Category: A New Chapter for the Family

By:

The Dude on the Right
Congratulations
to Barack Obama on winning the nomination for President of the United States,
and kudos to John McCain for giving what might be the most gracious concession
speech ever.  In an election season that has gone on way too long, where I
thank God I live in the Chicago area which limited the amount of campaign adds
on my TV (I visited Ohio, and TV really sucked without TiVo to fast-forward you
through the crap), now we move on, and wonder what "change" can really be
accomplished.

I found the "change" concept sort of inspiring when Barack
originally adopted it at the beginning of his candidacy, but then, wouldn’t you
know, as other candidates realized "change" became a buzz-word, suddenly Hillary
Clinton adopted the word as her own, and then, low and behold, John McCain did
the same.  It didn’t matter that Barack adopted the word first, all that
mattered was that now everyone was about change. The thing is, as much as change
is professed, it’s easier to talk about doing it than actually accomplishing it.

And so, whether or not Barack Obama can really bring about change we can believe
in, after three days of 70 degree days in November, here in Chicago, when back
in college some of us would have blown off three days of classes to catch the
last sunny rays of the year by hanging out on the roof, I at least took a couple
of walks near the dude-pad and realized there is only one aspect of change you
can always believe in, and that is the change of seasons, maybe a little more
pronounced in a place like Chicago.

As I took those walks, looking at a
retention pond that is changing to hibernation mode for an upcoming winter, I
thought about things earlier this year, when that pond was barren, and I would
walk past it, reflecting on the passing of Dad on the Right last January, and
2008 was looking like a strange year.  Then spring and summer came, the
pond blossomed with new life, and suddenly I reconnected with a friend from my
past who has now become my BFF.  Fall came, Mom on the Right passed away,
and as I looked at the pond the other day, and took the picture accompanying
this blog, it didn’t make me sad that things were dying, it made me smile that
as some things that have changed have made me sad, other things that have
changed just make me smile.

Mother Nature knows how to do change right, so
that every season is beautiful.  I wonder if there is any way politicians
can learn from Mom.

That’s it for this one! 
I’m The Dude on the Right!!   L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right
Her
death certificate reads "Time of Death: 11:55 PM" and the date of her death was
Monday, October 20, 2008. Actually, I’m not really sure the exact time on the
death certificate, because I haven’t actually seen it, and technically what is
written is wrong even though "officially" correct, but for me my mom will always
have passed away on Saturday, October 18^th, at 3:32 PM.

This will
be a long blog post.

It was just over nine months ago that my dad died. Simply put, he was done.
After 78+ years of fighting multiple sclerosis, a brain tumor, thalamic
syndrome, a slight stroke, and a cavalcade of other crap, he was just tired and,
even though this sounds weird, he opted to just let his body die. He entered the
hospice center and a few days later, well, Dad on the Right had passed away, but
not before my sister and I got to see him one last time, which I would like to
say was a lovely, serene scene, but when the body dies over a few days, as
sometimes happens, the visual aspect can be a little jarring. Seeing dad,
though, hours before he passed, was nothing like the experience of hanging with
my mom for the last four days of her life.

But as difficult, emotional, and visually/auditorially disturbing those days
might have been, at 3:32 PM on October 18^th, Mom on the Right set my
heart at ease.

You see, Mom wasn’t really ready to die at first, I think, but her body was
finally giving out. She smoked for years, eventually was diagnosed with
emphysema and had some partial blockage requiring a stent, and nowadays all of
that seems to be lumped into something called COPD. Then a few years ago she was
diagnosed with lung cancer, and even though the end was going to eventually
come, she kept up the fight. But Mom didn’t want to die in a hospital or a
hospice center – nope, if she was going to go, well, it was going to be at home,
so she ended up in home hospice, resting comfortably for the past few months in
her easy chair. Then, a few weeks ago, she became increasingly tired (I could
tell because she wasn’t checking or replying to any e-mails), and as my brother
and sister rotated duties caring for her, and from the talk of the hospice
nurses, mom’s time was coming, and my turn came to return to the old country,
Lorain, OH, to take care of her for a spell.

When I arrived she was tired, but still had her wits about her. When she
would have her short bursts of energy we would have quick conversations about
the upcoming election, the Cleveland Browns, how she still can’t stand the
manager of the Cleveland Indians, how Lorain has gone to shit, and she doesn’t
really like Rachael Ray but still watched her show on The Food Network. But as
the body goes, so does the mind, and as a day went on Mom started to become
confused, her eyes started to give her problems focusing, and in my down time I
re-read a couple of times the "Crossing the Creek" guide the hospice center
leaves with their "families" to help them understand the things that will be
happening, and in the end, it is all about helping the person about to pass to
make that journey to their next destination.

So I found myself covering the curtains with an extra blanket because the
light was bothering Mom’s eyes. I didn’t watch TV because the glare and images
on the screen bothered her. I brought Mom’s CD player into the living room where
she rested, and luckily I had a way to play her iPod through it (yup, the nurses
at the cancer center were duly impressed an 80 year old woman listened to her
music through an iPod!). At times Mom seemed scared, at times she seemed alone,
at times she had a burst of sadness yet seemed coherent things were coming to an
end (Mom was upset she never made a list of organizations she wanted to donate a
few dollars to at her passing, so we worked on the list together for the minutes
she could), and at times she just seemed, well, pissed.

And through it all, the only thing I could think to simply say is "Mom, it’s
gonna be okay."

Saturday came, and at first it seemed like another day of bizarreness, with
the morning having a slight episode. But then, in the afternoon, Mom woke up
again, looked at me sitting across from her, and I went to sit next to her.

She wasn’t stirring, she wasn’t angry, she didn’t seem sad. I held her hand.
I asked, "Do you need anything?" She looked at me, smiled, and said, "No, Andy,
I’m okay. I’m okay."

Mom went back to sleep after that moment, at 3:32 PM on Saturday, October 18^th.

For the next 56ish hours mom’s body worked to finish the dying process. There
was the incoherent talk, the "death rattle" (which I had to keep reminding my
sis that it’s worse for us to hear – not so much for mom – at least so said the
"Crossing the Creek" booklet and mom’s nurse), and sometime around 11:40 PM on
Monday, October 20^th, Mom tried to get up one last time, Mom’s
breathing had stopped, my sister said she couldn’t feel Mom’s pulse, and it was
about ten minutes later when the hospice nurse showed up, she tried to find a
pulse, hear a heartbeat, and get a blood pressure reading, and a little before
midnight she pronounced my Mom had passed away.

I’ve never seen anyone die before, and "What is a normal way to die?" might
be a blog for another day, but for me, my Mom died at 3:32 PM on Saturday,
October 18, 2008.  After 82 years she was finally "Okay."  It just
took her body a little while to catch up.

Mom on the Right is now "Okay."

That’s it for this one! 
I’m The Dude on the Right!! 
Mom, I love you!!!

L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right
So a group of us got together last night and since this is the new weekend for
Daylight Saving Time, we reminisced a bit about how back in college the changing
of the clocks pretty much had two meanings – "Spring"ing forward sucked because
it was one less hour to drink, while Fall"ing backward was party time, but for
each season there was always the untold rule of pretty much doing absolutely
nothing during the afternoon except watch TV (my choice was golf) in order to
begin resetting the body clock, and then getting back to studying that night.  I told the tale of how I was late for Easter mass one
Sunday because I forget to set my clock ahead and walked in halfway through
mass, while Whammy now laments one less hour of sleep.  The Dude on the
Left sees things a little differently, namely that you shouldn’t miss out on
your hour of sleep, that you should still get your prescribed nine hours and the
hell with the rest of the day, while Stu Gotz and Mama Gotz quickly reminded The
Dude on the Left of his lack of children who don’t really grasp the concept of
time changes nor sleeping in.

And while I had many intentions of being very
productive today, maybe catching another movie, doing some DVD reviews, or
cleaning, when I woke up this morning, looked at the clock that said 8:15, which
really meant 9:15 because I didn’t reset it yet, I knew today was going to be
pretty much useless in terms of getting much done because I was already out of
synch with my day.  So resigned to the fact of a discombobulated Sunday, my
accomplishments have been few today, but I think I’m okay with that.  I did
watch a DVD I need to review, called "Spiral," which I’ll write about later this
week, I did get this cool Headline Animator going for our
Mostly Entertainment
link on the web site (sure, it’s only on the home page right now, and here, but
I did say today was going to be useless).  Such was my afternoon.

My
evening is even looking even more exciting as I finally decide if Flickr will be
the site for posting all of the old family photos I am trying to scan,
archive, and get out on the web for all to see. 
I mentioned in a previous blog about enlisting Mom’s help in
identifying a batch of photos, and since I’ve finally settled on my Canon
scanner to do the job, I’ve been e-mailing her copies of the pictures, at first
just looking for simple things like who is in the photo, maybe an age or year,
but Mom has gone a step further, giving some nice back stories, like for this
picture of a baby and a dog she e-mailed me back (My Mom is so hip!): "I’m
positive that is me in the
rocker as Mother always talked about how the dog would be by my side to protect
me.  The dog’s name was Skippy.  There was another dog who was the
mascot of the Boy Scout’s Troop, and he was called Trooper.  A beautiful
dog.  His dog house was back by the garage."

My body clock should be
back to normal tomorrow, and maybe having Daylight Saving Time a few weeks
earlier isn’t so bad, especially since it looks like those of us in Chicagoland
will be breaking out of our cold spell for a week.  All I do know is that
it was so much easier to deal with time changes back in college.

That’s it for this one! 
I’m The Dude on the Right!!  L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right

At first I was going to blog about how I may never shop at Best Buy again,
then I was going to type a follow-up blog about how I found a new scanner
(though I’m still torn between posting pictures at Picasa or Flickr), and then I
was going to blog about my Mom not feeling well, but she better plan on sticking
around a while.  Since, though, they are all related, oh hell, let’s
intertwine them all.

The Best Buy and new scanner stories kind of fold together, so this blog
starts with my scanner buying experience.  As I mentioned in

a previous blog my scanner shopping was necessitated by needing to scan
medium format negatives, and although liking the Epson scanner, I hated their
software.  Best Buy let me return the scanner, which was nice of them, and
then I headed to Staples who had an HP flatbed scanner that almost sounded too
good to be true, and it was.  First I was disappointed in the software they
were using (maybe I am just too used to the Photosmart S20 software and afraid
of change), but when it started to look like it would take hours to scan
negatives, well, I started to get worried that my search for a medium format
scanner under a thousand bucks was for naught.  Staples took the HP scanner
back (Yay!), but I had one more hope, a Canon flatbed scanner, and that took me
back to Best Buy.  The medium format photos in this blog were all done with
my new scanner, a Canon 8800F, and so far I am happy with it because the speed
of the scanning is acceptable for what I want to do, and their software is a
little more intuitive (but damn, I still like that Photosmart S20 format), so I
think I’m going to stick with the Canon scanner.  As such, Best Buy, don’t
expect another return from me, at least for this scanner.

But Best Buy, what the hell is with the overly-friendly associates.

In this world where they say the easiest way to get sick is to shake the hand
of someone who has a cold/flu virus, both of my trips to Best Buy were greeted
with dudes overly-enthusiastic to help me, and wanting to shake my hand. 
There I am, just looking for a scanner I already had decided I wanted to buy,
but it was "Hi, my name is Joe.  What’s your name?" as they extended their
hand for a handshake. 

Not wanting to seem like a total ass, I extended my
hand to shake theirs (how do they know I didn’t just pick my nose or scratch my
ass, and conversely, how do I know they didn’t just pick their nose or scratch
their ass), and said "I’m The Dude.  I want to buy this scanner." 
Suddenly germs were transferred, Best Buy doesn’t have an easy access to Purell,
or those wipes the grocery stores have so you can clean off the cart handle, and
now, in addition to finally hoping this scanner will do the job I want to do, I
have to remember not to let my hands get anywhere near my eyes nor mouth, much
less pick my nose.  And if these Best Buy associates are going to continue
this process of wanting to shake my hand I’m going to have to either be an
asshole when I shop there by not shaking their hands, bring my own bottle of
Purell, or just not go to Best Buy anymore and shop online where now all I have
to worry about is if the UPS driver has a cold, but can, at least, easily wash
my hands before I pick my nose.

So what does any of this have to do with my Mom and her sticking around a
while?  Well, since I have a new scanner that seems to do the job, I have
over 100 medium format negatives to scan and post somewhere, and the only person
I know who can help me identify the people, places, and things in these photos
is my Mom.  For example, from the photos I have posted for this blog, I
have no idea who the dude is with the old car, the delivery truck is for the old
Home Dairy in Lorain, OH, but I’m wondering who is John Lopatkowvich, and have I
always been spelling my Mom’s maiden name improperly, or what happened to the
"w"?  The photo of the three children, I’m assuming, are my Mom, my Uncle
Ed, and my Aunt Lily, and I’m 99.9999999% sure the cute girl in the dancing
outfit is my Mom.  As I quickly flicked through these negatives they almost
seem to encompass from about 1935 thru the late 1950’s, and Mom, if you’re
reading this, I’ll need your help to identify/place them all, and it might take
a little while.  You’d better stick around.

That’s it for this one! 
I’m The Dude on the Right!!  L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right
As I continue to use my blogging for some psychotherapy in dealing with the
death of my father last month, a couple of strange thoughts hit me the last
couple of days, some now dealing with my Mom, brought on by the death of my Dad.
And as bizarre as this sounds, I’m wondering now what should be put in her
coffin. Since she’s still in the land of the living, I suppose we should just
ask her, but hopefully she won’t need a t-shirt.

Here’s the thing: Even with
my Dad’s many health issues, he always seemed to just soldier on, but with Mom
being diagnosed with lung cancer a few years back, and sorry, no offense Mom,
most of those in my family figured Dad would stick around and Mom would be the
one to go first. But Dad had other plans, because he always had to do things his
way, and last month his time on Earth was done. As we finalized his official
obituary (I’m still working on my version), we also found/wanted some things
buried with him.

In the couple of days following his death, as we were going through things,
we found his wedding ring, which he never wore as long as I could remember, but
it was stowed away, separately, distinctively, in his box of cufflinks. It was
decided Dad would be buried with his wedding ring on, and from my perspective,
to make sure, in Heaven, he remembered he couldn’t pick up other women.

It was also decided that Dad would be buried with a puzzle, because he liked
doing puzzles. We debated about burying him with an old puzzle he had already
completed, or a new puzzle for him to work on. So there, for him, is a puzzle of
the Chicago skyline that I gave him for Christmas but he never got a chance to
work on.

And as his official obituary stated, Dad enjoyed eating chocolate. One of his
favorites was a coconut/chocolate concoction called a "haystack." Back in Lorain
there was a chocolate/candy company called "Faroh’s" that had the best
"haystacks." They were made with long strands of coconut draped in tasty
chocolate, but sadly they aren’t there anymore. Dad did have some "haystacks"
left with him, even though the newer version from another supplier look like
turds with white speckles, and I have to admit, I snuck a few out of the box
before I left the rest for him for his eternity. Though not as pretty as the
Faroh’s brand, they were tasty. Sorry, Dad, I couldn’t resist.

But it wasn’t until the other day when I realized Dad had something of mine,
for the rest of forever, and it’s simply a t-shirt.

I normally don’t wear t-shirts but with the colder winter we have been having
this year, and my wanting to be a little more stylish, on colder days I started
wearing a white t-shirt, and with the pending passing of my Dad, I packed my
arsenal of four, white t-shirts for the trip back home. It wasn’t until the
other day when it was cold outside, and I was looking for a t-shirt, that I
realized I was one short, and that Dad was wearing my t-shirt. Forever.

You see, like most people dealing with the passing of a parent, there is
always that awkward part of what to have them wearing in their coffin. Dad
wasn’t a suit man and definitely not a jean’s man. His general attire, before he
become bedridden when it was just easier to stay in a hospital gown, was a dark
pair of slacks, usually blue, a t-shirt, and a flannel shirt in the winter,
something lighter in the summer. We found the pants, found a nice shirt, but
couldn’t find a crisp, white t-shirt in his dresser, so I gave Dad one last gift
– a t-shirt.

It was weird when it donned on me that Dad was buried with my t-shirt. It
didn’t make me sad, just seemed weird. I hope Mom won’t think it weird when we
ask her if she wants anything buried with her. I doubt she’ll need a t-shirt,
but when that time comes, I might just bring a spare one anyway.

That’s it for this one! 
I’m The Dude on the Right!!  L8R!!!