You know my story, that five years ago next week my mom nearly died. It was six weeks in the hospital and a year and a half to recover.
I no sooner breathed a sigh of relief at that 18-month slog when my dad told me his left hand had begun to shake and he’d failed a swallowing evaluation. I’d been pulled from a riptide, only to be slung back in.
If you’ve never read the story of Willie’s near-death experience, you’re in for a treat. Click on those links. She yelled at me because I let Rosie Perez – yes, the actor – into her office, tried to convince me Don was dead, and told me my dad had once shot himself in the head, but she’d hidden it from me even though A) my dad didn’t own a gun, B) I lived at home at the time, C) I was a nurse in the hospital where my dad would have been treated, and D) I worked in neurosurgery.
Neurosurgery is generally used to fix gunshot wounds to the head. In case you didn’t know.
Of all the things I’ve had to do these last five years – as power of attorney and somewhat of a caretaker – the absolute worst is the full, detailed, intense knowledge I have of my parents’ sex life.
Yes. You read that right.
Two years ago, I was hanging with Indy when I stumbled across incontrovertible evidence he and Willie still, well, play Parcheesi. Indy was not the source of my newfound knowledge and was, in fact, oblivious to the fact I possessed it.
I would rather live in the reptile house at any zoo for the rest of my days than discuss Parcheesi with Indy. Willie, however, is another matter.
Whispering so the hard-of-hearing Indy didn’t realize I know exactly what Parcheesi is, I called Willie. Was what I discovered accurate? Did she and Indy still play the occasional round of Parcheesi?
Willie whispered too. I don’t know why. She probably doesn’t know why either. But she confirmed that yes, she and Indy still enjoy Parcheesi.
For the year and a half prior to that discovery, I had dragged Indy from specialist to specialist. We didn’t have his Parkinson’s diagnosis yet. All we knew was his hand shook and he was tired all the time. Willie was perpetually concerned with Indy’s need for a daily nap.
That I had been spending days ushering Indy to Center City, North Philadelphia, suburban satellite offices, had bloodwork drawn and more than a few tests done, all in an effort to pinpoint the source of Indy’s fatigue seemed ridiculous in light of what I now knew.
Indy is six years older than Willie. Willie’s incessant rogering of the octogenarian Indy at least in part caused his fatigue. Right?
I hissed into the phone at Willie. Indy is old and not well, I told her. You leave him alone!
Then I hung up before she could say anything back to me.
Easily, one of the best parts of Parkinson’s is its tendency to cause genitourinary dysfunction. That means at every doctor’s appointment, the neurologist asks Indy well, how strong of a Parcheesi game he plays.
Indy, thankfully, keeps his response to this question curt. We have an unspoken agreement, Indy and me. In our world, Parcheesi doesn’t exist.
Earlier this week, Indy had an appointment with his new neurologist. It was a telehealth visit. Indy, Willie, and I crowded around Willie’s laptop. It’s unusual for Willie to join us for appointments.
And here’s the thing with Willie. She’s very tech-savvy. But she buys the worst computers. She has about three of them in the apartment, and each works less efficiently than the one before it. When our appointment time came and went, I refreshed the screen, thinking maybe the doctor had logged in.
All I managed to do was exit the appointment’s virtual waiting room. Panicked, I tried to get back into the waiting room. My fingers flew over the keyboard and mouse touchpad. But the cursor leaped around the screen, countering every move I made.
That was when I noticed Willie with the actual mouse, clicking away.
This time, it was the mouse rather than Indy I asked Willie to stop touching.
She huffed to my dad that clearly, when I was about, she was not allowed to handle her own computer mouse.
That’s not the only thing I want you to quit handling there, sister.
When the doctor finally logged on, she first asked for a list of Indy’s medications. Willie keeps a computerized record of Indy’s medications and ailments. I knew it was current because I had recently broken into her computer to update it.
I had asked Willie to print out a copy for the appointment. As I began to read for the neurologist I realized what I had was an old copy, full of medications Indy no longer takes. I had to dash across the apartment to grab a bottle of Indy’s pills because, while I now know his medications, illnesses, military history, social security number, monthly disability payment, and love of Parcheesi by heart, in that moment I couldn’t remember the dosage for one of his pills.
Exasperated, I sat back at the laptop. That was when Willie’s cell phone began to ring from across the apartment.
My cell phone sat on the table Indy, Willie, and I huddled around. I guess Willie figured cell phones were like kitchen and bedroom extensions – one could sub for the other. She grabbed my iPhone in an attempt to answer her bobo cell.
Sounding like a bear deprived of his Alaskan salmon, I growled to Willie she was answering the wrong phone. Willie scooted around the table to answer her cell.
Now Willie, not unlike myself, has two decibel levels to her voice – loud and shouting. She paced the apartment, speaking into her phone like she was trying to make the entire population of India hear her voice from her living room.
I know I’ve said here I whispered this or that, and now say I only speak in a tone that’s loud or louder. I can whisper if I’m trying to hide Parcheesi from Indy. Otherwise, it’s no secret what I’m discussing.
I waited for Willie’s pacing to land her in the office. Then I vaulted across the apartment and shut the door.
I contemplated pulling the large entertainment unit across the door, too. Just until the neurology appointment was over. I didn’t. But I should have.
Willie’s call ended just in time for the neurologist to ask about Indy’s Parcheesi game.
Willie, also not unlike myself, doesn’t have a lot in the way of a filter. She launched into robust detail. She and Indy enjoy a good game of Parcheesi, even still. Indy, breaking our unspoken agreement, lustily agreed.
The neurologist apologized to me for the awkwardness of the conversation. Comparatively, I told her, this was a piece of cake.
Two weeks ago, I was visiting with Willie and Indy. I absolutely cannot put our conversation into print here, for the world to see. I will say I was not a willing participant in the exchange, I told them to stop talking many times, I needed Starbucks, a glass of wine, a lava cake, and an afternoon with Jason Statham to recover from that conversation, and if you call me I’ll gladly tell you what was discussed.
After the neurology appointment, I trudged home, ready to call it a day. When Don called me from The Cabin that night, I relayed my adventure, how Willie and Indy wouldn’t stop talking about Parcheesi.
When Don mercifully arrived home from The Cabin last night, our son showed off his left arm, swollen from his flu shot earlier in the day. Then he paused. He’d had a vaccine a few months ago. Wasn’t that his flu shot?
I explained to our son he’d had his HPV vaccine, not his flu shot.
“What’s HPV?” he asked.
Now, long ago, Don put me in charge of The Talk. As a clinician, I believe in being honest with my kids. Tell the truth, answer the question at hand, keep the explanation simple.
My son is old enough to know what HPV is and how it is transmitted. So I told him.
He ran.
He secluded himself in his bedroom. And because he is his father’s child, he emerged several minutes later with a joke about what I’d just explained.
Yeah. I can’t print that either. We’ll cover it when you call me.
Don, for his part, rolled his eyes at me. “You are just the master of awkward conversations this week, aren’t you?” Which I laughed at two hours later because I’m blonde and English.
Is it really so bad, having parents who still love each other? Maybe not. But this somehow opened a door, and now every card-carrying AARP member in my life tells me tidbits of their Parcheesi game. I’m not a ghost whisperer but rather a senior citizen Parcheesi whisperer. I’m like the kid in The Sixth Sense. Except thankfully I don’t actually see seniors playing Parcheesi. I only get to hear about it.
Which I guess is a good thing. There’s a clock on this experience. Someday they’ll all be gone. I won’t hear about their love for Parcheesi anymore.
If I was a ghost whisperer I’d hear about it for all eternity.
