Sunday, May 15, 2011

Journal 19 Domestic (?) Goddess

There's a question mark in the title of this post as I truly write this phrase with a twist (of lemon. as in, a martini. I look around my apartment, and it is NOT Martha-worthy. But I digress).

It was Sunday today, so I went to my parents, the Adult Child visiting, the Patient, the Informal Caregiver. Those are the names we get on cancer websites I scroll through when I feel the need for more information than I already have. I am the Adult Child, who will often help with such duties as paying bills, driving to and from appointments, providing moral support, all the while feeling like a non-adult child, the child that is asking..."Hey...what happened to my family?"
That being said, I felt comforted reading all of this on a cancer website this week. It gave me a sence of normalcy (seems impossible, I know. I take what I can get.)
The Patient. The Patient has all sorts of conflicting feelings, and alot of the reading about the Patient has to do with the Patient getting well, and the sections of reading entitled "Life after Cancer". There are no sections (that I have found) entitled "Death after Cancer". That's what I really want to read.
The Informal Caregiver is the person who takes care of the Patient at home. Informal is another quirky word for "unpaid". Clever.
But today we felt family-ish. We didn't dwell, cry, let our shoulders sag, or ruminate about death.
We took my dad to the movie store to pick out movies to watch on the DVD player, despite the day's unseasonably cold weather and teeming rain. My mom and I went to get groceries, with the heavier items she needs being easier for me to help her with in the car.
We entered the new Marshalls, a bit of retail therapy. Whose kidding who. It works.
Groceries purchased, new shoes in hand, we had an early dinner together while my dad rested, then the three of us looked at family photos together. Ah...the seventies. Short hair for little girls, and lots of overalls. I didn't have a princess complex then, and I don't have one now (thank you Jesus). My dad smiled the most at the photos of a young family--his and my mom's. And photos of my niece and nephew when they were babies. And our family lab Shadow, five years gone now.

I left, packing up the baking accessories my mom gave me, along with a cookbook of muffin recipes (yes, I am baking. I have to channel the anxiety somehow, and as I have a one-martini rule, it needs to come out in other ways.)
We had an early dinner, I came home early (rain still pouring down), did my nails, tried on my shoes, put my hair up, pajamas on, and caught up on my emails.
My bathroom and kitchen are completely clean, my bed is made, and there is laundry in the dryer. I have lunch for tomorrow, meals for the week.....so somehow, despite the mis-firing neurons in my brain, I have accomplished tasks that required planning and organization.
May this continue on for the week ahead.

No comments:

Post a Comment