I am up at 0352 this morning and all is quiet, just the way I like it to be. There are no distractions from noisy neighbors, no vehicles racing off to work yet; it’s calm and peaceful, the way I like it.
I remember sitting on the front porch on the farm drinking coffee and watching the sun rise. Those were good times for us. I miss those days. Now I sit in my bedroom/office drinking coffee and smoking a cigarette in the peaceful predawn hours but it’s not the same as being on the farm. We made a difficult decision selling the farm, but it was the right thing to do. We were unable to handle the upkeep the way we once did.
We moved to town and rented an apartment. When Joyce had her first brain aneurysm we barely had time to get her to the emergency room to save her life. Had we been on the farm she would have died five years earlier than when she did pass away. Being in an apartment in our town I was able to travel to Saint Louis to be with her for the 2.5 weeks she was in the hospital there. I could not have left the farm for that long. When Joyce was sent back to Springfield for rehabilitation I could spend everyday with her because there were no farm chores to complete. From November seventh until January second I spent days and nights at the rehab center or at the hospital with her. Many of those days and nights she didn’t even know I was there, but I knew it. I was there for every event, every test, every setback. Those were rollercoaster days and nights, sometimes I was elated being at the top of the coaster and in shock as the coaster plummeted to its lowest point. Those were trying times, but I would not trade the experience for anything.
I brought her home on January 2nd of 2018 and she was weak as a kitten. Thus began a 24 hour a day of giving care. She was unable to do much of anything and could barely stand up without me by her side. She was in bad shape, but those days , weeks, months I had the opportunity to be a caregiver to someone I loved. Joyce eventually recovered, perhaps because she got tired of my limited cooking skills. I wouldn’t blame her for that. We had another good four years before her second aneurysm took her away from me. We had some great times during those years.
Now I face life without her. I am getting better at living like a monk in a monastery. I had often wondered what it would be like and now I know. I do have one leg up though. I can drink all the beer I want and that soothes the pain of my loss. Life is good. It won’t be what it was, but it is and it will be whatever it will be. This is one more chapter in the life of Bill. I suppose it may be the last chapter, but one never knows. As Yogi Berra (catcher and later manager for the New York Yankees) once said, “It ain’t over until it’s over.”
No comments:
Post a Comment