R.I.P. Mom

For the past couple of days, I've been in denial.  Yesterday, I took a ride to Connecticut on a beautiful late-summer Sunday.  Today it has rained.   I spent time with Mildred and did some work that engaged my hands and, occasionally, my mind. (It's somehow appropriate to Labor Day, isn't it?)  Among other things, I built a wheel and did some maintenance on Arielle, my Mercian Audax, and the Fuji.

There are other things I could do.  But I can't use them to escape because, at the moment, escape doesn't seem possible.

On Saturday night, just before midnight--and the change from August to September--my mother passed away.  

She had health problems, mainly stemming from her diabetes, for a number of years.  Last Tuesday night, however, she woke, her skin clammy and her breathing labored.  My father brought her to the hospital and after diagnosing her, installed a pacemaker with a battery would be "good for ten years."

I talked to her on Thursday night.  She complained about one thing and another in the hospital.  Based on my admittedly--and thankfully-- limited experience with such facilities, I can't say I blamed her. (Hospitals really do have the worst beds!)  But she seemed in rather good spirits, given what she was experiencing.  

On Friday, I called her cell phone.  She didn't answer, I thought that she might've gone home.  So I tried the landline.  Still no answer.  I tried each number again, later in the day and that night.  No response.

Finally, on Saturday morning, I heard from my brother in California.  Mom was heaving deep, guttural snores that seemed to come from deep within her body and, when my father tried to wake her, she didn't respond.  

She was hooked to some machines.  The doctor and my father watched intently.  After what must have seemed like an eternity, the doctor said there was nothing more that could be done.

My mother had a DNR on file. (So do I.)  Still, my father said, giving consent to remove life support was the hardest decision he ever had to make.  I tried to reassure him that he was following Mom's wishes.  Most important, he probably spared her a lot of suffering:  Within minutes, she had no brain activity.

Dear readers, I am sorry if I am burdening you with onerous details.  What I had been trying to avoid is happening:  I am replaying the conversation and exchanges of texts about something I was absolutely powerless to change.  My father, my brother, Millie and others I've talked to have reassured me that the fact I wasn't in that hospital was not a reason why she passed just before midnight on Saturday.  Even with her medical issues, none of us could have known how close she was to the end of her life.  Perhaps she knew; if she did, she didn't let on.

Anyway, I am writing this because I have posted every day for the past five years and most days for about four years before that.  I might not post for a while, but I am not abandoning this blog.  If nothing else, though she saw only a few posts (She never learned how to use a computer; she saw things online only when my father showed them to her), I think she'd want me to continue:  She knew how important cycling and writing are to me.  They've helped me, as she did, through some difficult times in my life.  I don't think that will change.

R.I.P. Max

I've just lost a friend.

You've seen him on these pages.  He's one of the most loving and friendly beings I've ever known. 

Sometimes he would climb on me while I was sleeping.  I didn't mind: When I woke to him, I felt the sun rising.  He looked like a sunrise.

I am talking about Max, the orange cat who's lived with me for ten and a half years.

He came into my life on 9 April 2007.  My friend Millie rescued him from a street near us.  She told me that when she saw him, she walked right up to him.  He did the same for me the first time I saw him.

What that meant, of course, was that he is anything but a feral  cat.  "He must have had a home before," Millie observed.  When I saw him, I couldn't not give him one.

The vet said he was between five and seven years old when I brought him home.  So, that means he lived about sixteen or seventeen years--a pretty good lifespan for a cat.

Even if he'd been in my life for only a day, he could have given me a lifetime of happiness:  That is what he carried with him, and couldn't help but to give.  He greeted everyone who came to my apartment--including Marlee, the day I brought her home--like an old friend and playmate.

He died late Sunday night, after I'd come back from a nice ride, had a sumptuous dinner and talked to my mother.  I wrote yesterday's post about the ride I took Sunday, the day before, because it was just too difficult to talk about Max.

He won't be waiting for me at the end of my next ride.  Not physically, anyway.  I believe, though, that I'll see him at the end of many rides for a long time to come.

Note:  In a sad irony, I lost another cat--the first one I had who was named Charlie--on 16 October in 2005.

R.I.P. John

Today I'm going to detour a bit, for a very personal reason.

In other posts, I've mentioned Millie.  I met her the day I moved to Astoria, in August of 2002.  She saw me as I unloaded boxes, bikes and two cats--Charlie I and Candice--into an apartment in the building next to her house.  She decided that she liked me right then and there, or so it seemed.  And, yes, I liked her immediately.

Well, over the years she's taken care of my cats whenever I've spent time away.  Two years after we became neighbors, I took a trip to France and she cared for Charlie and Candice, probably even better than I did.  Then, about two years after that, she took care of Candice when I went to Turkey.  Charlie had died a couple of months before that and, after I returned from my trip, I adopted a cat she'd rescued--and named Charlie.  A little more than a year after that, Candice died and another one of Millie's rescuees--Max--came into my life.

She's been as good a friend as I've ever had in my life.  So was her husband, John.

Referring to him in the past tense feels even sadder to me than the reason why I did so:  He died the other night, apparently, in his sleep.  Given that a tumor was causing his brain to play cruel tricks on him, that was probably the most merciful way he could have been taken from this world.

Millie has said she was fortunate to have married such a good man.  He could not have had a better companion in his life, especially in his last days.  And his granddaughter has told me he is one of her role models, for his honesty and kindness. I can vouch for both qualities.

The next time I have dinner, spend a day or a holiday, or simply sit with Millie--alone, or with her daughters and grandchildren--I will be happy, as always, to see her. Still, things won't be the same without John.

All I can do now is to thank him one more time.