Sometimes the desert

doesn't look like a desert! Now that winter seems to have arrived the sun's relentless brutality is just a painful memory. No Parking signs made it nearly impossible to get these shots last week. I love the silhouettes of the palm trees against the sky. The bottom left photo, not a very good one from a moving car!, is of the entrance to the million dollar homes right next door to the complex I live in. The entrance took over a year to build and includes a horse and rider statue. Andalusia even sounds nicer than Trilogy! Who came up with the name Trilogy? All I can say though is that whenever anyone asks where I live they know where Trilogy is and how far out in the desert it is. And, most people say, "Oh that's a great place."
Woke to snow capped mountains Sunday morning; what a glorious sight. Two rainstorms in two weeks have caused a bit of stress in the garden, what doesn't? We also now know that gutters are needed for the roof along the front entrance to the house! I need a sign that says, Flood zone.

The results of the MRI done on my foot last week are: Plantar fascia fibromatosis which often requires surgery. Not! I don't do crutches and seeing how I'm the caregiver for mom and Stacy I don't have 3 weeks of down time available that is necessary for healing. So, the PFF will just have to go back to wherever it came from!! A bone spur on my other foot is bad enough, but with the right shoes it's doable.

I started physical therapy yesterday for me aching aging knees and weak hips. It was kinda fun, though I'm not one for exercise and it will take a lot of effort on my part to keep doing the exercises. At the end of the session I had 15 minutes of a TENS machine and ice packs. I nearly fell asleep, that's how comfortable I was. I felt pampered.

Have-labeler-will-travel! All of the remote controls in mom's room are now labeled according to their use. On Sunday she couldn't figure out how to get the sound turned down on the TV so it seems that if one remote doesn't do what she thinks it should then maybe the next one will work!! Everything ended up being turned on including, the VCR, the overhead fan and the CD player. She arrived in my bedroom looking like a crazed person and couldn't even talk, "Come," is all she could say. I followed her and she then she said, "The room is out of whack." You can say that again! It took some doing to figure out what she was trying to do. "The TV won't shut up," is what she finally said.
I don't know if the labels will work. She seems to have some odd way of thinking that I can't tap into. I guess that it's a part of Alzheimer's but it sure sucks!

Last week she phoned me at about 8pm and said, "come out here." I ran out to her room only to find that she was still on the phone telling me that she couldn't figure out a phone call she'd just had. I hung up the phone but it kept beeping at me. I have no idea what she had done, but the phone wouldn't stop beeping until I unplugged it and then plugged it back in. Anyway, my aunt and uncle had been in a car accident and mom couldn't figure out the details and insisted that my 92 year-old uncle had been driving. Nope, he hasn't driven in years. I phoned my aunt and got the details. A woman had plowed into them in the library parking lot because she thought my aunt might try and take the space she'd been waiting for. Of course the woman didn't have a drivers license or insurance. My uncle ended up with some scratches on his leg that needed stitches. Not clear how that happened, my aunt is 85 and pretty sharp, but when she's stressed it's difficult to figure out what she is saying. At least I got the picture which is something mom absolutely couldn't piece together.

A former neighbor from Huntington Beach phoned mom last night and all mom could tell me about the conversation was, "That woman who used to live next to us called and rambled on forever. I don't think anything was new or important so I didn't remember anything to tell you." Took me awhile to find out who "that woman" was.

And so it goes.

The yard at eight months

Do I have enough potted plants? The plant at the edge on the left is a tomato tree. Not really, but I've never had such a large tomato plant before. And yes, there are about a dozen green tomatoes on it. It's too hot during the summer to grow tomatoes and now I'm wondering how this plant is going to survive; the nights are getting down into the 40's. A woman at the nursery said she grows tomatoes on her patio during the winter months. This is only a small portion of the potted plants. The door leads into my bedroom.

New rocks in the garden! This corner was rather boring until a trip to Southwest Boulder turned up these soothing rocks. The large turquoise rock in the foreground cost as much as all of the rest of them did. The turquoise is natural. The 2 small companions were a gift from the guy showing us around the place. They have hairline cracks on them; so what! This area now feels meditative; I've been known to gaze at the rocks while contemplating . . .

My daughter's family

I don't know why I forget about this blog! This is where the non-art drivel should go. I'm listening to the Three Tenors Christmas on PBS. What voices! I almost believe that the Christmas is just around the corner.

My daughter, Corey and her guys were in Australia for Thanksgiving. Brad's cousin was married in Brisbane on the 17th. Corey looks so natural holding the koala bear; took me a moment to realize what she was holding.

More health stuff to deal with for the next two weeks. I have an irregular heart beat, I don't think that it's serious, but the cardiologist thought it would be a good idea if I have a stress test. I'm rather panicky about the whole thing! I have a hard enough time walking on pavement so I can't even imagine how I'll be able to manage a treadmill. The orthopedic doctor agreed that I do have arthritis in my knees and hips; I've been referred to a physical therapist for two sessions. The orthopedic doctor has no idea what the lump is on my arch so I had an MRI last Thursday for what he called a soft tissue mass. And so it goes . . .

Mom had a rough day. Couldn't figure out anything and couldn't explain what she needed me to help her with. She lost the TV remote that ended up under the blanket on her bed. I lose my remote in bed all of the time which she was happy to hear about. The heater controls are also the AC ones but seeing how she never figured out the AC the heater has her completely baffled. I must have gown out to the casita every hour to go through how to turn it on. I thought I had her settled in for the night when the door bell rang. She was standing there shaking her head, "The house is against me and out of whack." I have no idea what she meant, but I think that she felt that her room has conspired against her. This afternoon she took frozen bread out of the freezer for sandwiches and somehow decided that if she put it into the bread keeper it would thaw. Interesting idea.

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This post was originally on ExpressionStudio,
Nov. 22
This morning I woke up to mom screaming, "Gail, you're flooding the entire front yard, you'd better do something. Water is going under the house and everything is flooding."I should have known that mom didn't have a handle on what actually was going on. (How could I be flooding the front yard? I was innocently sleeping.) Once I assessed the disaster it was pretty bad and I had no idea what to do about it. Water was gushing out of a broken pipe, down the side of the house at the edge of the garage making a deep groove in the dirt and lawn pouring over the sidewalk and into the street. From the looks of the damage I'd guess that it had been flooding for quite some time. I have no idea where the shut-off valve is for the drip system so I called customer service and discovered that today is Thanksgiving! I had forgotten what day it is while I was wading around in mud and water. Fortunately, there is an emergency number and of course I reached a pager! The upshot is that after 15 more minutes of watching the loss of water pour down the street and the crevice become something akin to the Grand Canyon, not really, but I was beginning to wonder just how deep and wide the crevice was going to become I received a phone call. "The turn-off valve is under the green round cover near the sidewalk."Instant relief! It seems that a wet spot I'd noticed a few days ago was the beginning of a leak and the pipe to the front yard drip system decided to break today. Why not? I'm guessing that it will be fixed by the HOA in the next few days. This is just an example of what the last few weeks have been like.

One thing after another along with numerous medical appointments to attend to that are spilling over into next week. No end in sight.On Tuesday I was able to start on a project for Christmas that I hoped I could continue to work on yesterday. But hope died when mom came hobbling into the house from the casita using dad's cane. I said, "This doesn't look promising." Seems that mom's left hip had suddenly started giving her problems during night. Had she fallen? She couldn't remember. And so it went until I put her back to bed with Advil and a heating pad. (Today both hips are painful and she can barely walk. Now what?!) Wednesday is dialysis treatment day for my daughter, Stacy, so I needed to get ready to sit for three hours. Mom has been able to sit at the dialysis clinic three-days-a-week for the last 7 years and I've been wondering how much longer she would be able to do it. Is this the beginning of the end? And will I be able to leave mom at home alone for 4 hours? Help costs $20 an hour with a minimum of 4 hours, something I simply can't afford!Thirty minutes before it was time to leave mom had forgotten that she was staying home and valiantly started to get dressed. Her memory has nearly stopped recording information, so much so that she couldn't remember that we had decided she needed to stay home!We went shopping last Thursday because she needed new pants. She's gained a lot of weight; one of her meds seems to be the culprit along with her lack of any kind of exercise outside of walking from the casita, a few feet, to the house and out to the car and into the dialysis clinic! I can't convince her she needs to walk around the block with me. The excuses are endless! Yesterday, when she started to get ready to go to the clinic she was shocked to find new pants in her closet. She didn't remember the shopping trip which included lunch and buying two books at the bookstore. She had a near panic attack in the bookstore when she lost sight of me and, "There are too many books here. I have to get out of here now." She threw the books and her wallet on the counter looking like a wild woman. The greatest guy I've ever encountered at a cash register said, "Well dear lets figure this out." It was if he knew mom was panicky. He was older and I got the feeling he'd had experience with elderly people. I'm grateful for his understanding and help because I was beginning to feel panicky myself. At best shopping with FM isn't easy for me.

The weather is finally starting to dip into the 70's! Frost is expected this weekend! What? We just had blistering heat and now frost. What a strange terrain this desert valley is. I doubt I'll ever get used to it. But the vastness between the mountain ranges is calming to me. The first week of November we left the valley twice in 48 hours for an ambulatory EEG for Stacy. The medical center is is Loma Linda a 3 hour round trip that involves driving on the crazy semi-truck clogged interstate through a pass that separates the desert from the big cities! On the other side of the pass I instantly become claustrophobic and want to scream. Everything seems frenetic to me; I have to remember to breathe.At the medical center wires were glued onto Stacy's scalp that were plugged into a recording device that I learned how to use along with a video machine. At least two seizures were recorded during the 48 hours of the test.

The appointment with the neurologist when we find out the results isn't until Dec. 27th!This week is the start of the return of the "snow birds" to the desert and I've sure noticed the increase of traffic and longer lines in the stores. Last year I was oblivious to a lot of what was going on around me being that I was trying to find my way after an exhausting move of two households into one. Perhaps though I didn't notice the influx of people because I came from a fairly crowded tourist area but after spending the summer here when so many people leave to escape the intense heat it's more obvious to me this year. About 3 new shopping centers have been built during the year, but at least there wide open spaces between them. There aren't too many high-rise buildings in the desert and there are lots of country roads I can take to get to the shopping areas. All-in-all it's quieter and calmer here than it would have been living closer to my daughter, Corey, in the LA area. I'm thankful for that

Happy Birthday!

Well the old gal doesn't look too bad! I was going to do a collage over this self-portrait but my friend told me to "stop hiding behind masks." So, I'll alter the image another time. . .

Birthday gift!

Sometimes a little tweaking is necessary in order to achieve a particular "feeling" that a camera can't capture. Such was the case with this gorgeous Italian pot. This was one of those nearly impossible spots to photograph. The area is narrow with a sliding door on the left side and the edge of house on the right. The plant is a guava that we're told can grow as a bush in a pot. Until this plant and pot arrived last week I had no idea how much the wall needed this divine composition.

The mystery of the migraine-from-hell was solved when the wind started blowing early this afternoon. I couldn't figure out why a migraine struck last night but apparently the dust has been heading this way since late yesterday and only reached us a few hours ago. Dust/wind storms in the desert are awful! The outdoor umbrella took flight right after dinner and I almost flew away with it! It's now locked down in the garage along with the cushions for the patio chairs. I added more rock to the new vase pots and have my fingers crossed that nothing falls over and breaks.

Quotes: Our birthdays are feathers in the broad wing of time. ~Jean Paul Richter
Inside every older person is a younger person wondering what happened. ~Jennifer Yane