Straight Line Relationships

On Friday night, Mom had a rough night.  The pain stepped up a notch, after her (assisted) shower.  She also threw up after her shower — the exertion, the drugs, or just the advancing of the disease, who knows the cause?  There is no certainty in cancer.

Saturday morning, the docs evaluated and increased her daily levels of methadone, to control the increased pain.  Mom slept much of the day, but it worked - she wasn’t up all night with her back hurting.

However, more methadone means more disorientation.  Today, she’s started having “stalls” — she sits stuck in a position, quivering slightly.  She tried to read a one-page letter from Uncle Bill, and she got stalled, glasses on, hands holding the letter up in front of her face, but eyes closed.  She wasn’t reading slowly, she’d drifted off and was “stuck”.  When I came over and said her name, she popped out of it, like waking up.

She’s sliding away.

I’m glad they’re controlling the pain, even if it means she’ll slide away.  She’s slowing down, like the elderly do, and the relief from the (I imagine) crushing pain means that her lucid moments with us are unburdened, free and light.  She can laugh with Chris when he jokes that she’s got to drive him home for something: “Well, if you’re not going to drive me, then how am I going to get there?”  We were teaching ASL alphabet signs to the nurse today — “O” and “K” — and she was making the hand-signs also, and amused by the nurse’s attempts.

Right now, Mom’s sleeping, breathing steady and fairly strong.

From http://www.amitabhahospice.org/hospice/signs_of_dying.php : 

Closer to death, the breathing involves the whole rib cage and is fast (up to 30-50 breaths per minute) mostly through the mouth and then may pause for even 10-15 seconds before the next in-breath. This period of no breathing is called “apnoea”. This pattern (called Cheyne-Stokes breathing) of shallow quick breaths followed by spaces of no breathing can continue for a few days, hours or minutes before the person actually stops breathing, but rarely does a person improve from this stage.

Mom’s not there yet.  But she did sleep most of the day today; she was awake for about 1 hour out of 4.

I’m gonna stay at the hospital with her tonight.  I don’t want to say “just in case”, but I’m thinking it.

My mind flips from rationality (”she’s been up out of bed today, that’s why she’s tired; she’s not even close to weak enough to leave now”) to anxiety (”should I call my brother and tell him to GET HERE NOW?”) a couple times an hour.

There is no certainty.

Yep, I’m staying tonight.

I had to run an errand to Mom’s house, waiting for the pickup guy to take away the unused medical bed from the house (now that Mom’s in hospital to stay).  While I was there, surrounded by her things, I got such a sense of the bits of her life that I didn’t know.  We’d gone on a trip to Belize three years back — she had clippings about other exotic places like Peru.  We’d had a garden years back, and I knew she loved her houseplants, but I saw a how-to article she’d printed out about planting an herb garden.  And around the house, she had two orchids in with the other houseplants — I didn’t know when she got the orchids!

My Mom’s life wasn’t easy.  She fought with her parents, and didn’t get much in the way of respect or caring from her own family.  I know I have an uncle, Gene I think?, but I don’t think I’ve ever met him.  In her marriage, she and Dad divorced more than 15 years back, and she had a hard time finding love again.  She & I didn’t have a super-close r’ship either.  A bunch of her anger at the divorce ended up flying my way.  It was a pattern with her, and I don’t have much tolerance for attacker-victim patterns; my reaction was to push her away and hold her distant.

So there, surrounded by her things, I had a moment of anxiety, and I thought, “What could I have done differently?  Oh sweet Mom, I wish things could have been better for you.” 

That’s when I started crying.

Today, Mom was a little social butterfly.  When I arrived, she was already on her second visitor of the day.  And then she got a phone call, and then the OROC ladies visited.  She was laughing with the OROC ladies, asked after all their families, and then joking about forgetting things.  But now she has a great excuse, she said, making quote-marks in the air, “I’m on methodone”.

Then she needed a nap.

She’s sleeping now, breathing slowly, a bit sporadically.  Her body is really worn out.

(now that I’ve found out that the hospice wing has wireless, I’m retro-posting some of this…)

My letter to friends on Thursday, 5/8/2008:

You may know that my Mom, Kay, was diagnosed with cancer 5 years ago.  She has been fighting it well, pushing it into remission multiple times.  However, she has been declining since January, and this past week she transitioned to palliative care (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hospice) instead of curative-focused care.

I’m actually in Ohio right now, for a quick visit.  I plan to visit again later this month, and who knows after that.  Mom’s body is very weak.  She cannot eat anthing but clear liquids.  I know she is getting the best possible care, here at the Cleveland Clinic.

I ask you to keep Mom in your thoughts, and myself and my brother Chris, and my Dad (they divorced long ago, but are cordial).  Chris has been wonderful this month, coming up from Columbus and really getting Mom what she needs.

If you have a moment to do a random act of kindness, drop a card in the mail:

   Kay

   20000 Harvard Road, Building A, 3rd floor Hospice,

   Warrensville Heights, Ohio 44122

I think Mom would be touched to receive 15 cards from “Becky’s friends” in Seattle. 

Also, I thank you in advance for your care and support of me.  I’m sure I will need it.

–Becky

So, everyone has a fav movie, right? 

Blade Runner is mine.

Why?  Maybe because I was an impressionable 10-years-old when I first saw it.  Maybe because I already loved flying cars and science fiction.  Maybe because I’d just read Neuromancer, and the opening 10 seconds perfectly visualize the dystopian ruined-industrial vision of LA that I’d imagined while reading that book. (and I didn’t even know the word dystopian yet).  Maybe because I was already secretly in love with Han Solo, and so I easily fell in love with Pris and Rachel and Roy and Sebastian.  Maybe because that movie is so -quotable-.  (Try using this line randomly in a meeting at work: “So we’re stupid, and we’ll die”.  Or this one: “We share a similar problem - accelerated decrepitude”.  Or this one: “We’re so glad you found us — you’re our best and only friend!”)

Maybe it’s the music, maybe it’s the art.  Maybe it’s that the hero isn’t perfect, and isn’t even particularly capable in spots.  Maybe it’s the story about the spider.  Maybe it’s the psycho-analyzing machine (”We call it Voight-Kampf for short”), or maybe it’s the owl.

The 1984 Apple ad hadn’t come out yet.  But Ridley Scott had already made the first Alien movie.

Anyway, in today’s world, I can see my favorite movie anytime (at home, on DVD).  But it’s still pretty special to see it in the large.  It’s playing at the Egyptian this weekend, the midnight show on Friday and Saturday nights.

I’m going on Friday.

Art wall projects are now complete.

With hanging-hooks from Dad (since my house doesn’t have picture rails), a little wire, and some fishing line (to secure the quilt to the mounting-block), the quilt now is positioned nicely in the stairwell wall.

And I finally bought/found frames for more of my travel pics, so those are on the facing wall.  Yay!

The quilt from Aunt Rachel is a special gift.  I had been seeking, searching, musing for something to fit in that space, and when Rach offered this particular quilt, it looked and fit perfectly!

Movie reivew: “State of the Union“, starring Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn. 

An industrialist (Tracy) starts a run for the presidency.  He begins with fire and ideas, but twists to follow the professional politicos who promise to get him elected.

 (transcribed from the DVD, all credit goes to the real writers)

The politicos talking about their man, and a long-standing conundrum: “He’s beggining to wonder if there is any difference between the Democratic Party and the Republican Party.”  “.. There’s all the difference in the world: they’re in and we’re out.”

This speech, from Grant Matthews, the budding candidate: “You better not worry so much about tax reduction until we accomplish some of the things we have to accomplish.  I’m gonna tell ‘em that the weathiest nation in the world
is a failure unless it’s also the healthiest nation in the world.  That means the highest medical care for the lowest income groups, and that goes for housing too.  One thing this nation is not rich enough to afford is
not having a roof over our heads.  And I’m going to tell them that the American dream is not making money.
It is the well-being and the freedom of the individual throughout the world from Patagonia to Detroit.  We can’t be an island of plenty in a world of starvation, you know.  We need to send food, clothing, machinery, and money, to the bitter, impoverished people of the world.  Try to re-create their self-respect.  Give them the desire again for individual freedom.  And I’m gonna tell them that as long as dictatorships remain in the world,
we’ve got to remain well-armed.  Because the next time we’re not gonna get two years to get ready; they’re gonna jump us overnight.

“And I’m gonna tell them that there’s only one government which is capable of handling the atomic control, world disarmament, world employment, world peace, and that’s a world government.  The people of 13 states started the United States of America.  Well, I think the people of that many nations is now ready to start a United States of the World, … with or without Russia …  and I mean a -united- states of the world, with one bill of rights, one international law, one international currency, one international citizenship.

“And I’m gonna tell them that the brotherhood of man is not just an idealistic dream, but a practical necessity if man is going to survive.”

That bit was worthy of Aaron Sorkin.  It was written in a time that they feared the spread of Communism.  Communism is weakened; funny how much of the rest is still unachieved.

I love good writing.

To close, this line was fun, too, delivered by Kate Hepburn: “No woman could ever run for President — she’d have to admit she was over 35!”

This morning, I looked up a handful of autism links.  I was trying to remember the title/author of a book I’d read back in 1992 or so.  My step-mom Judy, who taught special-ed in the public schools, recommended the book, an autobiography written by an autistic lady.  (No, not Temple Grandin.  I read that one later, around 1998)

Google came through.  I found a list of books by autistic authors (http://www.autistics.org/library/booklist.html), and found the book I remembered, “Nobody Nowhere” by Donna Williams.  I still remember the description Donna gave of “seeing particles in the air”, and how distracted she would get by the excessive sensory data coming at her all the time.  Judy made the observation, “We’re all a little autistic, aren’t we?”

Elsewhere on the books-by-aut-authors list, I found this gem: an autistic person has assembled some demonstration pages to simulate what the world looks like through her eyes/mind.  http://www.hale.ndo.co.uk/scotopic/index.htm

On to tonight.  More research. 

Nic & I were talking about the high MS rate in the I wanted to see the rates of cancer occurance, across the US.   Google came through again.  US Cancer Deaths by Region 

It doesn’t have the data in the viewable form I want, but it seems Washington is only 17th in the nation for cancer incidents (new cases, latest year measured is 2006).  I’d heard some scare-statistic or other that said Washington had super-high incidence rates.  Now I need the data in more detailed form (Seattle area?  E-Wa vs W-Wa?), and easier to navigate and the data (currently you can view one per-state report at a time, text only).

Here’s a good vis summary page, tho it only lists cancer deaths, all types of cancer counted together: http://statecancerprofiles.cancer.gov/map/map.noimage.php

One more research proj for the night — the great Global Warming debate continues.  I’m for sustainability — I think that’s the higher-order-bit than just tracking carbon outputs.  But I’m glad of the push that people are getting from the Global Warming scare.  However, a documentary called “The Great Global Warming Swindle” (GGWS) (incendiary tactics start with the title!).  It has a Wikipedia page.  So does “An Inconvenient Truth” (AIT). 

Now, my recollections from seeing AIT is that one main graph, which was prominently displayed behind Al Gore’s podium in a thick red line, graphed temperature, and showed the recent (latest 20 years?) sharp upslope, which AIT claims is caused by increases in atmospheric carbon, which increase AIT further claims is caused mostly by human activities and excesses.  The problem is that, as I recall, AIT’s graph only went back a couple hundred years.  You have to go back millenia in order to get a good pic of the “normal” or “average” whole-Earth temp, IMHO.  (Found the graph:  “Temperature record since 1880 showing that the ten hottest years ever measured in this atmospheric record have all occurred in the last fourteen years.”  — Um, 1880?  That hardly spans enough time to consider this warming-spell to be geologically significant.  The tracking of that data started right after the Little Ice Age, which lasted from at least 1650-1850.  So, budding-scientists, if you start tracking your data after a known-lowest-temp, what kind of curve do you expect to see? :P) 

I further recall a separate reference, that during the era of the dinosaurs, the earth was warmer than today.  I think I read that in Collapse.  (BTW, this was quickly re-confirmed/cross-ref’d — my first search turned up this quote+link:  “… with an average temperature of 68° F (20° C) (10 degrees warmer than today).“, from http://news.softpedia.com/news/Dinosaur-Era-Australian-Crayfish-Show-Once-There-Was-Only-One-Continent-78153.shtml)  (BTW2, I know, two references doesn’t make it true)

That’s what’s up in my world.  Oh, and a be-autiful eclipse tonight!

I had a lovely little traipse on the web today.  In the commentary on Toy Story, John Lassiter mentions a Nissan ad that was directed by Ridley Scott.  So I had to look it up.  Blade Runner is my fav movie,  (and Alien ranks pretty well too), but I didn’t know that Ridley Scott did the Apple 1984 commercial.  So I had a lovely trip down memory lane, remembering when I first saw that ad on TV (I was 12, and had only programmed on Ataris and Commodores so far). 

Here’s the ad, best capture I found so far: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xCxCkysdzc  (some other versions on YouTube seem to have a different cut of the Big Brother video, that doesn’t match up with the speech voice track)

Wow, more than half of my life has been filled with Ridley Scott dystopian futuristic treatments!