the narrative thread

Here we are at the very end of January and I’m only now getting to the first journal entry of the new year. It’s been a full month since my last post, and I feel guilty. I hate missing a deadline, even if it is self-imposed. I could say that I don’t know where the time has gone, but that wouldn’t be entirely true. I know it’s been spent cleaning out, getting organized, doing paperwork, regrouping, and yes, at least preparing to “have fun.”

In a recent essay in The New York Times, writer Alan Burdick  (It’s Been a Year of This?  1/21//18)  talks about the fungibility of time, how it drags when you are bored or fearful or sad — such as in this era of the Trump administration — or how it flies when you are happy or engaged or productive —such as in this era of the Trump administration. Curiously, even involvement in fervid political activism can qualify as “fun” if you are really into it (depending, of course, on how you define fun).

Anyway, my personal description of the last few months has been that the days seemed long, but the weeks and months flew by. That description is not completely incompatible with the standard psychological trope: time slows down when you are agonizingly conscious of it, such as at a boring lecture or involved in a tedious conversation, but it “flies” when you are fully absorbed and occupied, even if you are not exactly “having fun.” Days full of stress and anxiety may feel excruciatingly long, but when those days add up in chores accomplished, objectives reached, and goals achieved (such as handling my Mother’s affairs, getting her relocated, and recovering from a hurricane), then you somehow feel that time has, indeed, flown by. “Fun” is beside the point.

But not always. This month I had dear friends here to visit for a week. It is a given that stressors can be both positive and negative, and that even happy occasions can create stress, especially when it comes to entertaining guests: the planning, the cleaning, the cooking, the work of preparation. An additional stressor for our week was the absolutely terrible weather that San Antonio experienced during their visit: snow, sleet, ice, rain, mist, and freezing temperatures. On the day one of my friends arrived at the airport, the entire city was shut down. (Good thing I am confident, even if stressed, about driving in snow and ice.) But, we had plenty of food and wine in the house, and our own good company, so even though some of our plans had to be adjusted, we did have fun.  We talked and laughed and enjoyed each other, rejuvenated our relationships and set a date for our next get-together.

During that week, time flew because I was not aware of it. I was happy and busy, “in the flow” of friendship, much as I am “in the flow” when working on my art quilts or my writing. The conscious suspension of time happens not only in creative pursuits, however, but also in moments of ordinary everyday pleasures. Something as simple as reading a book, hugging the dog, or walking in the sunshine can offer moments of pure contentment, even joy. We just have to be quiet long enough to let ourselves enjoy those moments, to be present in them and be grateful for them. The experience of time flying is generally an indicator of good mental health and emotional stability, though we may not always recognize it as such until it’s behind us.

Ultimately, time slows down because you are painfully aware of the waste of it; likewise, it speeds fast forward when you are NOT counting the minutes and hours. It may seem counterintuitive but, even when engaged in unpleasant activities, time will accelerate because you are totally occupied.  While that may not be remembered in retrospect as one of  life’s happier periods, it is still better and more productive to tackle difficulties head on than to sit and sulk and count each dreadful day.

Now that we are over the hump of January and all the feigned optimism and good wishes that a new year inevitably brings, I am looking ahead to 2018 with a more realistic attitude, even a somewhat selfish one. Yes, I still have to face some of those mundane chores of  another year, banking and taxes and medical appointments, all of which will fritter away time holding on the phone or sitting in doctors’ offices, but I am determined not to deliberately waste my own time — or to let others waste it —on anything that is not absolutely necessary.  I have stories to write, art to create, and trips to take. After all, whether it drags or it flies, time is a finite commodity; there are only 24 hours in a day and only so many days in a life. We need to spend what we have wisely, and well, in the interest of our own happiness.

So, are we having fun yet?

Fall weather comes to South Texas all of a sudden and late in the season, with a cold front from the north that we Texans call a norther. A norther blew in this week, with temperatures dropping form the 90s into the 50s virtually overnight. The few deciduous trees that grow here won’t drop their leaves until much later, so the small dust devils that erupt from the winds swirl only dust and debris in tantrums of defiant protest against those who resent them, like me, for not swirling the brilliant colors of fallen leaves found in other ares of the country. With the change to Central Standard Time and the sun now sitting lower in the sky, these days of late autumn in South Texas take on a “twilighty” feel, a grayish cast that slows the mood and portends the dark days of winter to come.

In literature study, when the natural setting mirrors the mood of the characters and the events of the plot, it is called “sympathetic nature.” And so it is now, I think, in real life here for us. We have entered the twilight of this season, and maybe of my Mother’s life, and certainly the setting reflects my mood and hers. It’s okay; we have talked; we’re good with all this. But as is so often the case in literature and in life, things have proven to be not quite as expected, not quite as they seem.

As originally planned, I went down to get my Mother and move her up to the assisted living place I had arranged, and decorated, in late October. The day I arrived, however, she had another stroke, which precipitated another hospital stay, which precipitated yet another facility decision, or range of decisions, upon her release. She could no longer navigate the assisted living facility I had previously arranged, nor could she return to the nursing/rehab center from which she had come. Panic. I had closed on her house the morning of her release! Best-laid plans thwarted once again. In a forced decision, I had her discharged to a memory care home in Victoria, knowing that it wouldn’t be a permanent solution, but not having much choice at the moment. The first night there she fell. And so it went…

Ultimately, after frenzied phone calls and kind interventions from Hospice and residential health professionals with connections, I finally picked my Mother up, put her in my car, and drove her up here myself to a lovely, new memory care home in San Antonio. She is happy,  or so she says, to be in a permanent situation and happy to be close to her family. And so we are, at last, the both of us, out of Victoria for good. We have survived it all, including the hurricane, we have recovered (sort of), and we have relocated and begun a new chapter. My Mother is, understandably, a bit sad, but resigned; I am now in something of a “twilight sleep” myself, being terribly sleep deprived, but also relieved that the decisions have been made and that there is simply nothing else to be done.

I have managed to use some of the pretty things I had purchased a while back with which to decorate her assister-living suite — a coverlet and sham and matching window valences, a petite lady’s electric recliner, matching sheets and towels — but many things have had to be returned because her room is smaller and the hospital equipment, oxygen, wheelchair, bath bench, special bed and such, take up space. Even so, the room is comfortable and we have set out family photos and brought in some of her favorite keepsakes. “Is this place permanent?” she asks me when we arrive.

“Yes,” I say. “This is your new home.”

Twilight time is perhaps a melancholy time, but oddly, it has always been my favorite time of day. After a long, exhausting schedule of work, chores, errands and obligations, the early evening hours offer a late-day respite, a wine-time break, some moments to reflect on the accomplishments of the day and in which to contemplate what may lay ahead.  Yes, as the Platters sang so long ago, the “heavenly shades of night are falling” and the uncertainties of tomorrow await the dawn, but there is time now for rest and recuperation, however brief, in the interlude.

It’s “Twilight Time.”

The storm hits and the drama of it all dominates the media: wind-blown newscasters hold fast to the nearest pole as they report on nature’s fury; rescue workers wade through waist-high water as they search for those refusing to leave; ravaged evacuees huddle in make-shift shelters, too tired and too terrorized to even think about what they’ve left behind.

Then, after the storm hits, the reality of what has happened settles in: friends and relatives call to see “if you’re okay;” relief organizations and FEMA set up headquarters in parking lots; the National Guard rolls in and politicians land in helicopters. Promises are made, damages are estimated, and recovery gets underway.

Except that recovery is not immediate; it is long and hard and sad and dull, and soon there are other crises, other “storms” of one sort or another, that will deflect attention and divert resources. The drama is over, as is the media coverage, and once again, people are left on their own to help themselves, to pick up the pieces and clear the debris of their uprooted lives.

So I returned to Victoria after my Mother was returned there from evacuation, to a town with power lines down, trees uprooted, roofs ripped off and piles of debris in the streets. The scene was dire, like something out of a sci-fi novel. Schools, businesses and most restaurants were closed; motels, the ones that were open, were full of evacuees from the Coast and relief workers from all over. And yes, there were those long lines for gasoline and long lines using up that precious gasoline waiting for entry into the circus-tent collection of relief agencies dispensing food and water, diapers and baby formula. I went there myself one day, in my Cadillac, to Samaritan’s Purse, to get help in clearing the giant limbs from a downed tree in my Mother’s yard which prevented me from getting electrical lines restored; the ladies at the sign-up table thought I was there to volunteer.

They must have forgotten that Mother Nature is nothing if not an “equal opportunity destroyer.” My Mother’s house had no electricity and no clean water. I spent the week mostly in my car, where I had air conditioning and wi-fi, sleeping at a benevolent neighbor’s house at night. The temperatures were in the 90s and the mosquitoes were the size of dive bombers; I washed my face with Evian and didn’t take a shower for a week. A most humbling week, certainly; gives you a whole new appreciation for the basics in life, like water and electricity.

As it happened, this was also the week when the hospital discharged my Mother, so I had to hustle to get her into a local nursing/rehab facility; of the two the case worker had recommended, only one was still standing, so the choice was easy. The day of her transfer was the longest of my life. They allowed me to drive her, so I was able to take her by her house and to let her neighbors come out to greet her. I knew that she thought , we both thought, that she might not ever see her home again. I wanted to give her a chance to say good-bye. Later that evening, after she was settled across town, I found myself back at her house rummaging through the closets and drawers with a flashlight trying to assemble the long list of required necessities the facility had given me.

So this is how our recovery goes. My Mother’s house was without electricity for almost two weeks. Her damage, while considerable, is not catastrophic, and not enough to meet the large deductible on her homeowner’s insurance: a huge tree came down and took the fence and some cables and lines with it, some shingles are shorn, debris still litters (though the goodness of neighbors helped clean most of that up), and a huge stump with roots has to be removed (see photo above).  It could be worse, a lot worse. Except for the fact that we personally have experienced the “trifecta” of health, home and hurricane events all at once, I guess I shouldn’t complain. It’s just “deja vu all over again.”

We have now entered the calm after the storm, except it isn’t calm for me. I am going to be living between two places for a while, until all this gets taken care of and my Mother gets well enough to go … where? The physical debris of Hurricane Harvey will eventually get cleared, but the emotional debris of this whole episode, happening again as it did almost 20 years ago, may remain forever. And I am not as young as I used to be.

And neither is she.

Photo: A home in the Harvey floodwaters; photo by Luke Sharrett/Bloomberg

The rains start gently, tentatively, as though they need to practice after months of prolonged drought. Over the next day or two, they build into steady showers — not unwelcome, mind you, since they bring the cooler temperatures of fall after a hot, dry summer.

We are sitting, my mother and I, out on the lovely Spanish-style patio in the courtyard of the famous Warm Springs Rehabilitation Center in Gonzales, Texas.  Founded on the banks of the San Marcos River in 1937 during the height of the polio epidemic, Warm Springs got its name from the artesian well of healing mineral waters nearby, which not surprisingly in Texas were discovered during drilling by Producers Oil Company of Houston in 1909. Over time, Warm Springs built a national reputation as one of the most comprehensive rehabilitation and treatment centers for victims of traumatic injury in the country.

I had flown into South Texas from Connecticut in an emergency a couple weeks earlier because my Mother, who still lived in my hometown of Victoria, had suffered a massive stroke. She was totally paralyzed on one side, couldn’t speak, and barely able to recognize me when I arrived at her bedside. It was devastating, and distressing, and overwhelming; I promptly had to exercise her power of attorney, take over her life, and take a leave of absence from my own.

Initially, I had been told that my mother would probably need custodial care for the rest of her life, but now here we were, barely three weeks later, sitting outside on a cloudy October afternoon. The road back was destined to be a long one, but “come hell or high water,” we were determined. Even though she couldn’t speak or read or write yet, she was getting the intensive therapies she needed at Warm Springs and would, hopefully, be able to go home at some point and resume her life. But now, with the clouds thickening and the rain beginning to fall again, she frowned and pointed upward as we moved inside. I knew she meant I needed to get on the road for the 70 mile drive back to Victoria before the skies opened up.

And open they did, into rain that lasted for days, though most of the 22-30 inches that fell did so in less than 24 hours. Ultimately, the floods in South Texas of the Guadalupe and San Antonio River basins between October 17-31, 1998, became a national disaster — this after the area had already been declared a national disaster due to drought earlier that summer. How could that be? There wasn’t even a hurricane!

But in fact, this “atmospheric event” of a low-pressure trough with high water vapor was caused by hurricanes far, far away, one near Baja and one near Acapulco. The rains fell, the rivers converged and over-flowed, and the earth was just too parched to absorb it all. The results were catastrophic: record flash flooding, which most forecasters missed, turned into $750 million in damage; the Guadalupe River in Victoria crested at 33.8 feet above flood stage, putting much of that city’s downtown totally under water, and completely flooding many neighboring small towns and surrounding farmlands.  Remember the famous photograph of the cow stranded on a rooftop above flood waters?

Of course Warm Springs on the banks of the San Marcos River flooded, as well, and I got a call in the middle of the night that my Mother had been airlifted by military helicopter from the roof and evacuated to … parts unknown. I located her eventually in Halletsville, TX, but it was several days before the water receded and the roads were clear enough for me to go get her.      Ultimately, we survived through “hell and high water,” but it took months before she, and I, could return to our lives.

That was nineteen years ago. Mother still lives in Victoria and I have now retired and live in San Antonio, which is a little over two hours away. Three weeks ago, one of her neighbors called to tell me that Mother had had “an event.” He suspected stroke, called EMS, and she was rushed to the hospital. I arrived as fast as I could; when I saw her in the ER, I thought that was it.

When we walked into her room the next morning, however, she was sitting up in bed. “Hi,” she said weakly. She had a major infection, along with some fluid on the lung, and probably several TIAs along the way, but she was going to make it, according to her doctor. “I feel good about this one,” he said. Three days later she was moved into the hospital’s Rehab unit; that old “come hell or high water” determination resurfaced.

With her settled in, I returned home for a weekend to grab what I needed to stay in her house in Victoria for however long I needed to. I would, once again, have to resume power of attorney and manage her care and affairs. She was doing well in rehab, getting physical, occupational, and speech therapy every day, though she tired easily and needed to build strength. Now the frantic search was on for a skilled nursing/rehab facility to which she could be transferred after Medicare’s allotted twelve-day stay was up.

A couple days into the week, I made a trip to the local HEB (a huge supermarket chain in Texas) to buy some things I preferred to cook and have at her house, rather than the Pringles and cheese sandwiches she favors. Wow! Welcome to madness! The parking lot was full, there were no shopping carts, and inside looked as though the place had been looted. The bread aisle was bare, the dairy was depleted, and people were searching area stores on their cell phones to find available water. “What on earth is going on here?” I asked a guy in front of me with a cart full of Budweiser in the very long, quick-checkout line for those with fewer items.

“A hurricane is coming,” he answered. “Haven’t you heard? Better stock up. They’re even running out of beer!”  He eyed the wine in my own basket and smiled.  Tsk, tsk, I thought. These people must not be real Texans, to let a little tropical storm in the Gulf get them all in a tizzy.

The very next day, on Thursday, August 24, I’m at the hospital for a team evaluation meeting that doesn’t take place. The hospital is going on half staff, and the rains and winds have begun. I try to talk to people to make some arrangements, but everyone is in “hurricane mode.” The doctor in charge assures me that he will not put my Mother out on the street with an umbrella, and says, “Go. Get back to San Antonio before the roads flood. Your mother is safe here, we have generators.”  Once again, South Texas is coming off a severe drought. This strikes me as  “deja vu all over again.”

The rains don’t start gently this time; they come in squalls. At her house, the neighbors help to move her patio furniture, board all the windows, and secure things that might blow. Now the rain is torrential, in sheets; I drive back to San Antonio late in the day.  Harvey hit the next day as a category 4 hurricane directly into Rockport, Texas, which is directly south of Victoria on the Gulf; the eye of Harvey lingered over Victoria for a couple days thereafter, before moving on up the coast to Houston.  (Ironically, we had just been down to Rockport with my Mother two weeks earlier to shop and have our usual summer seafood dinner there at Charlotte Plummer’s restaurant.)

And then, of course, I got that phone call again two days later, late at night, that Mother was being evacuated to … San Antonio … Austin …? It ended up being to Gonzales.  I had a meltdown, because Gonzales is exactly where she had been airlifted from 19 years ago. Sort of like muscle memory… or PSTD.  Or “deja vu all over again.”

But she landed in a lovely country hospital all last week. I wish she could have stayed; she seemed to thrive there. But then, late Thursday night, she was moved back to Victoria, where there is still city-wide contaminated water (though the hospital assures me that they are chlorinating), where there are still areas of no electricity (including her house), where there is considerable wind damage (including her house), and where there are shortages of food, water, gasoline, and other essentials. We went down on Saturday, after waiting three hours in line in San Antonio for a tank of gas to make the trip (while the price per gallon was being raised as even we sat in line). Victoria is in a shambles. So am I.

This saga will continue for a while, I fear, but I am headed back down to Victoria tomorrow. I have enough gas to make the trip, though I have nowhere to stay until the electricity gets turned on. But hey, I drive a Cadillac. I can get wi-fi and sleep in my car.

“Come hell or high water.” This time I have both, again. Cosmic symmetry?