Forward and Back

There's a single road that takes me to the past and to my future. I don't like it much, but I take it every week, from Alexandria to Baltimore, to visit my mother. Mom is almost 92 and is failing. Her short term memory is all but gone, fast on the heels of her long-term. I am reminded of the movie some time back where the guy woke up every morning with no memory of the day before, and was forced to create his world anew each day. (Or, if I were being more shallow, I would recall the plot of "Fifty First Dates"--but I detest Adam Sandler, so I won't.)

In any case, every Tuesday, I take mom to lunch and endure what passes for conversation: her recitation of stories she'd told the previous week, or sometimes even in the previous five minutes; then, my monologue about what I've been doing, what the grandchildren are doing, and anything else I can think of, from the condition of her plants to what she needs from the grocery store. It's hard.

Why this should be is anybody's guess, but I've given it some thought in the long, often slow-moving trip from my home to hers. My mom was always in control of things when I was growing up. I cannot tell a lie: we were never that close. I don't have any fond memories of sharing secret thoughts with her, or even going shopping, or confiding much of anything. We co-existed for the most part. Of course, I loved her, but in a rather detached way. I was never hers in the way my brother and sister were--at least, that was the way I perceived things. But, still, that was the way things were. Now, driving to Baltimore, I know that our positions have changed. I am no longer the obedient (though sometimes recalcitrant) daughter. I am no longer subject to her authority. Our roles are now reversed, and it is unsettling, to say the least. We all despair of her inability to remember the smallest things. We complain about her stubborn determination to do things for herself that we know she is incapable of.  We listen to her grandiose plans to travel unaccompanied back to Pennsylvania to visit her sister--knowing full well that she could never manage it. And yet, and yet...how unsettling it must be for her to no longer be in charge of even the simplest things: a  visit to the mall or the grocery store, preparing her own dinner, baking cookies, decorating her door, even watering her plants.

I remember my mom as being strong, of being capable. If she deferred to my dad in something, it was purely a courtesy or an ingrained cultural habit of wifely submission. We all knew who ran things. I myself am strong enough to make decisions--though most of ours are cooperative, rather than submissive. I know I would be angry if that decisive power were taken away--even if it were taken by my own physical weakness. Maybe the reason that visiting mom is so hard is that her angry memory of the past meets my own angry fear of the future.

It's easy to think that I won't be like that when I grow old. I point to how flexible I am, how often we've moved, my relationships with friends and family, my ability to work through problems and situations...but none of us really knows what lies ahead, or how we will deal with it. And so, I keep traveling back and forth on that road every week. Past, present, future--all on the same highway--looking for some kind of wisdom to face it all.