Making God Laugh

Where do you see yourself in five years?

Easily half my life I was a drunken drug addict who couldn’t imagine a life lasting five more years, but there was a time before the booze and drugs that I had actual plans for life.

A) is for All I wanted to be was a garbageman, hanging off the side of trucks and never having to dress up.

B) is for Barbie Dream House. We had very little money, so a drive through rich neighborhoods craning my neck out the car window to glimpse grand houses I’d never be invited to see the inside of became family “entertainment.” Usually, all I could see was the gatehouse or a long windey driveway. It was enough for me to start formulating a life plan that didn’t involve garbage. One rainy night I’d find my way to one of these champagne wishes/caviar dreamhouse towns, walk up a long driveway in my footy pajamas, and lay down at their front door. I was that particular kind of little blond child that was at her most irresistibly adorable when wet, bedraggled and amnesiac.

Had I figured out a way to get there without my daddy having to drive me, I might’ve made it work, but at three or four, my feet wouldn’t reach the gas pedal. I turned my rocking horse into a car, drawing a steering wheel and doors on it in crayon and “practiced” driving while watching cartoons and Soupy Sales. I’d be ready when the opportunity to become a bedraggled amnesiac presented itself.

C) is for Cardiac Arrest. With maturity came practicality. I’d marry a rich old man–emphasis on rich, double emphasis on old–and hope he had a heart attack on the honeymoon. Or I’d push him down the stairs and call it a heart attack. I was six or seven and the only stairs I could picture were those in my parents house, and while the carpeting might soften his fall, the glass door at the bottom of the stairs would surely seal the deal.

D) is for Divorce. I’d write really lovely thank you notes monthly to whatever rich, old man I could find to marry and divorce me in exchange for alimony.

E) is for Exotic. In a few more years, I’d think about being a “high class” call girl living in the city. I’d get to dress up and sleep late (the polar opposite of my OG what do you want to be when you grown up dream of being a garbage man, who only seemed to work in the mornings and never dressed up). The only “city” apartment I’d been inside was grandma’s in the Bronx; I imagined myself a fancy tween call girl who slept on a pull-out couch in my grandma’s apartment that I shared with two other girls. We had bouffant hairdos, see-through shortie nighties with marabou trim and matching kitten-heeled marabou trimmed bedroom slippers.

F) is for Firearms. Years passed, booze, anger, and drugs took priority over finding a man for inheritance, alimony or payment for services rendered. I considered joining the army to learn demotion and all the ways to kill someone, many someones, entire blocks or cities.  Inspired by Brenda Vaccaro, in the Streets of San Francisco,  when my tour was up, I’d come home and work for the Mob.

These were my five year plans.

I’d never planned to live very long. Or get sober. Or get sober enough and live long enough that my mother would need care. My plans never really involved anyone other than myself. But there you have it, luckily, as they say, you want to make God laugh, tell him/her your plans.

I haven’t gotten married, or divorced. I haven’t pushed a husband (or anyone else for that matter) down the stairs. There were many Bronx nights, but no Bronx addresses. Instead of amnesia, I had blackouts and traumatic memory loss. I was never anything high-class, but I have, on occasion, sold my ass and shown my titties. I’ve wished to kill some people, but never did. I did, however, work for the Mafia on and off from 1974 -1984 (see above re: showing and shaking titties).

So, I am capable of making plans. Following plans is an entirely other skill set.

Here’s what I didn’t plan for.

I didn’t plan for our last visit to the doctor where I got to explain to Ma’s doctor how more and more she doesn’t know who I am or where she lives. That the other day she woke worried about making her high school graduation speech in front of her whole class. That she’s losing weight (seven pounds off an already skinny old lady), doesn’t walk outside of the house at all anymore, sleeps a lot, eats almost nothing, is never thirsty and constantly dehydrated. I mean, I’d planned to talk about all that but I hadn’t planned for all that to be happening. Not yet. Not on my watch, at least. He offered to increase her anti-depressants, but agreed, no, this wasn’t chemical, she has a legitimate reason to be depressed.

Then he said, “Not now, but soon, you want to start thinking about comfort care. Making plans for palliative care.”

Those were not plans I had considered.
That took my breath away for the moment, that would never have been part of any five-year plan I could imagine making.

We’d made plans, me and my Ma. She’d started hoarding pills years ago. I’d be told by a social worker that many dementia patients do this, but by the time it’s “the right time,” they’re too far gone to do anything. Besides which, most of Ma’s pills would be be expired, crumbled to dust, or not appropriate for the job she wanted them to do by the time she wanted them to do their job.

We talked about moving to–in this order, as right-to-die legislation passed–Oregon, Washington, Vermont and six more states compassionate to the belief you have the right to make your own decisions about dying. But with dementia by definition, while terminal, she will never fit the criteria where she must be:

1. mentally competent, i.e. capable of making and communicating your health care decisions; and
2. diagnosed with a terminal illness that will, within reasonable medical judgment, lead to death within six months; and
3. able to self-administer and ingest the prescribed medication.

So, plans.
God laughs.
I spend a sleepless night Googling palliative care, palliative care costs, palliative vs comfort care.
God laughs.

Go ahead and laugh, motherfucker. It’s not happening yet, and with our track record, it might never.