Time and time again

Wende was here with mom while we were away, and observed that she is "slowly fading away". Mom was happy to see her, which was nice, but even so, Wende can't do a visit longer than about 35 minutes either. Time slows down in the Chute, and every minute feels like an hour. There is no real conversation with her - even though she tries to say words, they come out like random syllables that don't fit together. Still, she has a sense of humor and likes to tease.

I brought mom a pine cone from the forest near Yosemite, where we had our program last weekend. It had a greeny frosted look that made it beautifully two-toned, and she kept it as her centerpiece on the dining room table. That's good that she now feels her dining table is safe enough to leave "her" things - she used to worry that someone would walk away with her treasures and she'd carry them around with her all day. She enjoys her table-mate, Marta, who is silent and seems kind. Marta can't get her ice cream onto a spoon and lifted up to her mouth, so I almost always feed her when I'm there.

It's a strange world we live in. I'm reassembling my to-do lists after a week away. The fast world of email and text messages means that my calendar changes quickly, and I'm working on so many different fronts that I sometimes feel like I'm in a triathlon. It's probably good balance to visit the Chute time vortex now and then to remember that there are many realities operating all at the same time.