dahnajeen

During The Long Goodbye with Mama, I learned much about how to be with her, communicate with her, as she slowly lost everything except her sweetness.

If you have a loved one with dementia and you’re just starting out, here’s the most important thing: Obey the first rule of Improv. Say “Yes, and… ” to whatever her reality is at any given moment. (You don’t have to say those exact words, but that idea needs to be the basis of your response – don’t deny; agree.)

If Mama said she went shopping today with her sister or was staying all night at Mama and Daddy’s (all long deceased), I would ask her if she had fun, what she and her sister bought, or ask her to tell Grandmama and Granddaddy hello for me next time, say how I enjoy being at their house too.

She spoke in the present tense about others who have gone on as well. A positive of dementia for her seemed to be that nobody had ever died; in her reality, they were still alive. So my responses agreed. Why would I take that away from her?

The older memories were more dependable. When she talked about being with her sister or parents, she was very likely remembering real experiences with them from her past.

The newer memories could not hold on as long. She knew Evan from the time he was born. She knew he was her great-grandson and greeted him by name when we visited her at her house. But this connection slipped away from her gradually and she needed to be reminded who he was. Eventually, every visit called for an introduction to him, and later to Callie. She was always very happy to meet them and loved them naturally and immediately every time. And sometimes they would spark a connection with something older that she did still remember.

During one visit, she observed intently for a while as Callie played and initiated interactions with her big brother and others in the room. Then she said sweetly and thoughtfully, “She just wants to be included . . . (turning to look lovingly at me) just like you.“

It was indescribably sweet to me to see her remembering that, to know that her memory of little me was still firmly in place, that she knew who I was still, and that from the beginning she had noticed and knew how it was for me. I’m pretty sure she knew what I was feeling before I did.

What I was feeling was what I now call onlyness – like loneliness, but more specific and constant. I was the only girl, yes, but it was – is – more than that. I have felt it all my life and grown accustomed to it now. Describing it well would be a whole other article and not what this is about.

What this is about is appreciating that Mama knew. She saw me. I miss her so much.

Over the years, I have made many things myself – “from scratch,” as they say. (Thank you, Mama for teaching me.)

I’ve made nutritious meals, cakes, cookies, candies, clothing – for myself, my family, and some friends’ babies (all grown up now) – curtains, pillows, crocheted blankets, caps, scarves, pretty little cell phone slings for when you need and don’t have a pocket for your cell phone, and anything else I needed but didn’t have.

One year I made everyone homemade Christmas presents. Some got ceramics. (Thank you, Mother-In-Law, Jeanette Cox for teaching me.) Others got embroidered handkerchiefs. Mama’s said “Imogene. A small image of her mother” in the corner. I lost hers on the way to her house for Christmas and found it later with an ad in the newspaper. (Thank you kind person who found and returned it.) Such a tiny box. Why did I have it in the back of a pickup truck with the rest of the gifts? 🙄

Anyway – made lots of things. But none of them – although tasty, pretty, or useful – are really that important . . . well, food is pretty important . . . but my point is:

In recent years I’ve started noticing some much more impressive and important things I have made by my own damn self. And I’m so glad I did.

Made my own Diagnostician. (And moved in with her. That’s how I found out I have ADHD.)

Made two whole bodyguards. 

Made my three best friends. 

I made the gentle, intelligent, loving man who is helping teach and train this little grandson of mine.

I fully realized this recently while I cried in my room, listening to my son on the other side of the door, talking so sweetly to his nephew – giving him the kind of gentle, patient fathering he needed himself once upon a time. He is able to expertly and lovingly turn this little boy around when he starts on the wrong path — which recently he seemed to be checking to see how far down he could travel. Not too far, turns out. Thank you, Uncle. 

And I made another one who sits with him and colors, plays video games, teaches him to be (insists that he is) polite and respectful, and makes him feel safe.

He looks up to and adores both of his uncles and he’s always so glad when they come to see him – which they do every weekend (more than many kids get with their fathers.)

I’m so glad they are here, so sweetly filling in gaps for him. And for his little sister. (That one may get louder and more complicated. We’ll see . . . Good luck, guys.)

So, yeah. I didn’t get a Daddy in my life. I really wanted that.

I didn’t get a happy, lasting marriage, a partner to grow old with. Really wanted that too.

I didn’t get listened to, or understood much by people I really craved that from.

I didn’t get much at all that I really wanted out of life – except for them. And I made ’em myself. 

Yes, I know some genetic input from another was necessary to bring about their existence. And I’m thankful for that input. But I did the work. I’m taking the credit.  

“Nobody gets everything. Everybody gets something.” (Mary Tyler Moore from her book “After All.”)

Yes, MTM. And if I were given the choice and could pick only one of those things I wanted so much, they would be it.

“Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.” That’s one of the things I remember Mama saying more than once. I can still see her one of the times, standing in front of the kitchen sink, saying it to me. It’s from the Bible. It means “Don’t borrow trouble.”

I want to share with you some of the other things I remember hearing her say multiple times. She didn’t originate all of them, but she’s where I heard them all first, and at least a few are original to her.

Mama said, “He can get glad in the same pants he got mad in.” This is one of my favorites. I think it means that 1) everything is temporary and 2) You have responsibility for managing your emotions.

She said, “Well, that’s better than a hole in your sock.” I believe this one is an encouragement to find a way to see what’s good about whatever the current situation is. Maybe it could be better than it is, but as long as it rises above hole in your sock, let’s be happy about it and move on. If it really isn’t better than a hole in your sock, you can move on to another one she said – “Well, it’s better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.”

She said, “Scat cat! Get your tail out of the butter!” And so do I. It makes my grandchildren smile. It means, “Hey, you sneezed! Let’s giggle about it.” Much more fun than “Bless you.” (I think some people say “get your tail out of the gravy,” but Mama said butter.)

She said, “Pretty is as pretty does” and also “Put on some lipstick.” She didn’t really ever say these two together like that; I just think it’s funny to combine them. But she did say both of them to me fairly often – so I tried to act right and remember to put on lipstick if I was going to be somewhere she thought called for it.

She said, “I was born at night, but not last night!” I think we all know what that one means – basically, “I’m not buying what you’re selling,” if someone was trying to put something over on her. I used this one quite often when I was a teacher of teenagers. She also said, “I didn’t just fall off the turnip truck” which means pretty much the same thing.

She said, “It’s tomorrow?” This was in response to me telling her – on my way to bed – “Oh, Mama I forgot. I need something to wear for Western Day tomorrow at school.” The next morning, on her sewing machine, was a western style, quilt-print pinafore ready for me to wear that day.

She said, “Anything that doesn’t bite me first,” when I asked her what she’d like to eat.

She said “Be still . . . Close your eyes . . . Breathe . . . Don’t talk . . . Don’t think. This was in response to my question, “Mama, how do you go to sleep?” I was seriously fascinated by her ability to do this after watching it happen several times while she read to me at night, or right after reading, as she lay beside me, her eyes closed, mine wide and wondering. This seems like the kind of question many adults might decide to ignore – especially when they were just interrupted from falling asleep – but she gave me a thoughtful, gentle answer. I appreciated her instructions and attempted to follow them. I never could get the hang of it. One of my friends once said, “Yeah Johnnie still can’t get her baby to sleep through the night.

She said, “Wiggle Worm” “Hot House Plant” and “Goofus.” These are all things she called me, and they were all endearments. Goofus is my favorite. (When I was an adult, she called me Morticia once because I liked the smell of a musty room.)

She said, “Y’all clash because you’re so much alike.” Gasp! How dare she?! This was her response to me when I complained about some trouble I was having with my brother Paul. At the time I was very young and greatly offended. But, yeah . . . she knew her kids. What she saw then is very clear now, and I don’t mind at all being very like him. He gets me.

She said, “Come on, we’ll catch him!” Then she propped me on her hip and ran out to stop my brother David just before he began backing out of the driveway, so he could kiss me good-bye first – because I was having a proper loud melt-down that he had left the house without doing so. She leaned me into the car and he kissed me good-bye. Then everything was okay.

She said, “I can’t believe I’m walking alone, with two little children, after dark in this part of town.” She said this as she walked along a sidewalk with me and Byron toward the New Isis theater in North Ft. Worth, to see a movie. I think it was The Cowboys with John Wayne. Or maybe it was that other one she took us to that I’m pretty sure she thought was a completely different type of movie – Monty Python and The Holy Grail.

She also took us to Casa Manana. We saw the musical Porgy and Bess there. We heard Roger Miller sing there. And listened to George Lindsay tell jokes. We must have seen Ruta Lee there too or else I’m not sure why I would even know there is a Ruta Lee.

Mama gave us experiences. She gave herself some too. One day, many years ago, she told me a secret she had kept for many years before that. She told me that one evening on her way home to Azle from her job in Ft. Worth, somewhere along the side of Hwy 199, she saw one of those giant slides that had been put up for people to come pay to slide down. She pulled over, paid the fee, climbed her little self up there and slid down. Then she got back in the car, drove home, and cooked us dinner. I’m so glad she did that and glad she finally told me about it. She deserved a little break and some silly fun.

Once when something happened to me that I didn’t understand, Mama said “Thank you for telling me; I’ll take care of it.” And then she did. And what I did is I just went on with my childhood starting immediately after she finished her sentence. I went with no worry about it or ill effects from it, and it never happened again – because Mama had it. She was a genius at loving and protecting us. I wish I had always been smart enough to tell her everything.

She said something with no words. One of the sweetest and most powerful things she ever said to me made no sound at all. We had climbed up together to the top of the Tree Slide at Six Flags. The climb scared me pretty badly and when we entered the almost completely dark interior at the top, I was absolutely terrified. Overcome. Paralyzed with fear. Until I felt her hand on my leg. That’s it. Just a soft touch. No words. It was some kind of powerful magic. Everything was instantly fine, my fear completely gone. With that touch she said to me, “You are perfectly safe. No harm will come anywhere near you. Because I am here.” I immediately knew this was the truth. We slid down that slide, back into the sunlight, and all was well – just like her hand told me it was.

I have a very simple, very yummy sugar cookie recipe. I’ve made it lots of times.

Here’s what happened when I tried to make it tonight – while also making a casserole, heating up previous casserole for Evan who couldn’t wait for today casserole to be ready, and holding Callie who couldn’t wait a few minutes for Mommy to get out of the shower.

First, I melted the butter – makes it easier to mix and then you can chill it to get dough to right consistency before baking.

Added the sugar. Stirred it into the melted butter. See? So easy!

Now vanilla. Nope. No vanilla. No problem. Almond extract.

I really thought we had eggs. We don’t.

Did you know bananas can be used as a substitute for eggs in cookies? Yep. I mean they’ll be banana flavored instead of just butter and sugar, (and almond instead of vanilla) but that’s okay. I like banana. And almond. So add mashing and measuring bananas to the doing several things at once fun.

Okay, recipe – What does that say next? Oh yes. 1 and 1/3 cup – but I’m doubling everything, because I really like cookies and we have plenty of bananas, so in goes 2 and 2/3 cups . . . of water. Ummm. What? Yep, that sure was water. It says FLOUR Donna. And you KNEW that! When did you – someone who has made SO many cookies in your life – ever put that much WATER (or any water at all?) in COOKIE DOUGH?!

Me and that bowl of double recipe portions of melted butter, sugar, bananas, almond extract, and water stared at each other for a while.

Finally I decided, Welp! Not sure what it’s gonna be, but it’s gonna be somethin’. And whatever it is it’ll be a a quadruple recipe of it. I put in the same amount again of butter, bananas, sugar, almond extract, oh and baking powder. Forgot to mention the baking powder. Now the flour.

Guess what.

Yyyyeah, not enough flour to quite get another 2 and 2/3 cups. So… oatmeal to finish off the measurement. Then, what the heck, more oatmeal till I get tired of stirring.

So, Evan’s fed, next casserole is in process, and the Meant to be Sugar, now Banana Almond Oatmeal cookie dough is chilling in the refrigerator. I’ll let you know if it turns into cookies.

My mother was 17 years old when she graduated as Valedictorian of the Rhome High School class of 1943. While she delivered her Valedictory to classmates and guests at the graduation, the man she would later meet and marry, my father, was serving as a U.S. Marine in World War II. He had entered service about 5 months earlier, two days before the first anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor. (He had to wait until he was 18 to enlist.) He fought in The Solomon Islands. After the war, he was stationed at Marine Corps Air Station Eagle Mountain Lake. Mama went to business school after graduating, then worked as a stenographer on the base. That’s where they met.

What follows is Mama’s Valedictory to her class. Her words take on deeper relevance to me as I consider the history we know now that she didn’t know then. I am struck by the intelligence and maturity her writing demonstrates. Did you know about The Beveridge Plan that Mama references in her speech? I did not until I read this and then looked it up – it’s worth a Google. I already knew Mama was smart, but here is evidence.

I wish there existed a video or audio of her presenting the speech. But you know – 1943. I’ll do my best to recreate it. I’m told I sound a good bit like her. If you’d like to hear me reading her speech, here is a link. (The applause at the end is for her, not me.) https://drive.google.com/file/d/1TduqUxF6H3Hl8OO1TunWwmuq6Ue0p3Am/view?usp=sharing

If you’d like to just read it yourself, here it is:

1943 Valedictory: FUTURE OBLIGATIONS OF THE YOUTH OF TODAY

THEME: The attitude of America in the years to come will be that of us who graduate today.

By Grace Imogene Johnston

Ladies and Gentlemen:

We who are graduating in this class of 1943 are facing the most important problems yet faced by any class to graduate during our lives. Many of us will soon be on our way to the fighting fronts. All of us will be doing our share in the great world war effort.

Graduating classes of the past have faced problems of local or national significance. Ours faces problems which can be answered only by considering the world as a whole. Already the airplane has altered forever our concept of time and distance. In the world which we face there will be no barriers of sea or desert. Business transactions and all forms of human relations will be carried on between all parts of a rapidly shrinking world.

Does all this still appear a vision to you? It is a reality. In the sky now are pilots, with their training planes, bombers, fighter planes, and transports. The purpose of it all now is to defeat an enemy and to preserve a way of life, to build the structure for a better world. Out of the victory will come a day bright with opportunity for all. With our opportunity in the future there is an equally great obligation.

Almost more significant, we are the ones who will be gaining our place in the world as the post-war civilization is being built. What the world is to be depends in a great measure on us, on the knowledge we gain in the next few years, on the type of mature adult we become. WE must soon become valuable workers and fighters. We must then develop into valuable thinkers as well.

What pattern the world we enter will have has not yet been fully cut out. Perhaps we shall have some part in the cutting of the pattern.

To be worthy of the responsibility which must necessarily be ours, we must yearn, read, study, evaluate – so that when the time comes, we will be equipped to take this part.

Our national leaders are even now studying, investigating the changes which will come to the world economy in order to make this world a better place, a place where wars of greed will not be necessary. These changes may be immense. They may need to be only small but changes there will be, and every man is but one of many seeking the solution.

We too will be among the seekers when this war is over. A few of us may be preparing the blueprints, many of us will be carrying out the work of these few. Therefore, we must be prepared to be intelligent citizens, informed citizens, so that through the democratic system of selection we may choose leaders who will truly represent us.

We must use wisely the tools of democracy. WE must learn to evaluate those who seek political office. We must learn the operation of the referendum, the recall, the community meeting, and the other instruments which we as American citizens will possess.

Too often do we think, foolishly, that the sort of peace we will have depends upon far-off obscure decisions by men whom we do not know. We hope that it will be a good peace and that it will ensure peace in the years to come.

We must not be content to hope. We must not be lulled into laziness by those who prefer to see us apathetic, disinterested clumps of earth who pay our taxes and believe that our responsibility in government ends there.

Our responsibility does not end there. This very war is being fought to preserve our right to do more than pay our taxes and be silent.

We cannot, however, think of ourselves alone. We cannot say, “Here in our community we have good government, we have a low disease and death rate, we have no poverty, we have no un-employment” and believe that we have achieved all that our position as American citizens demands of us. We cannot sit back and rest on our laurels until we can say this of the world.

There have been presented already many plans to ensure this security, notably the Beveridge Plan, which is intended to bring freedom from want to the people of Great Britain. There have been similar plans conceived in our own country and others.

We may not be the planners of these great reforms, but we will very likely carry them out and, perhaps, plan others. Therefore, we must be prepared.

The next four or five years, more or less, will be war years, and, as such, important years. But the years that will count most in the whole course of civilization are the years which will follow. Let us be ready to make the best of those years.

No high school class has yet graduated during our lives which faced as critical a period as the one ahead of us. No other such class has faced as many opportunities and responsibilities in the life ahead. No other class has had to consider so carefully along what lines it should work.

With the closing of this occasion today we cease to exist as a high school class and it becomes my duty to say farewell to the Board of Education which as so ably directed the school system. We thank you for your consideration and the generous application of your wisdom.

To the members of the faculty, we say farewell. They have endeavored to encourage the good in us and develop our individual possibilities. You have been good friends as well as our instructors.

To our parents we do not say farewell, but we wish to thank you for making possible for us a good public school education. As we say farewell to the school you have provided for us, we hope that our benefits will give you joy and pride and partly repay for your work.

Classmates, we may say farewell but there is no farewell between us. As we go different ways in our lives to come, we will be always held together through bright days and dark ones by the common possession of the principles and ideals taught in this school.

                   “There is no person you can be sure will never let you down.”

A counselor told me this many years ago. I didn’t necessarily disbelieve it then – but I also didn’t completely grasp how completely true it really is. (I was young.)

It doesn’t mean that EVERY person you know definitely WILL let you down. It just means that no person is incapable of it. And to one degree or another, most everyone will eventually. Because you know . . . people.

These disappointments can range from “Well that was unexpected and didn’t feel great, but whatever” all the way to “Oh look. There’s my heart on the floor broken in a million pieces.”

It’s not fun to know, but it’s safer to know. It’s better to not put anyone up on a pedestal – unless they are actually made of stone.

How uncommon is unconditional love and acceptance?

For how many people walking this earth right now,  do you hold this type of love and complete acceptance?

How many people do you know who have this for you?

Are you sure?

Pick someone in your mind who you love this way and feel returns that love.

Got it? Okay.

What if, at some point, after deep soul searching, you stop believing something that, right now, today, the two of you both believe deeply? You don’t ask them to stop believing what they believe – but obviously you feel they are in error, just like they think you are, because you both believe sincerely in opposing ideas.

Can you do that and still love, unconditionally accept, and even respect that person?