Today at...Atria

Well, today may have been one of the most depressing days I've spent in a very long time.  I contacted Susan last night from the ER and told her I couldn't work today.  She understood.  I went to Atria to spend a few hours just to observe my mother and see how she was after the emergency room trip last night (of which she has no memory).

I knew it was not going to be a fun day when I walked in and asked how she was. She had her head down and said "not good."  I asked what hurt and she said her headache, her stomach was upset and her right leg was hurting a lot. She asked if there wasn't something I could do.

Sadly, and bad me, this led to about a half an hour discussion about how I had taken her to the doctor (which she does not remember) and she told the doctor she had no pain.  I told her that the doctor can't help her if she doesn't let her know what hurts.  She got defensive and decided that she just would never say anything about her pain again, since she doesn't know what to do and how to do it.  She could not get comfortable in any position.

I actually took a video of her describing her pain so that if she tells a doctor she is not in pain, I can show what she was talking about.

An Atria worker came in to check on her and my mother perked up and didn't mention her pain, then sank back down into her pain again after the worker left.

I had gotten there at 11 so at 12, I asked if she felt like going to lunch, which she agreed to do.  As luck would have it, they were celebrating September birthdays and she agreed to sit at the birthday table, though didn't talk to anyone  I did not have my camera with me.  One of the guys at the table will celebrate his 100th birthday next week.  I'm wondering if maybe she was miffed because someone is older than she is and she seems to want to think nobody can possibly be as old as she is.

But lunch was uncharacteristically good and they brought out a HUGE birthday cake and all the staff sang to the birthday people.  My mother never cracked a smile.

I was going to pass on the cake in preference for peach pie, the alternate choice, but, as an old cake decorator, I was curious about both the cake and the mountain of frosting on it.  I decided to have a piece, fully expecting to find the frosting cloyingly sweet, but instead it was stabilized whipped cream and absolutely delicious.  So I ate the whole thing, which I regretted about 4-5 hours later when I had the sensation of being uncomfortably full!

We went back to the apartment (she is never sure how to get there).  She tried to get comfortable for awhile and I finally suggested she take a nap, which she did...so I did too.

(isn't it amazing that I can take selfies in my sleep?)

She slept for about an hour and woke when Jeri called.  Jeri is usually a bright spot in her day, but she seemed almost irritated that Jeri kept talking to her.

After we finished the conversation, she was very restless, saying over and over again that she doesn't know where she is supposed to go or what she's supposed to do.  This is not a new thing.  She has said that every single day since she moved to Atria.  She knows she has to do something but she is so afraid of doing it wrong...and can't figure out what it is in the first place.

I reminded her that I had brought her clean laundry and that it was on her bed waiting to be folded, so she got up and did that (to my surprise; usually when I suggest some simple task she can do, she refuses to do it).  But then she came back and it started all over again -- where was she supposed to go and what was she supposed to do?

I tried telling her that the doctor told her she was supposed to rest today, but she wasn't buying that.  She would just sit there, head in her hands, the picture of misery because she can't figure out what she is supposed to be doing -- and the leg pain was just making it worse.

She would get up, walk into the bedroom, turn around and walk back out again and into the kitchen, then back to the couch to ask where she should go and what should she do.  Then she'd repeat the trip again.

I cannot tell you how much it pains me to know that this seems to be her life now.  Agony over not knowing what to do and unwilling to do anything suggested she do, even something as simple as moving the newspapers, which are bothering her because they are "clutter" and putting them in a stack so the housekeeper can throw them out. I cannot tell how many times I have suggested that "something to do" to her, but she never does it.

I finally came home, hating to leave her but there was nothing I could do to help her.  I did come home, though, and wrote to her doctor.  I can't believe there is NOTHING but Tylenol to relieve her pain.  This is what I wrote:

I'm sorry to keep bothering you. I spent 5 hours with my mother today and she is in agony over her leg pain. She says it starts in her right hip and goes down the front of her leg to about mid-calf. This is no attention-seeking, she even cries out in her sleep. Today only one leg was involved, the other seemed OK. But she could not sit or lie comfortably anywhere. She walks very slowly, and with a limp.

She had a bout of sciatica many years ago. I'm wondering if this might be the problem. I'm also wondering if referral to an orthopedist might be in order. I am so frustrated because Tylenol does not help and it is so frustrating to see her in such pain and be able to do NOTHING to help her.

I read up on sciatica and it is described on one page I found (which, of course, I cannot find again) as pain originating in the hip and going down usually just one leg to about mid-calf.  That is EXACTLY the pain she is describing.  I hope Dr. A will give us a referral to an orthopedist because it is clear that she herself has nothing to offer my mother, but that doesn't relieve her pain at all.

I just hate to think that this is her life from now until it is over.  

A Good House

6

When you are involved with theater for awhile you get in the habit of "counting the house," guesstimating how many people are in the audience.  If it's a lot, you have a good house.
Charles had a good house.

Walt's former boss and friend of over 30 years lost his battle with cancer last week and his funeral was today.  St. James Catholic Church in Davis has a seating capacity of 580 and they were not packed in tightly, but it would not be out of the question for there to have been ~300 people there today.  Definitely a good house.

We went to the rosary last night and there weren't quite as many people for that, but still more than your average funeral.  Everybody loved Charles and he had people from the many corners of his life showing up...work friends, people from the church, couples that he and wife Vicki counseled before their marriages, and friends from the neighborhood where the family lived.  I'm sure there were lots of other subgroups too.

I didn't know Charles well because there weren't that many social events where we crossed paths, but I always liked him and he always gave big hugs.

When David was in grammar school Charles and Walt would have lunch together once a week (a practice which continued for many, many years) and on their lunch days, David and Charles' son Christopher would also have lunch together at school, which I just loved.  Chris is now this big hulking guy and I reminded him of his lunches with David.

The funeral was unexpectedly extremely emotional for me.  For one thing, I get emotional at other people's pain, and there was a lot of it to go around today, but as they walked in with the casket to a hymn sung by the congregation, all I could think of was my mother's eventual funeral.  I think so much about how she is and how much happier she would be to join her family, and the day to day running of the things that need to be run for her, and what I can do to make her remaining time here more pleasant, that I never think about her actually being GONE and all of us sitting around a church some day singing hymns and sharing memories.  I had to really fight to keep myself under control and force myself to think of anything but what was going on in that church.

After the ceremony, Walt is a great schmoozer and this was a chance for him to catch up not only with the people in the office where he worked, but also people from other NRCS office around the state (Charles was the State Conservation Engineer). 

I ended up finding a friendly wall to sit on and sat there for awhile until this lovely woman came and sat with me.  She saw me sitting alone and thought I might need some help.  We had a nice visit and at one point when we were talking about house prices and how it was impossible to find an affordable house in the Bay Area, I told her about our friend Ndangi from Zaire, who lives near Stockton and commutes to an office south of San Francisco, a one-way trip of 2-3 hours.  She was surprised that I knew someone from Zaire because she was also from Zaire.  She had left Zaire to go to Rwanda and when the war broke out there, the borders to Zaire were closed, so the only way to get out of Rwanda was by flying to the United States.  She's been here ever since.  Talk about small worlds.

The reception was huge

(about half the people)

And at the end people shared memories of Charles and folks from the office gave the traditional cheer that they gave to everyone who retires...a hip...hip...hooRAY!

I came home and took a nap and started writing this, but the phone rang.  It was Atria telling me they were sending my mother to the ER.  They said she had fainted and was "disoriented" and that her blood pressure was "sky high." They sent her to Sutter Davis Hospital (where I volunteer) and I rushed over there.  She was scared and confused but I kept explaining things to her and got her laughing.  

They ran every test in the book including another CT scan, chest x-ray, EKG and tests on every possible body fluid.  All came back normal.  The doctor had no clue what the problem is but suggested maybe getting an EEG to rule out seizure disorder was recommended.

After reviewing everything I know about what happened, I think that Atria people were just seeing one of her "spells" for the first time and to be safe sent her off to the ER.  I am going to talk with them tomorrow.  I am going to have lunch with my mother and then spend a few hours with her just to kind of take stock of how she is and if she faints again.

It's not time to plan her funeral just yet.

But it looks like I'll be taking her back to the doctor again soon.

What SHE thought of the whole thing.

That's it -- I'm done

Unless she is unconscious or bleeding...profusely... (or both) I am finished taking my mother to the doctor.

Yesterday she was in terrible pain. She always has back pain, but it was shooting down her legs and she could barely walk.  While I was on the phone talking to Kaiser, she staggered to her bed and when I came home, she looked like death warmed over and said she wasn't going to get out of bed.

The nurse and I agreed I'd bring her in to Kaiser at 11:30 today and I fully expected her to be just fine, and me feeling like an overreactive idiot. Again.

But when I arrived she was in the kitchen and when I asked how she felt she said "not good" and it was one of her more vague days where she didn't know where she was or what she was doing. Good. At least she was symptomatic...and I hate to say I was glad that she was feeling bad, but at least the doctor would finally believe me.

I could tell how bad it was because she agreed to let me take her to the car in a wheelchair so she didn't have to walk down that long hall when she was in such pain. She is usually so adamant that she needs NO assistance, whether cane or walker or wheelchair, the fact that she got into the wheelchair without argument spoke volumes.

We drove to Kaiser and on the way there she kind of "came to" and started commenting on the pretty trees again, and when we arrived at Kaiser, she refused a wheelchair and walked to the waiting room.
We waited for awhile, during which time she asked me many times where we were and why we were there.

When we got into the exam room, she turned into Miss Personality again.  Pain?  What pain?  She had no pain.  The doctor manipulated her feet, her legs, her hips.  She poked and prodded and to everything, my mother responded that nothing hurts.

So  OK.  The pain is gone.  That's good, but again I felt like an overprotective mother running my kid to the doctor for every little pain.  That's kind of how the doctor seemed to feel.  We came home with the suggestion that she take Tylenol if she had pain again.

I decided to take her to lunch and we went to IHOP, the closest restaurant to Kaiser.  As she got into car, she winced and grabbed her leg and said it was hurting.  When she got out of the car she hobbled into the retaurant and when she got into the booth, winced and kept rubbing at her thigh saying it was "giving her fits."  When I expressed frustration that not ten minutes before, she had told her doctor that nothing hurts, she said "well, at that minute it didn't hurt."

Throughout the lunch she was constantly wincing and moaning and trying to find a comfortable spot in the booth because her body hurt so much shifting from cheek to cheek and groaning with every move she made.

ARRRGGGGHHHHH!

She was uncomfortable in the car and didn't understand why I was frustrated.

I let her out and told her I'd be back in 3 hours with the guy who was going to see about fixing her chiming clock.  I had forgotten to take her key with us, so I gave her my key so I could leave her at the building, since there was no parking to be had in the whole block near Atria.

When I returned with the clock guy, she was not in her apartment and I had to get someone to let me in.  Darrell fixed the clock and left and I hung around until my mother got back.  She didn't remember where she had been. But she was moving like someone in great pain.  Again. 

She hobbled over to her chair, sat down, winced painfully and said her legs were giving her a hard time today.

I couldn't even discuss that because she wouldn't understand.  But I went home and send the following email to her doctor:

I am sending my mother to live with you. We went to lunch after her appointment and she winced and gasped and groaned and rubbed her thigh and told me it was "giving her fits." She is only pain free when she sees you, so I will deliver her to your house at my earliest convenience. She won't be any trouble and she doesn't eat much.

Thank you for your assistance.

Sadly, her doctor seems not to have a sense of humor.  Maybe it's because they don't joke like that in Bangladesh, which is where she's from.  She thinks my mother is feigning pain to get my attention...but I was watching her in pain when she didn't know I was there and she's definitely in pain.

But I'm done.  No more will I rush to take her to the doctor again.

Maybe.

No Dry Eyes Here

For years I have been seeing commercials for drops to combat the condition of "dry eyes."  When I go to the doctor, they usually ask me (because I'm old) if I'm taking anything for dry eyes and express surprise to learn that I am not.

I can't relate to dry eyes.  I tear up so often during the day, my eyes don't have time to get dry.
When we saw Sully this weekend I started with big tears rolling down my cheeks the first time they showed the passengers getting ready for impact and I literally cried for the rest of the movie just because the emotion got me so strongly.

I have often commented here that I cry at supermarket commercials...and especially Hallmark commercials.

As I  teared up for the first time today, I decided to keep a record of everything that brings tears to my eyes today.

- I saw a commercial for the upcoming Michael Weatherly show, Bull, which starts next week and which I am looking forward to.  But as I watched Weatherly as Bull (I think that is the name of his character), I remembered his finale with NCIS and DiNozzo realizing that he had a daughter with the now deceased Ziva.  I am tearing up again just writing this.

- Next there was an interview with Angelina Kerber, who just won the US Open title.  I had never heard of her and if you said her name to me, I wouldn't have a clue that she was a tennis player.  But she was asked about a note or a phone call she received before her winning game and when she said it was from Steffi Graff my eyes immediately filled with tears.  I don't follow tennis.  I don't know about either of these women, but the fact that one would call the other just touched me enough to bring tears.

- I teared up 3 times watching back to back recordings of Cooks and Cons, the Food Network show that asks the judges to figure out who is a real cook and who is not.  I cried at two of the stories of the "cons" and at one of the announcements of the winner.

- I teared up telling Walt about my mother's dreams about her mother all the time and how much she misses her and how I wished my grandmother would come and take her home and let her be out of the misery she is in these days.

- I teared up when I got an e-mail from Jeri telling me about the good conversation she'd had with her grandmother last night.  It made me wonder how things changed so drastically overnight.

- Tears during two NCIS episodes, one when DiNozzo finally decides to put his feelings for Jeanne behind him, and in another episode, Gibbs thinking of his dead daughter when he listens to a message from her.

- Tears during the news and a Trump attack on Hillary.  I have tears often when I think of the people who are buying his shit and who may very well elect him president.

- There was something else between the Trump attack and the Food Network kids star that brought me to tears but i can't remember now what it was.

- And of course I cried when they decided which of the kid chefs competing to be the first Kid Food Network Star was to be sent home.  She was crying, I was crying and even one of the judges was crying.

But after that I settled in to finish reading "The Girl on the Train," which is by no stretch of the imagination a tear jerker, so I think I have finished my tears for the day.

But this is not an unusual day, so you can see that I have zero need for anything to help me create tears!
 

---

I went to Atria this afternoon to get laundry and my mother was "not good," she told me.  It wasn't a brain thing this time, but she was in great pain radiating down both of her legs.  She could hardly walk.  I gave her a couple of Aleve, hoping that would help the pain, and I called Kaiser.

It was too late in the afternoon for them to give her an appointment today, but she has one for 11:30 tomorrow.  Of course, if things go the way they usually do, I'll arrive at Atria and she will be just fine with no memory of the pain she is in today and then I'll have the dilemma of whether to keep the appointment, knowing that her doctor can't diagnose a no longer existent pain or cancel it and hope the pain does not return.

The other problem is that her pill container has disappeared.

Last week, I brought the pill container that has her doses for each day in the week.  She still had two days left in her old container, so I left that one for her to finish and left the other one as well.
When I returned two days later, all of the pills were gone out of the new container.

But the thing is I couldn't be sure that I had brought a filled container.  She has two of the same color and maybe I had mistakenly brought the empty one.  (With the signs of my own early dementia, it would not have surprised me). So I didn't stress about it because when she empties a container, she leaves the lids open, and these were all closed and knowing how she hates to take pills, I couldn't imagine her having taken them all in 2 days.

So I brought back a new pill container, which I KNOW was filled, but today, when I went to check on whether she had been taking her meds, the container was gone.  I looked everywhere, even in the freezer. I checked every drawer, cupboard, medicine cabinet, linen closet and her purse.  It doesn't do any good to ask where she put it because she can't remember that she takes pills at all.

So I decided that the time has come to have Atria monitor her meds.  I have a note in to the coordinator to find out how we go about getting that started.

In truth, it will be a relief for me and I won't worry about whether she is taking her pills or not.
By the time I had done all I had to do, and had finished checking all the drawers, my mother had gone back to bed, moving very slowly and painfully.  I told her I was going to go and that I would be back tomorrow to take her to the doctor.  She said she felt like she wasn't going to get out of bed.  I told her that was probably a good thing, then she asked "but what if I have to get up?"  I told her to get up, then.

I stopped at the front desk on my way out and explained what was going on and that we had a doctor's appointment, but asked them to check in with her throughout the rest of the afternoon.
I don't have a clue what I will find when I go tomorrow.  If she is still in pain, I suspect I will have a battle on my hands because I will insist that she let me push her in a wheelchair out to the car.
Every day is a new adventure.  I ache for her and it is so frustrating being able to do so little for her.

Another Thought on 9/11

A guy named Jim Wright posted comments on 9/11 that Facebook immediately deleted.  I think he has a point and decided to post his comments here:

You’re expecting some kind of obligatory 9-11 post, aren’t you?

Here it is, but you’re not gonna like it.

15 years ago today 19 shitheads attacked America.

They killed 3000 of us.

And then … America got its revenge for 9-11.

Yes we did. Many times over. We killed them. We killed them all. We killed their families. We killed their wives and their kids and all their neighbors. We killed whole nations that weren’t even involved just to make goddamned sure. We bombed their cities into rubble. We burned down their countries.

They killed 3000 of us, we killed 300,000 of them or more.

8000 of us came home in body bags, but we got our revenge. Yes we did.

We’re still here. They aren’t.

We win. USA! USA! USA!

Right?

You goddamned right. We. Win.

Except…

Every year on this day we bath in the blood of that day yet again. We watch the towers fall over and over. It’s been 15 goddamned years, but we just can’t get enough. We’ve just got to watch it again and again.

It’s funny how we never show those videos of the bombs falling on Baghdad today. Or the dead in the streets of Afghanistan. We got our revenge, but we never talk about that today. No, we just sit and watch the towers fall yet again.

Somewhere out there on the bottom of the sea are the rotting remains of the evil son of bitch who masterminded the attack. It took a decade, but we hunted him down and put a bullet in his brain. Sure. We got him. Right? That’s what we wanted. that’s what our leaders promised us, 15 years ago today.

And today those howling the loudest for revenge shrug and say, well, yeah, that. That doesn’t matter, because, um, yeah, the guy in the White House, um, see, well, he’s not an American, he’s the enemy see? He’s not doing enough. So, whatever. What about that over there? And that? And…

Yeah.

15 years ago our leaders, left and right, stood on the steps of the Capitol and gave us their solemn promise to work together, to stand as one, for all Americans.

How’d that promise work out?

How much are their words worth? Today, 15 years later?

It’s 15 years later and we’re STILL afraid. We’re still terrorized. Still wallowing in conspiracy theories and peering suspiciously out of our bunkers at our neighbors. Sure we won. Sure we did. We became a nation that tortures our enemies — and our own citizens for that matter. We’re a nation of warrantless wiretaps and rendition and we’ve gotten used to being strip searched in our own airports. And how is the world a better place for it all?

And now we’re talking about more war, more blood.

But, yeah, we won. Sure. You bet.

Frankly, I have had enough of 9-11. Fuck 9-11. I’m not going to watch the shows. I’m not going to any of the memorials. I’m not going to the 9-11 sales at Wal-Mart. I don’t want to hear about 9-11. I for damned sure am not interested in watching politicians of either party try to out 9-11 each other. I’m tired of this national 9-11 PTSD. I did my bit for revenge, I went to war, I’ll remember the dead in my own time in my own way.

I’m not going to shed a damned tear today.

We got our revenge. Many times over, for whatever good it did us.

I’m going to go to a picnic and enjoy my day. Enjoy this victory we’ve won.

I suggest you do the same.

I have always had a problem when 9/11 rolls around because of the fact that we were not in the United States when it happened, so we missed all the media coverage.  You never realize how our emotions are affected by media coverage until the entire country spent several days glued to the television, while you were in another country where the event did not receive all that much coverage.

When we returned home from England, it was to a different country.  The first thing I noticed was flags everywhere.

My grief over the events of 9/11 are real and deep, but can't possibly match those who sat here, day after day, watching video over and over again, hearing the anguish of people searching for relatives and friends, and sharing their tears.

So I think that Jim Wright has a point with his comments about the commemoration of this date.
Mostly, I am angry that Facebook chose to delete his words as inappropriate.


Aren't the brave men and women fighting for this country fighting for such things as the right to speak our mind about things that are important to us?  I can't find anything offensive in his piece. I didn't go enjoy a picnic on 9/11, but I did watch many hours of Star Trek instead of 9/11 memorials.

Sunday Stealing

If your life was a book, what would be its title?

Funny the World, of course!

Who is/was the weirdest person in your life?

Wow.  Now there's a challenge, given the cast of weird characters in my life!  Of people who just pass through my life it would have to be the artist Bruce, who is a regular at the book store.  Always dressed in baggy, shaggy white clothes with a hat he makes for himself, usually out of paper plates.  Nice man, but definitely a weirdo.

As for people who are actually my friends there are lots of possibilities, like Cam and Evelyn, who are roller coaster enthusiasts and travel around the country riding roller coasters.  Or Steve Schalchlin, who sings choruses in public, which is mad enough.  Or maybe Debra LoGuercio DeAnglo, editor of the Winters Express, who is one of the craziest women I know.  But I think I'll choose Derrick Bang, former Entertainment Editor for the Davis Enterprise, the guy who hired me (and the best of the four or five editors I've had). In addition to that, he's a HUGE Peanuts fan, has written two books about Peanuts, helped with the construction of the Charles Schulz museum in Santa Rosa and his house is filled...and I do mean filled with Peanuts memorabilia, hundreds of stuffed Snoopys, statues, pictures, magnets, flags, books, statues.  If it's Peanuts, Derrick probably has it.  At Christmas time he has a floor to ceiling tree filled with Peanuts ornaments and his house routinely wins "best decorated," with its Peanuts theme (and other cartoon characters). He once staged a life-sized Monopoly game around half of what is now Central Park. 

 

What is a special thing that someone once did for you?

My son Ned just finished completely re-doing my office, painting it, decorating it, building shelves and a special craft desk.  He worked at it for weeks.  I love it and was truly touched that he wanted to do that.

If you could erase someone off the planet, who would it be?

Is there any doubt?

 
 

What’s a big goal that you have?

I don't have big goals any more.  I guess at the moment it's just helping my mother live the rest of her life comfortably and with dignity.

If you could time travel and meet yourself at 16, what would you tell yourself?

It wouldn't make any difference; I probably wouldn't listen to this old lady anyway.  But I'd remind myself to brush and floss!

If it were the last day of your life, how would you spend it?

Calling my family and friends to say goodbye.

If you could meet any celebrity, who would it be and why?

I'm not big on meeting celebrities.  I'm too shy.  I would, however, like to be a fly on the wall in some of the writers' groups, especially for The Daily Show, or a social gathering of the NY critics who appear regularly on Theater Talk. It might be fun to meet Rachel Maddow, since she and friends of ours were on the same swim team a bazillion years ago an I find her endlessly fascinating.

What is one thing that you would never do that others you know have done?

Drugs.

What is one romance depicted in film that you’d love to experience?

I always love the final scene of Affair to Remember.  

 

Describe yourself in just one sentence.

Bev is a fat old lady who tries to do what she can to improve her little corner of the world.

Who is the most beautiful person on earth?

I'm not moved so much by physical beauty as inner beauty. I would nominate Dame Daphne Sheldrick, whose Sheldrick Foundation has saved so many orphan elephants.  If not "the" most beautiful person, definitely up there in the top 10.

 

What was the best experience in your life?

Only ONE best in 73 years?  Not possible.  But some of the top contenders;

• Childbirth, especially the first one, because it was so new.
• Walt's 50th birthday party
• Walking the Great Wall in China
• Lawsuit's Whole Earth Concerts
• SCT's You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown

If you could rule the world, what would you change?

Clean water, enough food, and toilet facilities for everyone.

Where were you when you heard the news of 9/11?

Sitting in the lobby of a hotel in London.  We had just arrived in England.  Someone came to the front desk and said she had heard that "something happened" at the World Trade Center.  When we got into our room, we checked CNN in time to see the second plane hitting.  We spent our first day in London glued to the television.  It was a surreal experience.  We heard all the news filtered through British minds and by day #3 all we heard was the Brits who were victims of the bombing.  I remember two talking heads, one of whom asked the other "what does this attack mean for America?" and the answer was "Well, they're going to find out how we live in the rest of the world." Of course we could not fly home and by the end of 2 weeks in England, we were in Orkney at the northern end of Scotland, where 9/11 didn't even make the front page, but was a small article on the back pages.

Thank you for playing this week on Sunday Stealing! Please leave a comment or link when you have posted. Stop back and visit other player’s posts. That is really what this is all about, making new friends! Have a great week. See you next Sunday!

50 Years

It was 4 a.m. before I went to sleep last night.  I made the mistake of channel surfing after watching an old movie and I saw there was a Star Trek 50 Years tribute.  I checked on whether it was being rerun because I had missed about 20 minutes of the 2-hour show, but it was not.  I set it to record, but started watching it.  I was still enthralled when it ended at 4 a.m.

Star Trek came into our lives back in the 70s when the original series was being shown in 
reruns, consecutively each night. We'd missed all the hoopla when it first came out. We weren't part of the write-in campaign that kept it on the air for a third season, but now we were having a chance to see what all the fuss was about.

The kids were little. We were living in Oakland. Each night we'd sit in front of the TV and get hooked on Star Trek. We had our favorite episodes--there was the one we called "The Giant Cornflake," (Kirk's brother is killed and everyone is attacked by things that looked like giant flying placentas). There was Harcort Fenton Mudd, his "women" and his wife. There was Joan Collins being noble in the 1920s, falling beneath the wheels of a speeding car. There were Kirk & Spock dressed as gangsters, playing a game of Fisbin. There was dear Raina, the android, torn between her creator whom she liked and Kirk, whom she loved, her heart literally breaking because of her inability to choose between love and "the familiar." There was Mr. Atoz, the librarian. And of course there was everybody's favorite--The Trouble with Tribbles. 

The kids played Star Trek all the time. Ned was Spock, Jeri was Janice, Tom was Sulu, David was Kirk and Paul was McCoy. They would run around shouting each other's names and I'd hear stern commands of "ready to beam up." I remember Tom asking me, "Some humans have real ears, right'" (Spock ears were big around here)

Star Trek gave them the opportunity to exercise their imaginations. I loved that about it. No electronic games. In 1975, I wrote:

Ned and Matt are really into playing Star Trek. I've been listening to the sounds this morning--the boys shouting "red alert" and making siren noises, then someone else yelling "warp 8!" Last week they took the very tall box that the gym set had come in and they made a whole control panel, which takes up one half of the room. They drew in as many things as they could think of (including an "off" button--Walt said he always wondered how you stopped a starship)..."red elert," "fazers," etc. Then knowing that all electronic things are connected with wires, they took some old piano wires and stuck them into the back of the box so it appears to have a very complex circuitry.

Ned even learned how to do a pretty good Scottish burr and loved to say "I'm sorry, Captain, but the engines are damaged." The Vulcan salute was real big around here, as was the Vulcan death grip.

We broke down and took them to a Star Trek festival once. Paul didn't know what an autograph was when we left home, but after listening to Jeri and Ned talking about getting autogrpahs, he was just as anxious to get signatures from the guest celebrities by the time we arrived. The kids stood in line for about 15 minutes waiting to meet Sulu, who was Mr. Personality and chatted with each of them. (He must have thought Paul was a girl because he asked him, "Hi, sweetheart, what's your name'") 

By the time the interview portion of the program was over, the kids were really into the spirit of things, yelling with the audience and flashing the Vulcan peace sign at appropriate moments. The whole thing was a little surreal for us, and it was the last festival we ever attended--but it was one of things that it's always good to say you've done once.

Star Trek was a part of our everyday life. Ned was once so obnoxious at Jeri's ballet recital that I said something I never dreamed I'd ever say to a child, "sit up and act like a gentleman!" Ned finally leaned over and said, "I can't help it. I'm a Vulcan. I don't know what ballet is."

For Tom's birthday during this period, we had a Star Trek birthday party. I don't remember all the activities, but I do remember we played "Pin the ears on Spock," and of course I made a tribble cake. Oblong shaped cupcakes, frosted in different types of frosting and sprinkled with various things to give them a "fuzzy look."  Paul's 8th birthday was a Star Trek party, with invitations I made featuring Spock.

The impact of Star Trek in our lives diminished a bit when Star Wars came out, but still we've always had a fond spot in our heart for Star Trek, so it was really a big surprise when I discovered that I'd been corresponding with David Gerrold, who wrote The Trouble with Tribbles, for a couple of years. David and I were both part of a discussion forum on CompuServe, he under a pseudonym. We had developed a nice friendship and enjoyed trading quips, and especially puns. Apparently his real identity was one of the worst kept secrets on this particular forum, but I was late to figure it out.

It was difficult to decide how to treat someone whose books I'd read and whose TV work I'd admired and who was suddenly someone I knew quite well. Very odd feeling. But I adjusted. We met finally when I was in Southern California and got along well. I enjoyed meeting his son, then about 12, who became a good friend of ours.  (Said son is about to get married in December!)

When David started his David Gerrold Forum on CompuServe, he asked me to be in charge of it. I tried to tell him I had no background in sci fi or in computer hardware, but he insisted I would be perfect for Wizop. I have to admit...I was. The forum evolved into what it should have been--sci fi talk and tech talk, I was kind of the hostess, making people feel at home, starting funny subjects, making sure every single message had a response. We built up a nice community of crazies and I really enjoyed the two years I gave to it.  It's another big loss with the loss of CompuServe the way it used to be.  Some of the regulars went on to Facebook and we are still "friends," and a few others have died.

And during that time David and I got to be better friends. He gave us our dog, Benjy. He became part of our family, joining us for family picnics and helping me through the grief following Dave's death in 1996. He gave Paul pointers to improve his last monologue show and then, when Paul died, David came here for the funeral and conducted the graveside services, which were so much more meaningful than the services performed by our family friend, a priest, for Dave.

With our long standing history with Star Trek I was delighted to get some Star Trek stamps this week.

I have not seen the new Star Trek movies and, given that we almost never go to the movies, I probaby won't, but it's nice to know that the little experiment Gene Roddenberry started is still going strong 50 years later.