"this is not a good time..."
it was a nice relaxing evening following a nice uplifting day...
i was in my bedroom playing on my computer when i realized it would be a good time for some dinner, so i walked into my kitchen. why i did this i will never really understand because there was no chance that i was going to find food there. but conveniently i did come across the take-out menus hanging on the side of my refrigerator. there is one dish at one chain restaurant in town that i actually enjoy and i was just fortunate enough to have that menu present. so i ordered my spinach tortelloni... and cappuccino cake... if one is going to have dinner delivered, one may as well go all out. the woman on the telephone said that it would be approximately one hour. fine, i thought. one hour is a perfect amount of time. back to the computer, back to chatting with my online friends.
chat chat chat.... approximately 40 minutes go by...
there is a knock at the door and i am delighted that dinner is a bit early.
so i opened the door and i did not find a green mill delivery person, no, i found my former neighbor looking around, all wobbly, confused... "can i just come in and rest for a minute!?" as she pushed through me to get to my couch. now i have seen betty in this condition before. it is not uncommon for betty to be too intoxicated to know exactly what is going on around her, so she usually just sits down and laments over having had "too many glasses of beer".
"betty, where do you live now?" at this prompt betty looked at me as if i had said, 'betty i am a giant bunny rabbit and i have brought you here to give you a nice ogilivie home perm.' utter confusion and irritation.
"WELL!!! right over there!" pointing to the apartment across from mine. "i've lived there for umpteen years!!"
and this was true. to the extent that the descriptive term "umpteen" has meaning, she was not lying. however, "no, betty, you moved out of there last week. how did you get here?"
"WHAT?!? i did not move out! he dropped me off." pointing at an empty space in the atmosphere where there had apparently recently been a person with a car.
"betty, can i call your family? what is your daughter's number?" at this point she rattled off a number 3 or 4 times that i eventually learned was her own home phone number. later felt kind of stupid for leaving a message on her voice mail. she should be all kinds of confused about that today.
several attempts to retrieve family phone numbers from betty's questionable memory resulted in the following:
*approximately 19 "where's my purse?"es
*10 or 11 attempts to find "her" phone book in MY kitchen
*7 requests to "turn off that damn ugly thing" referring to my green and blue christmas tree
in the corner
*4 reminders that this has been a damn bad day
*6 "WELL I'M TRYING TO REMEMBER!!!"s
*12 or 13 "what the...?" looking around puzzled..."why is everything different?"s
*3 observations that this room "doesn't even have a damn tv or nothin'?"
**and my favorite of all!** while i continually 'woke' her from her near-slumber to request family names and phone numbers: "you know. this is not a good time to be asking me these questions!"
betty's suspicion grew as time went by. at first she just wanted to sit down. then she started to stir and wander about. into the kitchen... stunned by the fact that it appeared to be backwards (our floor plans are opposite). then she started to walk back to the bedroom where, of course, MY bed and computer and dresser are located. "WHAT THE HELL is all of THIS!?!?"
"that's my bedroom, betty."
"well, what are you trying to do to me here?" the suspicion is mounting now.
"betty, hun, i am trying to figure out how to get you home!" at this precise moment, betty flops back down onto my couch, throws her arms up in the air, looks me dead in the eyes and shouts "I. AM. HOME." (oh dear.) things were not progressing at quite the rate i had initially hoped and it was getting more and more difficult to follow her around and redirect her to the couch. there were a number of occurrences that can only be identified as vomit-swallowing, but i am just not going to get too descriptive about that. the images in my head were terrifying. i was so not interested in cleaning my carpet last night for any reason.
no luck on family phone numbers since the only number betty knew was her own and she wasn't answering her phone. as reluctant as i was, i had to call the police for help. now there's an awkward conversation. i began by identifying myself and then said: "ummm, i have a little problem...."
while i waited for the police to show up with their magic tracking abilities, my dinner arrived. i placed it on my kitchen counter where it cooled for quite some time. it will appear again later in the story. betty passed out about every 4 minutes and each time she opened her eyes again it was the same conversation.
"you know i just don't know WHAT is going on!"
"betty you are in my apartment."
"What?!"
"you are at my apartment."
"no, i'm not. i'm home."
"no, betty."
"well what did you bring me here for?!"
"i didn't, betty, you came here. i think you got a ride from someone at the bar."
"well, what do you want from me?"
"just trying to get you home, betty."
"i AM home."
"no, you don't live here anymore."
"What!?!?"
"you moved out last week."
"I DID NOT! i think i would know if i moved!"
"you did, betty."
"well how do you know???"
"i watched you move out, betty. the apartment is empty."
"i wonder where i moved to....."
"i don't know but we're going to find out."
"where's my purse???"
"you didn't bring it."
"well that's stupid......why did you bring me here?"
when the police officer finally arrived, betty was ready to be frisky. she was looking for a boyfriend in uniform and jason fit the bill! this was rather amusing to both jason and me. jason tracked down a son. he'd be right over to pick her up.
things took a bit of a dark turn then. betty started to get angry with me. pointing and staring and saying things like "it's you, isn't it?" (huh?) "you did all of this." (no, you came to me.) "well where the hell is my car?" (i dunno.) "oh, i know how it is. it's you." then came the saddest part of it all. perhaps the saddest part of the last several months of my life. betty sat on my couch, seeming to have dropped (again) out of the awareness that i was there and that she wasn't home. she folded her hands under her chin and whispered repeatedly:
"oh please, please just let me be dead. i know you can do it, only you can do it. all i want is to just be dead. oh please oh please. let me out of this hell, you know how it's been. all the hell i been through with my kids, oh please please. let me just have death. you know how it is. only you can do it."
then she looked at me again. didn't seem to matter to her that she had no idea who i was or why i was sitting on "her" couch. "you just don't know how much i just wish i was dead." long pause while i try to keep empathetic eye contact. something she was in no condition for, frankly, and was pointless since she couldn't see me anyway. "you have no idea! just be thankful you don't have to feel like this!" {a funny thing to say to someone who lives with chronic major depressive disorder} "just be thankful you have a life!"
betty spent several minutes praying for death taking brief intermissions to remind me that she is so depressed and i am so lucky.
it can sometimes be physically painful to feel that much sadness for another human being. there she sat, two feet from me, lamenting a lifetime of misery. a lifetime more than twice as long as mine has been thus, and i watched her and knew that no matter how profoundly devastating it was to witness this kind of illness, there was not a god damned thing i could do to undo any of the pain, to heal any of her illness or to begin to make things better even in this moment. all i could do was wait for her children to get there and hope that they would take care of her and that they love her.
well, that and hope she didn't pass out and pee on my couch.
when betty's daughter got there i was in the kitchen again, following betty around. she had once again gotten feisty and had to look around for something familiar. she was at the counter trying to dig into the plastic bag containing my dinner. "i'll just put this stuff away." i was just guiding her back toward the couch when i saw the headlights from her daughter's truck. "don't THINK i don't know what's going on here. it's you. it's you who started all of this! where's my purse?"
i opened the door to welcome betty's daughter to the situation and suddenly i was no longer a suspect. betty turned around, walked into me and said, "you. you're a sweetheart." then turned to her daughter and said, "you know, i just can't figure out WHAT is going on." i quietly tried to inform the new participants in the evening's drama: "she thinks i took her tv away so she is mad at me. she also has no idea that she doesn't live here." i apparently wasn't quiet enough because the next voice was betty's "i DO live here!" she began to rattle off her address of "umpteen years", which i strongly suspect is how this whole thing got started as she got into a car with some random bar regular. "no. mom. you live down the hall from me now, remember. now get in the truck." she was not pleased.
after my observation of the prayer vigil i wanted to be upset that her family was mad at her when she was obviously so sick. then i saw in her daughter's eyes a lifetime of frustration and exhaustion. i wondered how much of this kind of thing her kids have had to deal with over the years. which "side" is more sympathetic? the ill mother whose kids are angry and impatient? or the kids whose lives have been profoundly impacted by the behaviors and lack of predictability of the ill mother? perspective is an interesting thing. and in this situation, as funny as it was at times, it was just sad from every perspective.
i was in my bedroom playing on my computer when i realized it would be a good time for some dinner, so i walked into my kitchen. why i did this i will never really understand because there was no chance that i was going to find food there. but conveniently i did come across the take-out menus hanging on the side of my refrigerator. there is one dish at one chain restaurant in town that i actually enjoy and i was just fortunate enough to have that menu present. so i ordered my spinach tortelloni... and cappuccino cake... if one is going to have dinner delivered, one may as well go all out. the woman on the telephone said that it would be approximately one hour. fine, i thought. one hour is a perfect amount of time. back to the computer, back to chatting with my online friends.
chat chat chat.... approximately 40 minutes go by...
there is a knock at the door and i am delighted that dinner is a bit early.
so i opened the door and i did not find a green mill delivery person, no, i found my former neighbor looking around, all wobbly, confused... "can i just come in and rest for a minute!?" as she pushed through me to get to my couch. now i have seen betty in this condition before. it is not uncommon for betty to be too intoxicated to know exactly what is going on around her, so she usually just sits down and laments over having had "too many glasses of beer".
"betty, where do you live now?" at this prompt betty looked at me as if i had said, 'betty i am a giant bunny rabbit and i have brought you here to give you a nice ogilivie home perm.' utter confusion and irritation.
"WELL!!! right over there!" pointing to the apartment across from mine. "i've lived there for umpteen years!!"
and this was true. to the extent that the descriptive term "umpteen" has meaning, she was not lying. however, "no, betty, you moved out of there last week. how did you get here?"
"WHAT?!? i did not move out! he dropped me off." pointing at an empty space in the atmosphere where there had apparently recently been a person with a car.
"betty, can i call your family? what is your daughter's number?" at this point she rattled off a number 3 or 4 times that i eventually learned was her own home phone number. later felt kind of stupid for leaving a message on her voice mail. she should be all kinds of confused about that today.
several attempts to retrieve family phone numbers from betty's questionable memory resulted in the following:
*approximately 19 "where's my purse?"es
*10 or 11 attempts to find "her" phone book in MY kitchen
*7 requests to "turn off that damn ugly thing" referring to my green and blue christmas tree
in the corner
*4 reminders that this has been a damn bad day
*6 "WELL I'M TRYING TO REMEMBER!!!"s
*12 or 13 "what the...?" looking around puzzled..."why is everything different?"s
*3 observations that this room "doesn't even have a damn tv or nothin'?"
**and my favorite of all!** while i continually 'woke' her from her near-slumber to request family names and phone numbers: "you know. this is not a good time to be asking me these questions!"
betty's suspicion grew as time went by. at first she just wanted to sit down. then she started to stir and wander about. into the kitchen... stunned by the fact that it appeared to be backwards (our floor plans are opposite). then she started to walk back to the bedroom where, of course, MY bed and computer and dresser are located. "WHAT THE HELL is all of THIS!?!?"
"that's my bedroom, betty."
"well, what are you trying to do to me here?" the suspicion is mounting now.
"betty, hun, i am trying to figure out how to get you home!" at this precise moment, betty flops back down onto my couch, throws her arms up in the air, looks me dead in the eyes and shouts "I. AM. HOME." (oh dear.) things were not progressing at quite the rate i had initially hoped and it was getting more and more difficult to follow her around and redirect her to the couch. there were a number of occurrences that can only be identified as vomit-swallowing, but i am just not going to get too descriptive about that. the images in my head were terrifying. i was so not interested in cleaning my carpet last night for any reason.
no luck on family phone numbers since the only number betty knew was her own and she wasn't answering her phone. as reluctant as i was, i had to call the police for help. now there's an awkward conversation. i began by identifying myself and then said: "ummm, i have a little problem...."
while i waited for the police to show up with their magic tracking abilities, my dinner arrived. i placed it on my kitchen counter where it cooled for quite some time. it will appear again later in the story. betty passed out about every 4 minutes and each time she opened her eyes again it was the same conversation.
"you know i just don't know WHAT is going on!"
"betty you are in my apartment."
"What?!"
"you are at my apartment."
"no, i'm not. i'm home."
"no, betty."
"well what did you bring me here for?!"
"i didn't, betty, you came here. i think you got a ride from someone at the bar."
"well, what do you want from me?"
"just trying to get you home, betty."
"i AM home."
"no, you don't live here anymore."
"What!?!?"
"you moved out last week."
"I DID NOT! i think i would know if i moved!"
"you did, betty."
"well how do you know???"
"i watched you move out, betty. the apartment is empty."
"i wonder where i moved to....."
"i don't know but we're going to find out."
"where's my purse???"
"you didn't bring it."
"well that's stupid......why did you bring me here?"
when the police officer finally arrived, betty was ready to be frisky. she was looking for a boyfriend in uniform and jason fit the bill! this was rather amusing to both jason and me. jason tracked down a son. he'd be right over to pick her up.
things took a bit of a dark turn then. betty started to get angry with me. pointing and staring and saying things like "it's you, isn't it?" (huh?) "you did all of this." (no, you came to me.) "well where the hell is my car?" (i dunno.) "oh, i know how it is. it's you." then came the saddest part of it all. perhaps the saddest part of the last several months of my life. betty sat on my couch, seeming to have dropped (again) out of the awareness that i was there and that she wasn't home. she folded her hands under her chin and whispered repeatedly:
"oh please, please just let me be dead. i know you can do it, only you can do it. all i want is to just be dead. oh please oh please. let me out of this hell, you know how it's been. all the hell i been through with my kids, oh please please. let me just have death. you know how it is. only you can do it."
then she looked at me again. didn't seem to matter to her that she had no idea who i was or why i was sitting on "her" couch. "you just don't know how much i just wish i was dead." long pause while i try to keep empathetic eye contact. something she was in no condition for, frankly, and was pointless since she couldn't see me anyway. "you have no idea! just be thankful you don't have to feel like this!" {a funny thing to say to someone who lives with chronic major depressive disorder} "just be thankful you have a life!"
betty spent several minutes praying for death taking brief intermissions to remind me that she is so depressed and i am so lucky.
it can sometimes be physically painful to feel that much sadness for another human being. there she sat, two feet from me, lamenting a lifetime of misery. a lifetime more than twice as long as mine has been thus, and i watched her and knew that no matter how profoundly devastating it was to witness this kind of illness, there was not a god damned thing i could do to undo any of the pain, to heal any of her illness or to begin to make things better even in this moment. all i could do was wait for her children to get there and hope that they would take care of her and that they love her.
well, that and hope she didn't pass out and pee on my couch.
when betty's daughter got there i was in the kitchen again, following betty around. she had once again gotten feisty and had to look around for something familiar. she was at the counter trying to dig into the plastic bag containing my dinner. "i'll just put this stuff away." i was just guiding her back toward the couch when i saw the headlights from her daughter's truck. "don't THINK i don't know what's going on here. it's you. it's you who started all of this! where's my purse?"
i opened the door to welcome betty's daughter to the situation and suddenly i was no longer a suspect. betty turned around, walked into me and said, "you. you're a sweetheart." then turned to her daughter and said, "you know, i just can't figure out WHAT is going on." i quietly tried to inform the new participants in the evening's drama: "she thinks i took her tv away so she is mad at me. she also has no idea that she doesn't live here." i apparently wasn't quiet enough because the next voice was betty's "i DO live here!" she began to rattle off her address of "umpteen years", which i strongly suspect is how this whole thing got started as she got into a car with some random bar regular. "no. mom. you live down the hall from me now, remember. now get in the truck." she was not pleased.
after my observation of the prayer vigil i wanted to be upset that her family was mad at her when she was obviously so sick. then i saw in her daughter's eyes a lifetime of frustration and exhaustion. i wondered how much of this kind of thing her kids have had to deal with over the years. which "side" is more sympathetic? the ill mother whose kids are angry and impatient? or the kids whose lives have been profoundly impacted by the behaviors and lack of predictability of the ill mother? perspective is an interesting thing. and in this situation, as funny as it was at times, it was just sad from every perspective.
posted by shelly at 12/08/2006 06:30:00 AM
4 Comments:
Shelly, you are a kind person to help Betty. Most people wouldn't have helped her and wouldn't have shown her such kindness. You recognized that she was in a sick state and made her more comfortable by your kind nature.
Shelly, I don't even know what to say but that for all the places Betty could have ended up, she is very fortunate to have landed on your couch, even if only for a moment.
Today is one of those days where I feel the things Betty felt, where I share her prayers (even though a non-believer). Thank you for your couch.
thanks to both of you, sara and jack. those are kind words, but i am having difficulty understanding what i did that was different from what anyone would do.... would leaving her outside in the cold in ND in december have been an option to anyone? i certainly hope not! and if it is, then my already jaded perception of humanity may take on an even sharper edge!
No, I'm not sure a lot of people would have left her out in the cold. What you did is you reflected upon the experience and then you transmitted it to your readers in a way that allowed us to share not just your own feelings and experiences, but those of Betty as well. That my dear, is the difference...
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