Richard's mental sharpness is deteriorating almost, it seems, before my eyes.  He's slower, his speech is slower, his voice is no longer his but an old man's voice.  It's almost as though I speak to him through a thick brown pane of glass.  He can hear me and I can hear him but the sharpness and immediacy of speech is muffled and delayed. 

This morning I rang Canton Ohio to see if Aunt Lee was still alive.  A letter I'd written her in October was returned.  I know now that she gave me the wrong address but I didn't know that until I'd googled it looking for the phone number.  Anyway, I spoke to her.  She had no idea who I was.  The name was familiar, Barbara and Jack's names were familiar but she couldn't place them.  She couldn't remember the name of her husband either.  I wrote in reply to a letter she'd written in October which although confused and rambling was anchored in the reality of names and places and events.  It's only December.  She's slid into la la land in a few months, the same as Grandma Anne.

Which brings me to - Richard, who was fully aware of who I spoke to and why (we spoke at length about the returned letter and Aunt Lee), kept referring to Aunt Lee as Grandma Anne.  Who, I asked.  Grandma Anne.  Normally a person would catch themselves and say, "No, I meant Aunt Lee!" but even when pressed he stuck to Grandma Anne.  Then when his attention was drawn to the mistake he accused me of being angry with him.  Because he's scared he goes on the offensive.

Often I see him standing or sitting staring off into space, no, not off into space, at the ground.  He doesn't look up anymore.  For minutes at a time.

I didn't used to worry but I'm worried now and I worry about my worrying for it doesn't help and it wears me down.  I understand why I slept for 2 days when he went to the States.  I didn't have to check up on him all the time, nor did I have to - not entertain him but break up the silent empty chunks of time for him.  He often comes looking for me.  I feel the neediness of him even if it isn't verbalized.  He needs to know I'm nearby.  I understand why I'm riding more than I used to.  That hour on Balthazar is time by myself where I cannot be reached.  I breathe more deeply then.

Worry too about moving house.  Is it a crazy idea?  Or will it help him to engage and focus more.  When he's interested in something he pulls himself together and seems quite normal (although he fixates on things more than he used to, grabbing on to a topic or job and worrying at it until it's finished).  On the other hand, if he is deteriorating as quickly as he seems to be, I will eventually face the reality of being on my own.  Do I want to be on my own and still live in Gatton?  Can't imagine I'd be moving myself and all the animals and furnishings by myself.  So if we're going to move it has to be soon.  Suspect that whereever we're living in the next couple of years is where I'll be seeing out my days.

 I feel guilty for thinking about a future that only contains him on the periphery but if my suspicions are correct there will come a time, and perhaps sooner than I think, when I won't be able to manage him.  If that is the case, I want to live in a place where there is no annual massive burning of the bush or an operating quarry.  I want to live in a place of physical beauty and be near people who perhaps aren't so hidebound and conservative as they are in this farming town.   So I plan and scheme and try and convince Richard that it's a good idea to move to the Tweed Valley and not north to the Sunshine Coast hinterland.  If we move there we will only be able to afford a small acreage and will be stuck in some hobby farm development on poor soil with the possibility of crap neighbours and noise.  If we go south we can afford acreage, acreage which will act as a buffer.

I would give a lot to have Richard back as he was.  I miss him.  I blame that damn surgery and that damn incident which put him in intensive care (and of which we don't know the real truth, I'd wager).  Until then he'd been fine.  Now I do the heavy lifting.  Maybe that's only fair.  He was my strong hero and looked after me.  Now it's my turn.  I chose to remain childless to avoid responsibility.  But there's no escape from the lessons we're sent to learn.  I have to learn unselfishness.  MIndfulness.  Trust in the Universe.  The healing power of love, for him and for myself.  Endurance.  Resilience.  Humour.  Patience.  It's all come together, is coming together in one massively intense One on One lesson. 

Richard away in Ipswch.  The farrier was here until 11.  Have done very little of a constructive nature all day.  Just finished yoga and meditation.  Trying to build up to 15 minutes of meditation - eventually to work up to 20.

The days seem to come and go with frightening rapidity.  Copied the previous post to the blog - wrote it 8 days ago - and have intended to write every day.  By the time I've ridden Balthazar and done morning chores it's 10am and I'm pooped.  Guess I'm not 20 anymore.  Have to stop and sit for awhile, then again I've been up and going since 5:30 so maybe I'm being a little hard on myself.

Truth be told.  I fritter away a lot too.  I'm an expert timewaster - reading Weird News on Huffington Post - or playing games - still  playing games although credit where credit is due - not nearly as much as I used to - also practive French - and writing weekly to my elderly aunt who's in a  home in Canton Ohio hundreds of miles away from family.

I hope I'm wrong and one of her two kids is nearby yet going on past history, I doubt it.  Can't help but pick up clues from previous letters.  She was so painfully grateful when L took her to the Cabin.  Maybe they are loving attentive children and make the effort to stay in touch but somehow I doubt it.  Therefore I've decided to write her once a week.  News, not from Lake Woebegone but from Dry Gully Road.  Perhaps she's non compos mentis now.  I knew she was having cognitive problems after a fall, maybe she's passed away - she's in her 90's - and no one's told me so that I wrote to an empty bed or a wastebasket, but it's still worth the effort.  After a shaky start she flouted husband and husband's brother and remained good friends with Mom.  That means a lot.

Suppose too, I've so little family that keeping touch with those that remain becomes increasingly important. My other aunt doesn't write and the few missives received are so fragmented and full of joy and gratitude that I've written her that she imparts no news at all.  She's a bright and loving spirit but goes off on tangents to her tangents to the degree that not one sentence is completed.  I love her and love her joie de vivre but she exhausts me too.

RIght Now and my happy death wish

"Right Now" rolled the die for this - choices were:  Wash walls (going to start washing the outside walls by hand, not enough water in tanks to use the gurney), washing living room windows, chip lantana, draw (nearly finished cloud drawing), blog or start weekly letter to Aunt Lee.

Aunt Lee.  Her husband, my Uncle Ben, died in January.  I wrote as soon as I heard but never received a reply.  Then, at the beginning of this month, I get a letter from her.  She's in an old age home in Canton, Ohio, hundreds of miles away from Grand Rapids, Lansing, where Linda lives, or Jake, wherever the hell he is (he was in North or South Carolina, then Mexico, so who knows?).  I don't know the story so getting mad isn't helpful.  Maybe Linda is desperately trying to get her in a home closer to her.  Aunt Lee doesn't mention the kids at all.  All I know is although she was trying to be brave, the letter was sad and spoke of a woman very much alone - and you can never be lonelier than when you're lonely in a crowd.  So decided I would write her once a week.  Can only tell her Dry Gully Road news, certainly don't want to write of my woes (not that I have any) but writing about the animals and Australiana and upbeat newsy stuff, well, it might just make her smile sometimes.  I am so glad Mom and Dad never went into a home.  I'm not going either.  I'll die first - and that's the only way to avoid them; stay healthy, stay active, keep your marbles, then die in the night or better yet, have a little warning that I am soon to be cactus so the animals are taken care of.

That was my only fear while Richard was away.  If something happened to me while he was gone and no one noticed then the animals would suffer.

So there's my death wish.  Suppose Aunt Lee is tired and perhaps no longer looks at dying with a jaundiced eye.  It's a long beautiful, well-deserved sleep at the end of a long busy life.

Remember reading somewhere that those who have recently died go somewhere where they get to recuperate from life's rigours.  And Wayne had that wonderful dream of Mom in just such a place.

Death is no enemy.  Death is called an angel with good reason.  It is love that releases us from the constant, miraculous, exhilarating, beautiful but ultimately exhausting embrace of life.