MOTHER | DEATH | COVID19 | CORONAVIRUS | SHELTER-IN-PLACE

The Day The Fence Blew Down

A Mother’s Advice for COVID 19

I was puttering about in the kitchen. Chris, home from working his night job, was watching TV in the family room. We heard the wind howl and then a crash.

“Chris, run outside and see what happened.”

He comes back in the house, “MaryJo, the back fence just blew down. It’s lying on the ground. There’s no other damage, and nobody was walking down the sidewalk.”

“Well, it could have been worse. I’m sure you and your Dad can repair it and stand it up again.”

The phone rings.

“MaryJo, this is Judy. I’m one of the nurses at Manor Care. I’m very sorry, but I have bad news for you. Your Mother has passed away.”

“Chris, Grandma Mary has died. I’m on my way to the nursing home. Please call your Dad at work. Tell him to meet me there.” (This was November 1989 and thus before cell phones.)

Chris turns off the TV and replies, “Oh, I’m sad. I loved Grandma Mary. I’ll call Dad right away. I guess the fence blowing down was Grandma Mary’s way of telling us she was leaving.”

I walked into my Mother’s room. She was lying peacefully on her bed, a pleasant look on her face. And, of course, fully dressed in a nice blouse, a pleated skirt, a necklace, panty hose, and sensible shoes. (The residents were always taken back to their rooms after lunch to take a nap.)

She had died quietly in her sleep by herself — as she would have wanted. My Mother was much too dignified to have wanted anyone by her bedside as she passed away.

I sat waiting for Eric to get there, remembering her last evening with us. We had finished feeding her a supper of gray blobs, green blobs, and some artificially-sweetened pudding. She could no longer feed herself and couldn’t chew or properly swallow so her meals consisted of baby food.

After she’d finished her pudding, she turned to one of the servers. “Oh thank you. It was a lovely dinner, and I enjoyed it so much.”

Despite serious dementia, no longer able to walk, and having to suffer the indignity of her daughter feeding her baby food, she was gracious to the end.

And she was a lady. A lady wouldn’t die in bed in her nightgown for all to see. The nursing home had asked me if I could bring my mother sweat pants or at least some kind of pants as it would be easier to dress her and to launder her clothes.

The answer was “No.” My Mother didn’t believe ladies should wear pants, even pants suits. And sweat pants?! She would wear a proper dress or a skirt and blouse. I understood their concern but wanted my Mother to keep her dignity in the way she would have chosen.

She was an optimist. “MaryJo, when do you think I’ll be able to go home?” I’ve been in this hotel long enough. It’s very nice, but I’d rather be at home.”

My Mother was all those things long before dementia invaded her brain: a lady, always “properly” dressed, gracious, thankful for all that came into her life, and an optimist. No matter what the calamity, she would remind us that things would get better and one should shoulder on.

Now with COVID19 upon us, I think about her. What would she have done? How would she have coped? Would she have followed the rules: social distancing, mask wearing, hand washing, sanitizing? Would she have been discouraged?

Of course, she would have done it all, while obsessively sanitizing everything. She was fanatic about cleaning: “MaryJo, never forget that ‘cleanliness is next to Godliness.’”

I never understood exactly what that meant, but knew that dirt, dust, messes of any kind, e.g. children’s toys scattered about, were forbidden. God was watching and didn’t approve.

My Mother was not a religious woman. The only time I ever heard her mention God was in relation to cleanliness. Cleaning and keeping everything tidy and in order was my Mother’s religion.

She would have taken COVID19 seriously, carefully following the rules. But she would never have been discouraged. The optimist in her would find good, even in COVID.

Following my Mother’s example, what good do I find in these difficult times?

Writing: I discovered my passion: I guess writing’s always been my passion: writing for others, sometimes getting paid, sometimes not. So maybe it’s not that I discovered writing as a my passion, but giving myself permission to write for myself.

I’m still sheltering-in-place so more time to focus on writing. Discovering that even my writing about writing is appreciated. Seeing raging ADHD in my writing: The online marketing mentors tell us to find a niche. A what, I ask?

Why not write about coffee pots, and children who don’t want to read, and graduate school, and the death of two fathers and canned peas and adoption and ADHD, and cats?

Why not make a list of topics to write about in the future? Books we’ve loved, Bach, pianos, Yellowstone National Park, walking off jobs we hated. Ahh, the endless opportunities for writing.

All of the this in addition to working on two memoirs: Finding My Hero: An Adoption Memoir from World War 2 and Growing Up Adopted: Love Wounded.

Introverting: Although outgoing and friendly, I’ve always been an introvert. After all, I was an only child of older parents. I enjoy my friends, but I’m quite fine alone in my office. Probably too fine, as a little leaving-my-office to exercise wouldn’t be a bad thing.

My sense is that extroverts are having a harder time with staying at home and keeping a distance from others.

Spending less money: Not that I haven’t given up ordering from Amazon, but I’m certainly being more frugal. This is good.

Buying less gas: If one isn’t supposed to go out much, one drives less. The less driving, the less gas purchased. And the less bad stuff into the atmosphere. This is good also.

Tuning into my neighborhood: I love watching folks walk down the sidewalk in front of our house:

An old woman with two canes (and I thought one cane was bad enough); a couple with a baby in a stroller, a toddler riding her scooter, and the family dog trotting along; young people in the street on their bikes; neighbors watering their grass; folks next door to us remodeling the outside of their house.

I’ve even met two wonderful, very large dogs: Sherman and Molly.

Indulging in take-out: Cooking has never been at the top of my list of fun things to do. Now I’ve an excuse for take-out since restaurants have been closed.

Zooming with friends I wouldn’t be seeing otherwise: When we left New Jersey a year ago to return home to Denver, we left the world’s smallest Episcopal Church, St. Luke’s, in tiny Hope, NJ. A church built before white settlers came to Colorado. I have wonderful, loving friends at this church.

But it wasn’t just church. It was the book fair at the Hope Christmas market where the night before we removed all the hymnals and Books of Common Prayer from the pews and filled them with used books to sell.

It was cashiering at our food stand for Victorian Days in Belvidere, NJ. It was cooking pots of chili for coffee hour after church — more like lunch hour. It was selling tickets at the door for the annual Mardi Gras pancake supper with music by Tin Pan Annie and The Bluegrass Boys.

Now I belong to St. Luke’s bi-weekly book club discussion. Thanks to COVID, it’s on Zoom. Every two weeks I see my NJ friends and talk and laugh. Makes me smile, even a bit teary.

I’m sure there’s more. If my Mother were here, she’d remind me of other things to be grateful for. Of how to be optimistic. She is missed.

What are you grateful for during the pandemic? What can you feel optimistic about?

If you’d like to be added to the list to receive a free copy of a short e-book, “9 Tips for Readable Writing” and a free review of one piece you’ve written (no longer than 1,500 words), send an email to [email protected].

Watch for my forthcoming e-book, Oh Look, There’s a Squirrel and Other Stories.

In addition to writing about writing, I offer words of wisdom to adult ADHDers and to folks who are adopted. I am both. (Many adopted folks have ADHD, often caused by trauma at birth.)

Given raging ADHD, it’s no surprise that focus does not come to me easily! In addition to adoption and ADHD, I also write random stories from my life, what I’ve observed, what’s in the news, about writing and editing, anything that tickles my fancy.

For a Black Lives Matter from a white perspective, see my stories For White Folks from an Old Gray-Haired White Woman with Arthritis. And Teaching Kindergarten at an all-Black school.

You might also like musings on Staying at Home because of COVID 19: The Good, The Bad, and the Not So Ugly.