the end of an era: no more chocolate throne

Well, if I had to put my finger on the most distasteful part of my parents' home decorating decisions over the years, it'd be the choice of a brown toilet for the laundry toilet, from here forth known as "my toilet" or "the chocolate throne". The chocolate throne is going however, and I could not be more delighted, and at last, amused (having been most unamused by it for nearly 30 years). This is how I broke the news to my eldest niece (who is close to me in age)

So there you have it, the essence of the whole distasteful thing - why would anyone make a poo coloured toilet, and who on Earth would buy one? When questioned on this, my mother responded that it was a choice between green and brown. OH MY GOD THERE WAS ANOTHER CHOICE?

Well wait actually, it gets stranger, because there was another choice altogether, the colour they put in their bathroom was a lovely light doe skin. Why not order two of these? The mind boggles!

My chocolate throne:

Their doe skin throne:

Why would you think you couldn't have two toilets the same colour in the same house, oh wait, it was the 80's. PS the doe skin is getting replaced too. Currently you can only flush it by reaching in and pulling something up to manually flush.... yeah, not happy about that, so not doing that!

When breaking the news to my like minded niece, she inquired about something else I find distastefully Australian in my throne room (again, not decorated by me)

 The dunny poem, The Australian Dunny by Roy T. H. Manning is printed on a tea towel hanging from dusty rod and twine.

It will frankly be the first thing I take down when given that power.

So tomorrow, while I unwind and enjoy getting my colour and cut done at my hairdresser's the chocolate throne shall be unceremoniously removed and replaced. Long live my new ivory throne, may it serve well for the lifetime of this house.

the state of the union

If you're wondering how we are getting along.... well you see, its like this:

Daily serious ruffling of the feathers, with intermittent outbreaks of fire, some passive aggression, the occasional bonding over dessert or a joke (at someone else's expense) and then we rupture over some other issue and it all starts again the next day.

Sadly it seems like a lot of our suffering has come from Dad not being diagnosed for Parkinson's and therefore having absolutely no assistance for his mental and emotional decline related to that over the past 15 years. Meaning, Mum and I cop the brunt of his depression, anxiety, low self esteem, and the fact that he can't hear us doesn't stop him from screaming "fucking shut up" at us like a total savage when we are not in fact having a go at him and might actually be discussing our shared loathing of Pokemon Go, or our Liberal government (state or federal, you pick).

My parents who probably should have been divorced in the mid 1980's will be married 42 years in March. People always say they stay together for the kids, in our case I think to torture the kid, but what can you do? They think they are a great couple. They say the nastiest and most juvenile things to each other multiple times a day before settling down to hold hands in front of the tv every evening, so go figure.

The house is starting to show its age. The windows sound like car crashes when you close them (its like screeching tyres followed by a loud impact). I did not get the lock fixed on the bathroom for my birthday and am still showering in a state of constant alert. My toilet was starting to have difficulty flushing on half flush, so my Dad, determined to fix it, rendered it more broken than ever before so that we can only use the full flush. He talks about having another go at it, and I'm afraid I'll end up with a totally broken toilet. Won't that be nice!

There aren't enough power outlets in the kitchen. There's not enough bench space in the kitchen. There's a seriously dodgy corner pantry (that is not a walk in, and you literally have to poke your arm in blindly to the far corners and hope you get what you want without smashing anything made of glass) and my excess food is stored in a cupboard in my office but at least with the dog bed being pushed hard up against those doors at night I'm pretty sure mice will never get in to raid.

I constantly find disembodied band aids in the bathroom, kitchen, and laundry. Usually soggy, dirty looking things. The floor around the dining table is usually good for a used toothpick or two. The dog licks the carpet hoping for cheese and bread crumbs, but cereal is also a fave.

Anything I cull because I seem to be the only one aware of how limited space is in this house, gets adopted by one of my parents before it hits the bin or the roadside bring out your dead collection. At a time when I've switched to kindle and iBooks because we just can't keep accumulating books, my parents have stopped going to the library and are bringing in hundreds of books they've purchased and are mounting up in the house like I can't describe. They NEVER bought books all my life, only read for free from the library, but now apparently is the time to be fast and loose with the money! As long as its for fun things and not helpful things like I don't know home maintenance and getting a handyman.

Dad, in my opinion, is about ready to lose his key privileges. Its hard to say that to a parent, but honestly the number of alarmed searches for vital keys he has lost is getting to be too much. We have spares, but we don't want his keys falling into the wrong hands.

I'm not sure how long Mum will continue to drive for, though at least our lives improved in one significant way last year, and that was my parents were assessed and approved for subsidised gardening help and driving - since I don't drive at all, they really need that help getting to out of town medical appointments. Dear God, the medical appointments alone are never ending and overwhelming.

And somewhere, amid all this screaming, I manage to run my business, Starzyia, and perhaps haven't completely lost my mind!

what I really want for my birthday

Its about a week until my birthday, and I'll tell you what I want (what I really, really want, and that had better not be a Spice Girls song going through your head right now!) I want a damn lock on the bathroom door that actually works.

I'm the only person in the house who needs to use a lock on the bathroom. Half the time my parents don't completely close the door when they're inside, and Mum is only going to get walked in on by her husband or daughter, who cares right? But me.... I want the door knob fixed.

Dad can't hear the shower running. Dad can't remember someone is even in the bathroom. Dad won't knock. I just want to have a shower and relax without having my ears pricked for every little sound and worrying about getting barged in on.

I live with all manner of unsightly things. I live with constant bickering. I live with worrying about 84 year olds having surgery that they probably shouldn't really be having, and stopping people from doing crazy things they really shouldn't be doing.

I want to sing in the shower and forget my troubles.

When asking my mother about getting the door knob fixed by someone other than Dad I get told "things like that cost money". Oh right. Yep. That must be the world's most expensive big ticket home maintenance item. We can never scrape up enough pennies for that!

Give me a damn lock on the door! Or at least permission to personally pay for someone to come and restore my few minutes of escape each day. That is what I want for my birthday. Sorry for the rant.

how to kill a blog project you love, in really easy steps (and how to save it)

(A gratuitious photo of the Heavenly place that I live)

Last year I did something I had been building up to and planning to begin for a long time, I started this blog. Yes this tiny thing. I happened to believe that it was worth sharing my experiences living with and caring for my elderly parents. I thought I had a lot to say (I always actually have a lot to say) and I thought it would be really great to build a supportive community for people of all ages as they face elder care and family issues. And then I nearly killed it in its infancy... here is a break down of how....

1. I started a large topic that might never be satisfactorily explained or factually expressed - why does the parent-child relationship get reversed as parents age? - right before my busy season. Busy season for me is preparing for a 3-4 month sales blitz leading up to Christmas, and the endless need to create tray after tray of art pendants, shrink plastic jewellery, air dry clay pendants, kilt and shawl pin brooches, art tiles, art canvases, wrapping and packaging, earwires, and market all of these things successfully online and at handmade markets.

2. I intended to resolve the theme/topic in my next post.

3. I realized I was not in the mental place to complete that topic but would not let go of the idea that the next post I wrote had to follow on exactly where I left the last post on this blog.

4. I lived in the fantasy land that I would one day feel up to the task of completing that topic.

5. More than 6 months of no posting on a new blog that should be gaining an audience and finding its niche were wasted, lets face it I haven't done the maths, but its probably more like 8-10 months. That's a huge period of idleness and hard to regain the attention of the actual people who were enjoying what I had created so far, who I said I'd be here for and wanted to build a community with... oh dear. Blog project death.

But wait, there is light at the end of the tunnel

 

The magic of time and perspective have allowed me to face up to the mental hurdles and obstinacy that I am solely responsible for and have made me realize a few things. 

The first is that there aren't really hard and fast rules for blogging, I can just write a new article about anything really. Anything I'm genuinely moved to say, and on this occasion its to encourage anyone who has ever boxed themselves into a blogging corner (I call it blogging oblivion) because the only way a blog truly dies is if you decide you can't or won't save it.

Secondly I really started to miss this blog, and realized that a lot of things I really wanted to share were being wasted simply because I wouldn't write them until after I'd resolved the un-resolvable situation I'd mentally created. 

And finally I can say I have the maturity now to pull myself out of blog oblivion and at least for my own sake start processing the things I'm experiencing in life through the therapy of writing, and hopefully connecting with people who can also shed light on what happens to families and individuals as parent's age. 

Phew! I'm so relieved. It feels great to break down those barriers and be free to write again, and if you're reading this, thank you! and please let me know how you feel about it.

every day is Freaky Friday, role reversals in the parent child relationship

There comes a time in life, when the parent - child relationship gets reversed somewhat, the extent of this depends on so many variables, but to a degree I'm sure you have experienced or witnessed grown adults who become protective of their parents - worrying about safety, worrying about health, advising, even "laying down the law".

My parents seem so innocent and gullible to me now. I have to tell them the people who ring them and say "I'm from Microsoft, please turn on your computer and login we've detected a massive threat to your computer" are lying scumbags from hell, and that its absolutely okay to yell at them "you are a fucking criminal ass wipe" and then hang up.

I have to practically tie my father to a chair to stop him from doing jobs he should not be doing, and that he promised me many times he will no longer do. After every heart valve replacement, and every code blue, broken hip, and hernia I have held him in front of me and looked deeply into his eyes and said "you cannot do any more hard work, you cannot chop firewood anymore or saw logs, or dig the edge of the garden beds to keep the front lawn from invading" and he has looked me in the eye and said "oh no, I won't do that anymore" and he has broken that promise one thousand times (or more)

Now I'm the one making sure Dad doesn't leave his jacket, walking stick, or cushion on the train.

I'm the one who checks the house is locked at night, or finds the keys when he's lost them, or thaws the 2 litres of soup out after someone has accidentally put it in the freezer instead of the fridge.

But this is the tip of the iceberg, these are the issues everyone talks about, but there's so much more, and I'm your girl, I'm the one who is prepared to say there are other ways that the relationship is reversed with age.

Because your parents are most likely the people who taught you the most about certain things. Like hygeine, and manners, and how to behave in public, and you've finally mastered all these things, and now they are unmastering them before your very eyes!

The woman who taught me not to pick my nose is the woman I walk in to find in up to her elbows while watching television, and I have caught my father using the car immobiliser lock to pick ear wax out of his ear, at the dinner table.

This is Freaky Friday, Twilight Zone, weirdness. Laughter is just about the only option. The others are nausea, outrage, and wondering how the hell your life turned out this way.

It is so weird to find out your parent's social skills include tantrums that the most devilish two year old would be proud to call their own, as well as the occasional bout of silent treatment, passive aggression, and deliberate property destruction.

Not to mention the faux pas. Oh my God, you will overhear so many terrible, terrible things. 

Listening to my father on the telephone is like Verbal Waterboarding. He could patent it. I am absolutely beside myself at times, but now I really try to find something to do well out of earshot as a measure of self preservation.

And if you are considering being any part of your parent's lives as they become elderly, you will need to find ways to cope as well. My recommendation is to become inured to it - let it be like water off a duck's back, accept it for what it is.... and treasure the lighter moments because they become precious memories.

how I got my dog

This is my dog, Fizzy, he's a rescued border collie x kelpie and today is our third anniversary or "gotcha day" if you are familiar with rescue terminology. Since he is such an important part of my life, I thought I'd share how miraculous it seems to me that he is mine, and the magic he works daily on our family. To be honest, I don't think we'd have made it this far without him.

Fizzy is my very first dog. I never had a dog when I was a child. I wanted one desperately. I don't think any child has ever been sent more gaga for want of a dog. We would be out and about as a family and I would see a dog, with a collar, and tags, and a family of its own on the horizon somewhere, and I would be crying and begging my parents to save this poor, wretched homeless dog that needed us. Loudly. Passionately. Blind to all the facts. I am sure many a family left in a hurry "quick Marge, put the dog in the car and let's get out of here!"

I was hysterical in my desperation to have a dog. To add fuel to the fire, my Dad was always whistling or singing 'How much is that doggy in the window'. He's not an evil genius or anything, he's just oblivious to the effect he has on the people around him.

I left home, lived in student housing (no pets allowed), lived in share houses (no pets allowed), lived in rentals (no pets allowed) and dreamed of the day of owning my own home and buying a dog even before fully furnishing the place... and somehow ended up back with my parents, and nothing wears away your morale more than being an adult and needing your mummy and daddy's permission to get a dog.

I wasn't overly hopeful about the chances of getting a dog - my parents never gave me any signs of hope that they like dogs at all.... they didn't want to pat dogs when visiting other homes and had steadfastly resisted all forms of begging and pleading for over 20 years.

But my Mum knows how much I need pet therapy for my mental health, and a 19 year old cat that poops on our beds during the night was a) not going to live forever and b) thankfully, not going to live forever. I said to Mum, "Mum I'm never going to have kids, and all I've ever really wanted was a dog. What if I die and I've never even had that experience of owning a dog?" (Oh Yes, I Did) and she told me that when my poor old scared cat left our lives I could get a dog.

Dad said "it will have to be an outdoor pet" and I said yes, mainly, but we've got to at least let is sleep in the laundry at night. So he made a pet gate for the end of our hallway. I still was a bit nervous about his attitude to our potential new pet, but Mum assured me he would be the softest of all of us and would let it in even if we didn't want him to.

And she was right. My dad, freaking loves this dog. My dad has never raised his voice to this dog, he is more patient and kindly with the dog than with us... but bygones....

We adopted a friendly but frightened, beautiful 8 month old boy named Tizzy (I renamed him Fizzy) and from the first day he has brought us nothing but joy. He is the most perfect pet we have ever had. He is gentlemanly, eager to please, grasps his place in the home (he never jumps on their bed or the couch) he doesn't dig, or bark, or steal our food, he is gentle and exceptionally patient with children, he brings joy to the elderly nearby who have no pets, and is everybody's favourite dog. They tell me every day.

My parents say "you could not have gotten a better dog" and I glow.

Fizzy is amazing, he has brought magic into our home. It brings me joy to see that he is pet therapy for both my parents and not just me. I accept many things about my parents that I previously would have fought them on because I think "they let me have a dog, let go of it". We laugh together, we enjoy his antics, we enjoy his love, we share his love.

For three years we have had better lives because he is with us.

a typical day in the nest

Morning has broken - my mother will rise and turn the television on by 7am and it will remain on until bed time. I hate television.

I squabble with the dog all the way around the block - he is afraid of an increasingly inconvenient list of things  all of which can be found in our 'hood or flying overhead (drug houses, airforce jets, small poodles, eagles, strange smells, hoon drivers, the rubbish truck) we tend to go the direction he decides moment by moment, is less threatening, and usually end up stranded with no "safe" Fizzy approved way of getting home.

While my parents breakfast at a table that had been almost completely set after dinner the night before (tablecloth, cups, saucers, bowls, cutlery, cereal... basically everything but milk and the teapot) I rush to the computer because my first thought is whether any orders have come in for my business Starzyia overnight, or if I have any customer questions to respond to, I love this!

I lovingly wrap any orders for my customers so I can ship them when I go to the shops, which is early, but fits around any doctors appointments my parents might have.

We shop or run errands.... if Dad comes there is a walker to collapse and shove into the boot and he likes to do it himself (which takes 50 times as long as if I did it but its better if I stand back and let him do it himself while I cop dirty looks from passers by at the sight of an 80 year old struggling to lift a walker into or out of a car while I stand doing basically nothing)

No matter the size of my "to do" list compared to the size of their lists, I will always, always be the one waiting for my parents. Its impossibly freakish the way it turns out. I play games on my ipod while waiting. Sometimes I wait so long I worry they have forgotten where we said we'd meet and agonize over whether I should look for them at one of our other meeting places. Sometimes I wonder if at least one of them has collapsed in the centre and I can't understand any of the PA announcements in the mall.... its all gibberish. I could be getting paged and I wouldn't know.

My father who recently passed his driving test to remain on the roads, will insist on driving and will quite roughly hit the curbs at least once there and back. It makes me incredibly nervous when he checks his wrist watch while driving, fails to register the time, and looks about three more times before asking me what time I think it is. Why time is important I don't know, none of us have anywhere to be in life, really. Though I think about Hawaii quite often.

After unpacking any shopping, I have to take the dog out at least to the park (3 houses down) or to the end of the street because he absolutely will not take a crap in our yard, though my life would be much easier if he would. He likes to do it in the 'hood to mark his territory. He is submissive to every other dog in the world but he can fake a good confident "this is mine" poo, I think, I'm only guessing.

At least once a day the phone will ring and my dad will answer it even though he cannot hear anything on the phone, and usually ends up hanging up because he couldn't understand the person's accent, or if the person is lucky, he will come and grab either Mum or myself to get to the bottom of what is going on.

At least once a day the phone will ring and my mum will hang up summarily on the person, because when she said "hello" they didn't say "hello" back right away which she believes is 100% proof that the person is in a call centre. They might just be a medical receptionist distracted mid ring by a patient or other staff member or any number of other legitimate callers who have just been given the Short Shrift.

I hardly ever answer the phone. I'm the one who can hear, does understand, doesn't abuse a call centre person until they've earned it, but I HATE phone calls.

Lunch time! I eat in my room while watching an episode of whatever show I'm binge watching on dvd.

After lunch I either: create new products; conduct photo shoots; write blog articles or my email for my VIP members; update bookkeeping; unpack supplies parcels; shop for supplies online; or when it hasn't been achieved in the morning - housework or garden and yard tasks my parents can't do.

At least once every hour while they are awake, my parents have a bickering match that begins over not being able to hear or understand each other and sometimes I have caught them arguing the exact same side of an issue only in different words and not comprehending that they are actually in complete agreement with each other. I face plant.

Nearly every day I will be actively involved in a dispute with one or both of my parents, in which I am treated incredibly rudely, and let's face it, I'm not one to cope well with being treated unfairly. Because of the way I was treated by my father as a child, I refuse to take abuse from him now. So when I call him on his current behaviour.... which I call "holding a mirror up" things tend to go badly. My intention is to show him how he has just treated me, but being unable to perceive that in the first instance, he still cannot detect it when it has been replayed for him. Its the biggest emotional void in my day and is one of the things I have to work on letting go of. But it sucks that I have to let go.

There's usually no way in hell I can get access to one of the toilets when I need it, because since Mum had bowel cancer she has had irritable bowel syndrome, and Dad has heaps of troubles himself. He will usually crap in the bathroom in the morning when I want to clean my teeth. Then Mum does it. Then Dad does it again. There is always spare underwear and a plastic bag in the car glove box. Unless I go to consult the map and the underwear is no longer spare... Eww!!!

Dad likes my cooking, mum does not, plus Mum can no longer eat foods that contain fructose since her bowel surgery. I don't like Mum's cooking (and never have) and don't want to kiss goodbye to so many gorgeous fruits and vegetables, plus I don't really eat meat... so every day there are two dinners prepared in our house. But not at the same time because the kitchen is too small. So I often cook early in the day and reheat for dinner. If I'm smart and cook for 4, I can get by having a day off in between cooking, and have a hot lunch and hot dinner every day. I buy my own groceries and only make the things I like, so its pretty good.

I come home from walking the dog to potent mixed aromas - Deep Heat and gravy would be one of my least favourite combinations (considering I hate both, and together, forget about it!) Whatever the smells are that day, they are bound to clash with the smell of my dinner.... and again, I eat alone in my room. Separate meals, at separate times (I can't force myself to eat dinner at 4.30-5pm every day anyway) this is the most independent part of my day.... the closest I come to living alone.

The dishes are washed and put away, the table is set for the morning, and I work on Starzyia tasks until 7.30 which is my designated computer shut down time. Relaxation begins and the dog loves his cuddles on the bed while we watch an episode or two on dvd.

A basic day in the nest! There are lot of things that are the same each day, but the variations are insane - the actual subject of any bickering match is sure to be one for the record books. I hate the tension, I like peace and quiet, but as long as we are having insane arguments and getting in bizarre predicaments I figure I might as well treasure them as the uniquely hysterical hilarious moments of our lives. There will be plenty of them. I hope they make you smile.