Contemplating life... again again.

 I was sitting in a chair thinking... thinking thinking thinking about the situation we are in with mom and about life in general. The phone rang and it was my aunt, she was wondering how things turned out with mom, I gave her the bad news. She then shared her bad news, a neighbour of ours passed away, a really sweet lady always friendly, always smiling, I'm good friends with her children, I'm going to miss her. Somehow she managed to turn 82 when I wasn't looking and left us suddenly.

 Apparently she sat down to eat breakfast and suddenly died, I think that's probably a good way to go considering what mom is going through. I sat back down to resume my thoughts on life. It's ironic that I just received that news because I was thinking about how I feel the world is flying apart on me. I also feel like the floor has collapsed beneath me and I'm just hanging on to the walls most times. Not only are my parents gone but my entire community of family and friends are mostly gone as well. It's the beginning of Steve's end times, life used to be so much better, everything seems to be falling apart around me.

 I heard an interesting Ted talk however, it said that life wasn't better when we were younger. We just think it was because the adults sheltered us from a lot of the hardships. The way people often do now as well. The person said that also when we are younger, we surround ourselves with young people so we don't actually see a lot of the problems people are experiencing. The person said that we only think we were happier back then.

 Maybe I wasn't happier, just unaware. It seems easier but there would be no benefit to going back to being ignorant. It made me think back to when I was finished high school and my parents were the age that I am now. My mom was worried about her mother because she became forgetful and they had to hire a house keeper to cook, do laundry and watch over her and grandpa. Later she was upset because of the treatment grandpa got when he had to stay in the hospital (full circle). Dad was worried about his mom but she was luckily still very independent and two of her daughters began to take turns and stay with her. The stress of the decisions were kept mostly away from us and I only realized it when dad died leaving mom behind.

 The difference now is that the community is much smaller, there is no one to lean on. I rightly or wrongly feel there is also some sick irony in the fact that my friends mother who was still smart as ever, is gone now, while my mom suffers through life in some dizzying bad dream that she must feel like she can't wake up from. One minute she is a young woman searching for her children, the next she is a girl waiting for her parents, never allowed to go home and always, always, always surrounded by strangers.

 My friends will come to me unfortunately for help with the arrangements of their mother and sadly I can't help them, I'm done.