Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Moving Dad

Even though it is my sister who is doing all of the work, I am going to bed exhausted and waking up exhausted. I am having so much trouble thinking. It feels like grief.
Dad is recovering well from the surgery that pinned together the bones that broke in his neck, but all of us have agreed that he can't move back home again. Looking and deciding. Looking and deciding. He will move to the beautiful Monticello assisted living into a one bedroom apt. It is near the middle of downtown Longview, so goodbye woods. He told us to sell the house, but my sister wants to rent it out. It is hard to let go of the house he has lived in for sixty years and that the girls lived in until marriage. As adults we played paintball in the woods. We picked grapes and blackberries and apples and tomatoes there.
We began the process of winnowing through his furniture and stuff to figure out what will move in with him. We were surprised that no he did not want his double bed any more, he wanted a twin one. And after spending hours finding the right chair for him because we were not going to let him keep his old, broken recliner, he decided to take Mom's old lifting chair that he had previously rejected. Well, the new chair did cost over two thousand dollars.
Our brother came out from Pennsylvania to help out, but his work only allowed him a long weekend here. It was a joy to spend time with him. He was practically quivering in sadness that he could not be here full time. My sister has two jobs now and dealing full time with this and she still has children at home. I have no idea how she is coping.

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