Wednesday, February 1
âThis horrible hospital,â Betty complains. She has an edginess to her voice I havenât heard for a while.
âPenny,â she calls out, âGet me a hamburger with onions, and no French fries.â
âMay I talk to Penny?â I ask.
âSureâŠ. Pen, itâs Laurel.â
Penny and I talk a bit about this and that, and then I say, âPenny, this might not be the best time to raise this, but if your mom should ⊠ah ⊠pass over while I am in Australia, would you be willing to have the memorial service after I return?â I have practiced this question for weeks, and I am relieved to have asked it.
âHow long will you be in Australia?â Penny asks.
âSix weeks.â
Penny talks of this and that and then says, âGood talkinâ to you, Laurel.â
ââYou havenât answered my question,â I say, surprised at my forthrightness.
âAll right, Laurel,â says Penny, without much enthusiasm. âHereâs Mom again.â
âIâll be back soon, Mom,â I hear Penny say.
âPoor Penny,â Betty says to me.
âHowâs your pain?â I ask.
âTerrible. The doctor ordered one of those pain patches four hours ago and itâs still not here.â
âHowâs your apartment?â
âEverythingâs topsy-turvy. Mike wants to do everything for me. It ainât gonna work that way. Things havenât found their places yet. Still need a toilet paper holder. My kitchen doesnât have a grater. Iâm like my grandma scraping carrots with a knife.â
âI like doing that,â I say. âI like roughing up the carrot, the coarse texture against my hand, the smell.â
The next time someone asks me how come Iâve stayed friends with Betty, Iâll tell them because both our grandmothers made chicken soup with de-strung celery, peeled onions, and knife-scraped carrots.
Thursday, February 2
Ten a.m. and Bettyâs back in her apartment, in pain, waiting for her pain pads. Pennyâs been waiting at the drugstore for two hours, only to learn that the drugstore doesnât stock them. Mike will try another store while Betty waits for a doctorâs phone call.
âIâll catch you later today,â I say.
Seven p.m. and my day and dinner finished, I call Betty. âYou sound good,â I say, responding to her deep pitched âHello.â
âThatâs the funniest thing Iâve heard all day,â she says.
âWhatâs so funny?â
âI feel awful. I am in so much pain. Iâve been in bed all day.â
âPulled muscles hurt.â
âPenny thinks maybe itâs something else. Iâve been on a muscle relaxant and it hasnât helped at all.â Betty starts coughing uncontrollably. âOuch. Cough. Ouch. Cough. Ouch!â
Hearing her screams, my eyes tear, the way they did when my children cried in pain.
âCan you take cough suppressants?â Here I am again, trying to fix the problem.
âNo,â she says angrily. âIâm not supposed to take muscle relaxants either.â Why then has your doctor prescribed them?
âEvery time I cough ⊠this is too much ⊠ouch ⊠the pain is right on my spine.â
âWhy canât you take muscle relaxants?â Maybe Iâm trying to escape her cries of pain through rational conversation.
âOh, what do I know!â she says.
âI am so sorry.â I say this so often. What else is there to say?
âPenny thinks itâs something else, not muscles,â Betty says.
âMaybe sciatica,â I suggest. I do not say maybe itâs cancer or maybe bones are fracturing when she coughs.
âPenny thinks it is not good for me to be in my bedroom all day, so she and Mike have turned my apartment upside down. Theyâve brought my hospital bed into the living room so I can watch TV. I sleep in the living room now.â
âThatâs different.â
âPenny thinks this pain is not enough to matter. She doesnât understand.â
Penny thinks, Penny says, Penny this, Penny that. Is Penny her Mommy?
âHow did Penny get her name?â I ask, surprised that I donât know.
âWell, it had to be a P name after my mother.â
Why? I wonder. Betty detested her mother.
âWhat I did to Penny is what my mother did to me,â Betty continues. âI gave her a nickname.â
Betty didnât quite do what her mother did, though. New Jersey law required that a child be named before it could leave the hospital. âWhatâs your name?â Bettyâs mother asked the discharge nurse. âBetty,â the nurse said. âThatâll do,â said her mother.
âWell, Ms. Bet, have you figured out how to avoid hospitals forevermore?â Iâve wanted to ask her this question for weeks now.
âIâve been studying up on that for years,â she says.
âDo you have pills?â
âYes.â
âDoctors canât make people take their pain pills or prevent them from getting more and stashing them,â I say, supporting her.
âI need to have this conversation.â
âWith me?â
âNo, not with you. With PennyâŠ. Pamâs in town and wants to visit,â Betty says. âI told her not to.â
âWhy?â
âIâve always told you if I can hold onto my dignity and sense of humor, thatâs enough. Wearing diapers, lying on a hospital bed in the middle of the living roomâitâs not funny, and whereâs the dignity?â
Friday, February 3
âThis always happens.â Betty sounds annoyed.
âWhat?â
âYou always call when Iâm just off the phone.â
Iâm confused. âYou are off the phone, arenât you?â
âNobody calls all day and then everybody calls at once,â she says.
âIs Pam coming to see you tomorrow?â
âSheâs not going to see me.â
âMaybe you could put on a nice robe.â
âShe canât see me!â Bettyâs anger is rising. âI have to let her come out here, though.â
âWhy?â
âSheâs bringing things I need from Kent.â
âWhoâs that in my house?â Betty shouts.
I hear a male voice.
âIs that you Jack?â she asks. âCanât you knock?â
âHow do you want your sausage cooked?â I hear Jack ask.
âLet Mike surprise me.â
âHow do you want it cooked?â Jack repeats. He must have orders to get Grandmaâs order right.
âSurprise me,â she repeats.
âI thought youâd have eaten by now,â I say. Itâs 7:30.
âYeah, thatâs what I would have thought. Can I call you back later?â
âSure. Whenever.â
The evening passes and Betty does not call back. Ernest and I watch Survivor and Without a Trace on our TiVo, and I straighten up my desk yet again. I am totally exhausted even though I have napped twice today. I look at my list of things to do before I go to Australia. On the list is sending my essay âJeopardyâ to Qualitative Inquiry. I spend a few minutes writing an abstract, cover letter, and title page. âJeopardyâ has been in my file cabinet for eight years.
Saturday, February 4
I reread âJeopardy.â It chronicles the marriage of my son Josh to Rachel, the birth of their son, Akiva, and the breakup of their marriage. Rachel was forty-three at the time of the pregnancy, no medical tests, interventions, preventions, doctors, or hospitals were involved in the birthing or aftercare of Akiva. As his tie-dyed baby shirt attested, he was âBorn at Home by CHOICE.â He had a tied tongue that the midwife cut with a knife. He was jaundiced and was placed on a sunny windowsill. His umbilical cord was put in the freezer to be buried in the spring.
Rachel believes in birth and death as âspiritual gateways.â The newborn, like the dying one, is fragile during the passage, susceptible to destructive energies. For Akivaâs first three months, she limits my visits. I worry that he will catch a terrible disease or never talk right or that he is genetically damaged. Rachel doesnât believe in any vaccinations, including polio. At four months Akiva contracts whooping cough. At six months heâs exposed to a child who was given the live polio vaccine. I do not have the heart to fully love a grandchild I might lose. Only when his first birthday passes and he is still alive, walking, and talking, do I relax my fears.
It is very painful for me to revisit tha...