Thursdays

Thursdays. To most, another day of the week. One day removed from Friday.

To me, a day of the week with the ripest memories.

For a couple of years before Mom passed, I spent every Thursday with her. Dad took time away from the house to golf or run errands, and I, with my flexible IBM job, set up my virtual office (a laptop and a cell phone) in their dining room. At this point, Mom was immobile on her own and required someone in the house with her around the clock.

I almost always got there around noon, and they'd be eating breakfast. Dad joked that the Hardison household operated on West Coast time.

"Hey Marmalade!" I'd bend down to kiss the top of her bald, scarred head.

"Hey Gertrude" (or Judy or Chicken or Alice or whatever funny name she was in the mood to use for me that day), she'd respond in a whisper.

I can't remember exactly when Mom got so quiet, but in the final years of her gradual decline, the sound of her voice matched the size of the world she was living in: small. First, she quit driving, then she quit walking, and eventually she pretty much quit talking.

Let me correct that: She didn't quit any of these things voluntarily. Her willing mind was suspended only by her damaged faculties. Damaged from prior brain surgeries and radiation. Cancer "treatments" that left behind a wake of destruction. But treatments we are grateful for, nonetheless.

By the time our Thursday ritual began, she was not only housebound, but mostly couchbound, too, getting up from her beloved throne (as she called it) only to eat at the table or use the bathroom.

A bowl of cereal was equivalent to brushing her teeth, such a morning essential it was. She'd be eating cereal when I walked in, my southpaw mama clumsily using her right hand to feed herself because her left hand bore the most complete brunt of the tumor's (and the treatments') wake. I'd wipe her mouth and take over. It was always funny to me that although her lap was full of cereal debris (her word), and her mouth and hands were sticky from milk, she'd see groid (her word for crumb or dirt) on the table in front of her and wipe it clean insistently with a napkin. Meticulous she was.

Many times, she'd be staring at the newspaper while she ate her cereal, and the normalcy of that sight always brought a smile to my face when I walked in the house. She hadn't been able to concentrate long enough to read in quite some time, but the newspaper was another morning essential, regardless.

When she'd consumed every last morsel of cereal (again, her word), I'd pour CranApple juice in her cup, wheel her to her cranberry-colored throne, and awkwardly, but surely, help her move from her wheelchair to the couch.

I once asked her if she went stir crazy being on that couch so much. She said no, she loved her house, particularly the den. She loved lying on her throne and looking at her collections from over the years, each thing reminding her of something wonderful from the past (so many of her things came from our summer trips to Florida). After that conversation, I quit worrying about her going stir crazy.

Once I got her on the couch, I usually had to dial into a phone call for work, so I'd turn on TV Land, hope for Lucy or Gunsmoke, kiss her head again, and tell her I'd be back soon to check on her.

"Tell those people you've got better things to do," she'd joke. And then add, "Okay, Chicken, love you. Don't be gone long."

After a phone call or two, I'd invariably walk back in the den and find her sleeping. She slept better during the daytime than at night, often telling me that she didn't fall asleep until 4am the night (morning) before. Earlier on in her housebound days, I knew the reason for that. She was too busy getting sucked into the infomercials on TV at night. Several times, I found little pieces of paper on her nightstand with scraggly 1-800 numbers written on them. And at least a couple of times, she completed the task. The doorbell would ring, and to Dad's surprise, it was a package for Anne Hardison: First, the Belly Burner. Then Cindy Crawford's Meaningful Beauty makeup. You can take the girl out of shopping, but you can't take shopping out of the girl.

When she woke up from her nap, we'd eat a snack together on the couch, usually trail mix or Chips Ahoy cookies with white chocolate chunks (her favorite).

On some Thursdays, after I finished work and before Dad got home from golf, I'd change her out of her gown, throw a bandana on her head, and take her out. It might be the only time she'd get out that week.

But those outings deserve a post all their own. I'll write about those soon.

Oh, Thursdays. Such good, good days.

Some days, I'd just crawl in bed with her.