dinner together more as a family.  We lit candles and went to mass. We talked and we listened more. There are too kinds of "more" - this year I decided I wanted the right kind of "more" - the real kind.

We truly celebrated Christmas this year, but I still want more time. As I'm facing their return to school, I wish I'd had more story times and afternoon naps. Maybe because I see 2013 will offer me older kids, less naps and more happily independent readers. I love reading to my kids - but now the older ones enjoy reading on their own as well. Maybe it never feels like enough - maybe the truth is that we can always be better at loving each other.

The second was because of the massacre in Newtown.  My three older children are in kindergarten, first grade and third grade and I couldn't stomach how this mass murder was covered in the news - misinformation, unethical reporting (who interviews a 6 year old witness?), and the desensitized banter around it all.

Almost nothing I read, even from writers I really admire, resonated with me. Everyone was talking, writing, and sharing but no one was really saying anything. Some of it even went so far in my mind as being self promoting (I felt like so many people were screaming I CAN MAKE SENSE OF IT ALL!  LISTEN TO ME! LISTEN TO ME!)  The final straw was the NRA press conference where they presented this atrocity as a opportunity to market more guns to schools. I felt sour, shameful and incredibly sad. I craved silence. It gave me a deeper understanding of why peace and quiet are synonyms.

I put my cell phone away before Christmas Eve and didn't take it out again until after Christmas.  My office had become gift wrapping central for the whole family and so it lost its appeal as my quiet retreat.  It felt so freeing to leave all the noise of social media and online news for a bit.  Like returning from vacation - I am energized and happy to be back writing, reading again.  It was an important lesson for me - stepping away hopefully makes us better when we come back.

The last time I took this kind of break, I accidentally forgot my phone on our family vacation last October.  The result was surprising and wonderful.  I felt more focused. I took runs without Pandora and had to listen to my own thoughts.  This blog emerged from one of those runs.  Running along the beach, watching the ocean disappear into the distance I saw a kindred spirit in the horizon, I saw myself and my writing in a whole new light. And so here we are a few months and many degrees different later.

Fresh snow, no footprints yet

I have many wishes for 2013. I'm sure you do as well. My nine year old told me yesterday that January was named for the Roman god Janus - the god of doorways. He is very into Greek and Roman mythology right now - I love the unexpected wisdom of our kids.

I am living in the doorway right now. I see both sides so clearly. My baby is no longer a baby - almost walking and more than one year old. The nine year old is dancing towards the end of childhood - he's not in a rush - but I can see him gathering wisdom, confidence and experiences like snow falling tenderly, quietly accumulating flake on top of tiny, miraculous flake.

The view from my favorite doorway

We spent the closing of 2012 and the beginning of 2013 with all our living parents. My mother-in-law is visiting for a few weeks and we'll remember my father-in-law (whom our youngest is named after) this weekend.  He'll have been gone for five years now - both a lifetime and an instant.

I asked everyone on New Year's Eve to share something they were grateful for in 2012 and something they were hopeful for in 2013. My father is grateful that his vision is improving, and hoped to keep as much of his memory in tack as possible.  We talked for the first time together as a multi-generational family about my dad's concerns about his memory and his ability. No one was upset or afraid. We moved along onto other hopes and dreams. It's a part of life we must acknowledge and respect.

It made me understand what it is I want for 2013.  I want to live honestly, slowly and fearlessly. I'd like to write twice a week for this blog - I hope you'll help keep me to that vow. I'd like to stay true to my ideals about living a happy, fulfilling life. Sometimes it is easier said than done. I believe in practice, I believe in living deliberately. Thoughtful living does not come effortlessly, but practice helps us face the darkest times with the strength and sturdiness of our sense of self and faith and purpose. I believe in muscle memory for the soul.

Kids on the edge of land and water

We are forever at the threshold of something - but in January we seem more aware of it. I write a letter every January to my kids about how I see them, what I hope for them in the up coming year. I finished it yesterday but it almost writes itself. Now I understand that this blog is for me, about what I dream and hope for myself, what I want to understand and share.

So as I sit here in this doorway thinking about what is behind us and what is ahead, I am grateful. I'm grateful for healthy bodies, true love, big families, safe homes, and all the bounty in our lives. But I'm also grateful for words and stories and the chance to share them. I am delighted that this threshold is a passageway from the brightness of our history, the preciousness of our past.  It sheds light into a new room with opportunity to glow and grow. I pause, we should all pause, and appreciate the view.
 

The divide

First steps on fresh snow

Small Moments, Big Life

A friend wrote me last week that she and her husband had abruptly arrived at a new stage of parenting.  Suddenly parenting was about behaviors more than care giving, more about discipline than bedtime routines.  She felt like the ground was shifting under her feet, without her permission.

That's the thing about parenting, every day you wake up not knowing what the world is going to look like that day. For example, my 5 year old daughter who is usually the epitome of sunshine and light decided THAT morning was going to be the day she decided she didn't want to wear her snowsuit.

The next morning, as she was struggling (but with no complaints) to get that same coat on, I realized that the tab on the zipper pull was actually broken off. Good grief!  How many times had I said the day before:

"It is a perfectly good coat.  It's silly to crab about a warm, working jacket."

Classic parenting. Just when you're sure about one thing, the rules change. Now, I didn't go out and get a new coat, but it did force me to reconsider the rest of the winter. It is important that she can zip the coat on her own - these small acts of independence matter. What I was so recently sure of - I had to pause and reevaluate.

One of my guiding principles of parenting is about life resiliency. The happiest, healthiest people seem to have an aptitude for bouncing back - sometimes even quicker and often even stronger.

So when the world is shifting, I try and think:

Rebound. Reconsider. React.  

In that order.

Maybe these are good guild lines for any relationship. I also find it to be true when thinking about my relationship with my siblings and parents. A few days ago, The Arch Mother, who has been bragging about how great her knees have been feeling, fell while getting out of the tub. She was fine, but hyper extended her knee and bruised her ego.  My first reaction was panic "You fell!?!" but I gave myself enough time to not make her feel worse about the situation.

"Calgon Take Me Away" could have been inspired by her proclivity to disappear into the bathtub sometimes twice a day.  As awful, as fearful as I felt about her slipping while getting out of the tub (where she would happily spend half her life - she loves baths and they are a peaceful part of her daily routine), I knew this was a jarring experience for her. I could hear her inner monologue.

"Old people slip in the tub - not me." 

So I knew this had to really bug her - the thought that she could be vulnerable in one of her safest places.

Instead of marching upstairs and installing railings on the shower walls (which she would hate), I gave us a minute to let the experience rest. Sometimes inaction is the best action. And the truth is, a few days have past and she's no worse for the wear, and so a big reaction would have been hurtful and unnecessary. As much as I hate to think about my mother getting hurt, an overreaction would have been a bigger injury. 

I try hard to not react first - but to collect myself and consider the circumstances. Life is best lived thoughtfully - and some of the most important moments emerge during every day, the seemingly insignificant small crisis, the action we take without thinking.

How many times a day do we allow our kids to interrupt us during conversation or in the middle of a complicated job? What are we teaching at this moment? The child learns to put his/her needs above the parents, and since that parent is the most important mentor in their lives, it creates an inflated sense of self importance. How do we think they'll react on the play ground when they need to take turns with a ball or on the slide or on the swing when their own parents can't differentiate between urgent need and standard issue?

Kids need attention.  They need love.  But sometimes, often times, love looks a lot more structured than cuddles and story time. Calmly making a child wait to interrupt or telling them you'll look at their project in a few minutes is often the kindest thing you can do for your child.  The trick is making sure you take the time to circle back, to spend a few minutes giving that right kind of attention.

Kids can adapt to this pretty quickly, for parents it's much harder. I recently had a conversation with a woman I admire.  We were talking about screen time and Wii. Our rules at the house mean no TV or Wii during the weekday. It's not a hard rule.  It's not written anywhere. In fact, I've never said it out loud.  It's just what I expect. On the weekends, the kids often watch cartoons on Saturday morning, and sometimes in the evening we play family games of Wii. We love the family movie night. She commented that

"I'm afraid of Wii.  I don't want the hassle the comes with technology." 

I totally understand this - in fact I felt exactly this way.  We bought our system a million years ago now, but it was after we'd suddenly lost my brother-in-law at 32.  The whole family was going to be under one roof for an extended time at the holiday and my husband and I thought that this would be something fun that would be active and a good distraction from the thick fog of grief of which we were still in the middle.  But I wasn't sure.  I worried about it getting out of hand.

Now several years later, we enjoy it.  We play it periodically, but certainly not every day, not even every week. Why isn't it an issue? I think, because at some point in my parenting, I discovered that I am bigger than any object, that I am stronger than any fear. We don't fight about the Wii because we don't let a whiny child win. We reward good behavior, not bad.

The kids know that if they want to play a game or watch a movie, that's reserved for good behavior. It seems impossible but it is so simple, so true.

So every time we give in because we're tired or busy or whatever, we're are creating future chaos. We think these small moments don't matter - that screen time for a kid who is falling apart is OK this one time - that buying the treats at the grocery store when everyone is melting down won't matter - or that turning the TV on when you don't have time to deal with the kids won't count.  But I hate to say that it does, it really does.

Life is built on these small moments. We have to ask ourselves with what kind of bricks are we building? Do we parent courageously? Do we parent with exhaustion? If we don't like the answer, we're the only ones who can change the situation. I hate to say that the answer to a lot of problems we face today is: Get more sleep. Schedule less stuff.

I fail at these things a lot, but not all of the time. We do the best we can. But the truth is we often could do better, we can always do better.  Hold your kids to high standards, but we would do well by our kids to hold ourselves to higher standards.

The Funeral Circuit

I talk to The Arch Mother every morning on the phone - usually by 9. Lately the conversation has often started like this:

"Hold on a second. (Yelling at my father The Brick) Honey, get me some more coffee. Look up what time the (FILL IN THE BLANK) funeral is at? Thanks. (Returning to our call) So who have you talked to this morning?"

My parents are in a strange twilight place where they seem to be professional travelers on the funeral circuit. There is at least one a week - sometimes more. This weekend they had a funeral of a lovely friend and then a wedding on the same day.  The Brick leaned over to me midway through the wedding and said:

"I like weddings a hell of a lot better than funerals."

Such is their life right now.  Long time friends getting old and dying.  My mother is finding it very inconvenient and sometimes annoying. Who wants to be the last one standing? Well, my mother for one. She was complaining last night (they'd returned from a funeral of a man my mother had babysat as a child):

"Everyone is so dour at funerals.  There is a group of widows that always wears black and never puts on any lipstick. I mean would it kill them to put on some make up and clean themselves up?" 

I laughed and she laughed, because what else can you do?

"I'm sure dad takes comfort in the fact that you plan on wearing hot pink and tarting-it-up when he dies."  

What she means with this kind of talk is that people seem to start dying long before they die, and for people who are interested more in the act of living, it can be a real downer.  She isn't near as callous as she can sound - but the truth is her frustration is born out of grief. It is hard to watch people get sick or frail and have memory problems.  But what are the alternatives? Sometimes humor is the best way to defray the accumulation of losses. 

My parents are both deeply religious and have built their lives around their faith.  I don't think either of them has a real fear of death - they're just working hard to enjoy every moment they're given here.  Really we should all be living that way - we're all heading to the circuit one way or another. Might as well enjoy the show.

Driving Force

 So last week my dad ("The Brick") found out that he is functionally blind in one of his eyes.  He's been undergoing treatment to see if he can regain some of the vision.  This treatment involves injections into the eye while he is awake. So far he's done this without any local anesthesia. Every time we talk about it it makes me squirm. Literally shaking and wiggling around in my chair (yuck, like right now).

He doesn't complain. He under reports health problems (I'm sure it has nothing to do with The Arch Mother's sense of humor). In fact he spent a few weeks with the trouble before he mentioned it to anyone. So far he's had three of these injection treatments and the last time it caused him a fair amount of pain.  When I was talking to him on the phone he was downplaying his discomfort and I started to laugh.

"Dad, there is a saying about this, an ACTUAL euphemism for something terrible you don't want to do, like I'd rather 'stick a needle in my eye' than shovel snow in October..." 

He laughed and said, that yes, it was indeed pretty awful having a needle stuck in your eye.  Again YUCK. The understatement of the year I would say.

Turns out that his other eye is actually in pretty good shape and so it's legal to drive a car with mono-vision (better than 20/40 in one eye). He's always been a good driver (although he does like to drive fast - and in his younger years he paid quite a few speeding tickets). He and my mother split their time between their home and a cabin about 200 miles away so they log a lot of time in their cars.

When he first mentioned to my mother that his vision in one eye was blurry or that maybe he was seeing some spots, I was at the cabin with them and my four kids. 

"Your father is saying there is something wrong with his eye. You go in and ask him about it."

So I did and of course he didn't complain - said it was no big deal (most importantly it wasn't affecting his putting). And I did what everyone in my family does when we have a medical question.  I called my brother, "The Doctor."

What do people do who don't have someone like this in their family? I image its way less effective to call your brother, the horse groomer, or your sister, the NASA engineer, when dad can't see so great. No offense to any other professions, but when your parents are getting older it is really nice to have a Geriatrician in the family. He has also given most of us stitches, looked at our moles, reset a nose or two.

Besides being a good doctor, my brother inherited my mother's directness and also doesn't sugar coat anything.

"Tell him to call me first thing in the morning. He's got to come home and be seen.  Immediately."

So I did the second thing that everyone in the family would do next, I felt guilty. I felt like I had tattled on my dad to my brother, which was of course never my intention, but now Dad would have to call his son and have a conversation about the trouble with his eye.

I didn't sleep very well that night and the next morning my dad showed up on my deck, not dressed in his cabin work jeans, but cleaned up in nice pants and a collared shirt.  He had indeed talked to The Doctor first thing in the morning and my brother had gotten him in to see a specialist that afternoon. He looked sad.  I felt bad.  But we both knew that it was for the best.

No one prepares us for this in our lives. One day you're a child being protected by your parents and then suddenly you wake up as a a child who feels terribly protective of your parents.  I love my parents and I want them to be around for a long, long time.  But its uncomfortable to feel like you're stepping ever closer to their toes. 

As a parent of small children myself, its hard to image that one day these kids will feel this same way about me, that they might feel somehow responsible for choices I'm making for how I'm living my life.  Right now the biggest conflict we have is about picking up clothes. It seems a long way off and yet I know that it isn't.

Here is the crux of the issue: For most of us, parenting starts as a dictatorship in the family and I suppose we all want it to become a democracy.  But a healthy democracy is hard. The biggest challenge is that, at the core, it is about freedom.  Sometimes we can influence, sometimes we can challenge, but in the end we have to respect the fact everyone has to make their own choices. Everyone gets a vote.

I think this is at the forefront of my thoughts because driving is a huge freedom.  And I can sympathize with the fear of losing control of this important aspect of daily life. But this seems to be one of the hardest parent-child conversations. How do you know when to say when?

I'm not a big fan of the "She only drives in her neighborhood, or to church or to the hair salon..." Because if your eyesight, reflexes or memory isn't safe for driving then driving in your neighborhood only ensures that you will know the person you hit.

While they are still trying to treat his eye, my dad is talking about not driving at night. My mom can still drive so it doesn't have the kind of impact it might in another situation. I'm sure this will encourage them to entertain at their house more, which they love to do. They'll adapt, they always do.

And now my dad can say on authority, it can't be worse than sticking a needle in your eye.

Meet The Arch Mother & The Brick

When I first started thinking about the connection between raising mindful children and the work I do with aging adults, I did what I normally do, I called my mother.

My mother is a lot of things, a wife, a retired politician, a fundraiser, a church goer, a true community organizer (but she'd hate that term). But a woman who minces words, she is most definitely, not.  A priest and friend of the family once coined the name The Arch Mother, and it's stuck.

My parents have been married for nearly 58 years.  They have one of those rare golden marriages built on shared responsibility, true love, hard work and a healthy sense of humor.  They rarely fight, they love being together and they love to have fun. My husband and I have worked hard to model our own relationship after theirs - give us another 46 years and we'll see how we hold up.

When I called, at first we were talking about my dad (The Brick) who is still playing tennis a few days a week, will golf until his cart can't get through the snow, sits on a few boards, and still seems to find time for an endless amount of projects around the house.

For as loud and engaging as my mother can be, my father is an endless peacemaker.  My mother is the great love of his life and everything else is just gravy. The long running family joke is when my mother dreams up a new project, party or adventure, someone yells "You're a brick!" to my dad. It never gets old.

He is having some trouble with one of his eyes and that's made my parents have to reconsider their driving situations. He's not been told to stay off the roads yet, but anytime you worry about your vision you have to ask yourself some questions.

So I mentioned to my mom that I'd like her to write with me about this experience of having to face life changes that aren't so delightful. At which point she said maybe in a few years, but right now she wasn't interested and didn't have time. Then she went on to talk about her experience with entertaining now, how health problems and retirement have seemed to change and limit so many of their friends. 

"I just want to say 'No one cares about your pacemaker!'"

followed only a few minutes later by:

"I just wish everyone would stop acting so old!"

I repeated these words to her and said - don't you think you have a unique perspective to offer about how to age gracefully? She relented (for now).

Her continual anthem to all of her kids is to keep making younger and new friends because eventually everyone gets old - some people seemingly faster than others. Not everyone has aged as well as my parents and there is often a frustration in my mother's voice when she comes back from a party and all anyone wants to talk about is their health and who's dead.

Well, one thing is for sure, my mom is not dead.  She's feisty and energetic. She's not interested in talking about the end of life while she's in the thick of living it. She says that the secret is wanting to have fun, be open to new things, new people. There is a little bit of the army general in her (sometimes more than a bit) - her life screams "Advance! Advance! Advance!

I admire this, this willfulness, if you will, to be positive, to be respectful of our her abilities. And yet she is pragmatic and not naive. She knows the reality of their situation - but there is no need to dwell when there is so much more life to be living.

And, yes, there is, so much more life to be living.