Nov 21, 2007
Yesterday we left to spend the Thanksgiving holiday with my mom. Took us a little over 8 hrs. to drive to Florida, Gary doing much of the driving. (We decided it would be easier to drive straight there rather than go through the rigamarole of unpacking and re-packing the minivan for an overnight stay at a motel on the way.) So, it took maybe about 45 minutes longer than if Gary hadn’t had to lift up for a minute every 25 minutes.
We’re staying at a Holiday Inn Express, and oddly, we are practically the only ones checked in – feels like we have the run of it! This motel chain seems to be a pretty good one in terms of accessibility, except sometimes, as with this one, the bed is higher than Gary would like; his feet don’t touch the ground after he makes the transfer onto it, which makes it harder for him to keep his balance. This particular motel probably does have the best roll-in shower, however – it’s the first one he could actually use. (The last place he was at was really a head-shaker in this regard: not only was there a bump he’d have to navigate to get into the shower, but the shower seat was clear over on the far wall – the combination meant he would’ve had to fly over to get to the seat.)
Someone mentioned that lately I haven’t said much in the blog about my own health. That’s because I figured you were tired of hearing me whine about the same thing ;-). In case you aren’t here goes: back and knee aren’t all that much improved; they hated the trip and let me know that, particularly during the night; but I think so far the trip has been easier than the previous couple. I really wish they’d hurry up and invent the transporter beam (as in, “Beam me up, Scotty”).
After Gary’s bed bath last night, he had me check out his flap. We were curious how it would be, because this was the first time he’s taken such a long drive since Missouri, at which time I’d yelled out “Jeez O’Pete” at seeing the state of his flap. We were fairly confident it would be okay this time, because he’s done shorter trips with no problem and because we figured the flap area had probably toughened up some by now. This time after I checked it out, he asked me how it looked, and I was happy to inform him he had a cute butt, no problem with the flap.
We moseyed over to mom’s about noon her time today, and spent the day talking, reminiscing (although I’m not sure I believe all mom’s recollections – come on, did I really tell my kindergarten teacher she wasn’t a very good teacher and that I wasn’t going to waste my time doing the assignments because they were too easy? Too bad I lost such impudence about middle school), relaxing, and trying to ward off mom’s attempts to get us to eat more. Oh, and we had Christmas. Probably the only people to ever have celebrated Christmas the day before Thanksgiving. Actually, we hadn’t gotten mom her gift yet, but she had gifts for us: two sweaters for Gary, pajamas and a dressy shirt for me.
As we left for the motel, mom said we had given her the best gift we could’ve: seeing us behaving “back to normal.” The last time she’d seen Gary was that first week after his accident, up at the hospital in Birmingham. Despite the fact she gets all the news of the blog, she still had in her head that Gary was going to be debilitated, and therefore that it was going to be emotionally hard for her to see how difficult life was for him now, and that she was going to have to put up a brave front and not let us see how this affected her. But then after being around us for a time, she said she realized, “Why, it’s just the same ol’ Gary!” Okay, not quite the same ol’, but you know what she means. She was fascinated to watch how he did his transfer into the driver’s seat of the van and to see how he could operate the controls. As typical, however, she said he ought to put his seat up higher (a trait I know I’ve inherited to some extent – always thinking you know a better way somebody should be doing something other than what they’re doing). As was also typical, Gary ignored her advice and continued to do it his way.
Yesterday we left to spend the Thanksgiving holiday with my mom. Took us a little over 8 hrs. to drive to Florida, Gary doing much of the driving. (We decided it would be easier to drive straight there rather than go through the rigamarole of unpacking and re-packing the minivan for an overnight stay at a motel on the way.) So, it took maybe about 45 minutes longer than if Gary hadn’t had to lift up for a minute every 25 minutes.
We’re staying at a Holiday Inn Express, and oddly, we are practically the only ones checked in – feels like we have the run of it! This motel chain seems to be a pretty good one in terms of accessibility, except sometimes, as with this one, the bed is higher than Gary would like; his feet don’t touch the ground after he makes the transfer onto it, which makes it harder for him to keep his balance. This particular motel probably does have the best roll-in shower, however – it’s the first one he could actually use. (The last place he was at was really a head-shaker in this regard: not only was there a bump he’d have to navigate to get into the shower, but the shower seat was clear over on the far wall – the combination meant he would’ve had to fly over to get to the seat.)
Someone mentioned that lately I haven’t said much in the blog about my own health. That’s because I figured you were tired of hearing me whine about the same thing ;-). In case you aren’t here goes: back and knee aren’t all that much improved; they hated the trip and let me know that, particularly during the night; but I think so far the trip has been easier than the previous couple. I really wish they’d hurry up and invent the transporter beam (as in, “Beam me up, Scotty”).
After Gary’s bed bath last night, he had me check out his flap. We were curious how it would be, because this was the first time he’s taken such a long drive since Missouri, at which time I’d yelled out “Jeez O’Pete” at seeing the state of his flap. We were fairly confident it would be okay this time, because he’s done shorter trips with no problem and because we figured the flap area had probably toughened up some by now. This time after I checked it out, he asked me how it looked, and I was happy to inform him he had a cute butt, no problem with the flap.
We moseyed over to mom’s about noon her time today, and spent the day talking, reminiscing (although I’m not sure I believe all mom’s recollections – come on, did I really tell my kindergarten teacher she wasn’t a very good teacher and that I wasn’t going to waste my time doing the assignments because they were too easy? Too bad I lost such impudence about middle school), relaxing, and trying to ward off mom’s attempts to get us to eat more. Oh, and we had Christmas. Probably the only people to ever have celebrated Christmas the day before Thanksgiving. Actually, we hadn’t gotten mom her gift yet, but she had gifts for us: two sweaters for Gary, pajamas and a dressy shirt for me.
As we left for the motel, mom said we had given her the best gift we could’ve: seeing us behaving “back to normal.” The last time she’d seen Gary was that first week after his accident, up at the hospital in Birmingham. Despite the fact she gets all the news of the blog, she still had in her head that Gary was going to be debilitated, and therefore that it was going to be emotionally hard for her to see how difficult life was for him now, and that she was going to have to put up a brave front and not let us see how this affected her. But then after being around us for a time, she said she realized, “Why, it’s just the same ol’ Gary!” Okay, not quite the same ol’, but you know what she means. She was fascinated to watch how he did his transfer into the driver’s seat of the van and to see how he could operate the controls. As typical, however, she said he ought to put his seat up higher (a trait I know I’ve inherited to some extent – always thinking you know a better way somebody should be doing something other than what they’re doing). As was also typical, Gary ignored her advice and continued to do it his way.
posted by Peg Daniels at 7:17 PM
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