CARE HOME (2)

Monday, July 15th, 2013

I did, at least, get a Sunday to myself, although I did very little with it apart from listen fretfully to the anxiety-inducing end to the cricket match whilst sitting in the garden.

There is always a price to be paid for such self-indulgence, of course, and that was the many hours spent awake during the stifling Sunday night when all the things that I ought to have attended to, like checking through mum's mail, suddenly loomed large in my mind and kept me awake.

Oh, how did I become so lazy...?

So, Monday dawns and we have a plan in place. I am going to swing by and see mum after work, delivering the cordial I bought her in the supermarket on Sunday (You see, I did manage to do something...) and explain the wonders of the new mobile phone I bought her, before heading home later and picking up the beloved on the way.

After a long, hot day in the office, which includes more bill paying for her by telephone, and for purely geographical reasons, I head straight to the Care Home from work and, after negotiating the "Wet Paint" signs and finding that the entry bell has been fixed, I find it far easier to get inside than it was at the weekend.

I bound upstairs to mum's room (thirty five), and find that she's not here, but that she's written up a lot of little notes which I expect are jobs for me to do. Assuming that she's in the loo, I unpack the cordial and scribble a few instructions about how the phone works, before inspiration strikes and I head off towards the dining room and find her anticipating her tea with mum having taken to eating in the public areas for the first time today, which is, of course, progress.

To be honest, after all this time, it's great to see her dressed and out and about again, and already she's looking much better than she did in the hospital only last week, and a heck of a lot more healthy than many of her fellow inmates, so it comes as no surprise that the "Lovely Doctor" see saw this morning doesn't think that she'll ned to be there all that long.

Meanwhile, her list of stuff to do includes an urgent trip to her flat to pick up supplies of sanitary wear because such things are not provided in the home itself which she thinks is "Disgusting..." although I mutter something about budgets. Still, I think it's best to leave them to their meals and head off to battle my way to and from the flat during the rush hour.

Half an hour later, I'm back, "products" in hand, and they're still waiting for dessert because all the staff are trying to deal with a bad fall which has happened somewhere. This means that we are able to have a nice little chat over a dinner table and I make the first demonstration of how the phone works before slipping away to ring my sister's message service with it so that she, at least, has the number. Mum seems less than impressed with the Care Home in general because one of her neighbours "Buzzed for an hour..." to get any attention earlier and she herself was "Stuck on a commode" for ages.

Given mum's unusual understanding of time these days, I remain slightly sceptical, but you never know.

After the jelly trifle and the evening pills, we head back to the room ("You're supposed to walk with me in case I fall!") and, amongst other bits of chat, I try to explain at great length how a mobile telephone works with no obvious success, but I do stress the importance of switching it off at the end of a call so as not to use up all the credit, and mum seems happy enough as I head off into the evening with the happy prospect of arriving home and knowing that I don't have to go out visiting again.

I ring my sister for a natter and council of war, and find out from her that telephone communications have been successfully achieved. After half an hour of that, I put down the phone and it rings to tell me there's been a message. Mum has left one, telling me that "a nurse" showed her how to use the phone and that she'd briefly rung her friend Doris, and also my sister, but now she thinks her credit's run out...

Twenty quid... Pfttt!

Just another thing, like Tic-Tacs and biscuits, to splurge upon I suppose...