Jan
2
Yesterday was such a full spectrum day. The whole rainbow.
I went to the barn in the morning, I meant to ride but the weather was just so dreary, socked in with what I think of as the Vampire Death Fog that we get a lot of in the blah months, some sort of inversion situation where chilly damp fog hangs in the valley for days on end. It had already eroded my motivation and then I saw that Little Joe had two coats on to combat the cold. TWO COATS, for my non horse people one coat is already a whole mf thing with the heavy wrangling and poop-coated buckles and the second one was just like: no. We are doing chores and snuggles and lots of silly horse babytalk (“WHO’S the most handsome bo-bandsome, YOU are!”) and we are not messing with the coats and tack today.
I did get to visit with the mama barn cat named Muffin, who has a most delightful white mustache that goes so nicely with her thick black fur. She came by for some lovins and I had the delightful experience of petting both horse and cat at nearly the same time, which is a primo top-tier sensory experience.
Earlier in the morning I’d had such a nice chat with my mom, and I was thinking of her as I left the barn and headed to see Mr. Mark in the care facility. We had talked about what sorts of things he might best respond to, and for this visit I thought I might play him some music. He had been in a band, so I know music had been important to him, but whenever I had brought it up previously he had seemed uninterested. What I now understand is that he has trouble expressing things but no trouble at all receiving, if that makes sense. He can often answer questions, he cannot ask them. While I did try and ask the right questions to try and understand what he might like, I didn’t get very far so I just pulled up some songs on my phone and played them, the two of us huddled up in his room together.
I could tell he liked my choices and then we got to The Gambler, and boy oh boy. His eyes lit up, and he could sing along, he knew every word. It was like he had been pulled out of his own Vampire Death Fog. The more I see him the the more I know about how he functions and my best guess is that he mostly retreats to a faraway state to endure his situation. His cognitive ability is far above the level of care he is in, and it’s not my place to say more about that but I have been doing my best to try and communicate to the team. It was a bittersweet visit, beautiful in its way as always and particularly special with our new musical discoveries, but god, I hated to leave him.
I had missed a call from my other hospice family and was dismayed to find out that Ms. I had declined rapidly this week after another fall. I went straight to her house where both her daughters had gathered, and she had been set up in a hospital bed in their living room. A terribly difficult choice for the family to face, whether to send her to the hospital for more aggressive care, or keep her at home in as much comfort as possible to let things happen naturally. I was glad for their decision and as shattering as it was to see her, she looked so deeply at rest. She was warm and cozy in a hospital bed with the softest sheets (this really struck me, they were sheets provided by the hospice medical team and you’d think they might be sterile or just white and no-nonsense, but they had a cute pattern and were so incredibly soothing and soft to the touch), surrounded by her familiar things, and her loving family.
I did not stay for a very long time but I stayed long enough to sit beside her and hold her warm hand and talk to her about the stories I had so enjoyed hearing from her. She had this one story about living near the US/Mexico border as a child and essentially smuggling sugar cane with her relatives, tying the long canes to their belts and walking like stiff-legged soldiers by the border patrol, singing out “American citizen!” as they brought back their sugar loot. I talked to her about that, and about the water tank near her house that sprung a leak and how they swam in the lake it made, and how they jumped trains and rode to Tucson and had to be back by 3 PM or they would have to sleep on park benches. About the wild donkeys she and her sister would ride. The tamales they would make every Christmas and how good the kitchen would smell as they cooked. I kissed her soft cheek and called her by my nickname for her and said I would see her soon, just like I did with every good visit. And I went home flooded with tears and took a bath at 6 PM and crawled into bed with Billy rumble-purring next to me.
As I write this, she is in the same state, but now has not eaten or had water for a couple days. I hope her passing is soon and so peaceful. She looked at peace, and like her body was doing the natural work of dying. The body knows how to die, is how I have heard it described. Like the body knows how to birth.
A small day in terms of activity I suppose, but such a big full day with my heart aching with delight and famlliarity and gratitude and discovery and loss and worry and love. 2026 starting out with all the levers pulled. I’m grateful to be able to feel so much, to hold so much heaviness and lightness at the same time. I just want to give back as much as I can this year, to take it all in and pour it out for others and for myself.
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