“My hands are shaky and my knees are weak
I can’t seem to stand on my own two feet…
Please don’t ask me what’s on my mind
I’m a little mixed up but I’m feeling fine…
My tongue get tied when I try to speak…”

By all rights, it should be Daddy singing this old Elvis Presley song tonight.  But he and his speech are too shaky to do it.   So at least he’s safe.  And safe without sound may be all we can ask for right now.    

Dad was caught near the busy road in front of his house this afternoon.  He was on a rescue and recovery mission to save his wandering dogs.  The dogs didn’t want rescuing.  But that’s beside the point.  At least in Daddy’s mind.  It was also beside the point that he’d left the house against Christi’s expressed wishes.  Daddy forgets he’s now house-bound….that he’s no longer mobile.   Even though his legs tell him every minute of his day.      

My cousins Mike and Judy were driving by on their way home.  And seeing Dad outside, they stopped to get him safely into the house.   Part-way there, Daddy’s shaky old legs ran out of steam.  Without warning, his knees buckled.   So they caught him a second time.  

Daddy sat in his recliner for three hours before he regained his small store of strength.  And while he was in recovery, the others were building a front-yard fence to keep the dogs (and Daddy)  corralled.  Christi says it won’t be pretty — but it may be a solution.   

How do you thank people who do out of love what others could not be paid to do?   They were tired themselves, ready to get home–they’d been up early with Mike’s mom (my Aunt Jo)– who had a heart procedure this morning.   And instead of relaxing, they were building a fence.  I know Daddy would thank them if he could string two words together.   I know Christi already has.

The fence may or may not be a solution.  And it may or may not be a beauty.  But I’ll always see it as one.  Because as the old Greek proverb goes — beauty is in the eye of the beholder.  And this beholder is beholden.  For the two who accepted our trouble as their own.      And did more than we could have asked or hoped.         

In spite of being tired and all shook up.

When the dog bites

When the bee stings

When I’m feeling bad.

                                –Rogers & Hammerstein

Our puppy Max has eaten more rocks.  So I call the vet.  My sister’s dog, Eve, is having puppies under Daddy’s bed.  So I call my sister, Christi..  I watch two lab technicians haggle, before one finally draws the short straw, to draw Daddy’s blood through his paper-thin skin.  Who can I call to fix this?  

Sometimes I wonder if  I believe myself when I tell others that Daddy is holding his own.  Dad actually does very little on his own.  My aunt cooks Daddy’s meals, a nurse’s aid helps him bathe and most everything else falls to Christi and me.  Together we get Dad to the doctor, we make sure he has his daily meds, we take care of his housekeeping and his shopping and paying his monthly bills.  So Daddy’s own is really being held up by others, mostly Christi.   

While I hate to acknowledge it, time is slipping away from Daddy.  Or maybe it would be more accurate to say that Daddy is slipping away from time, as Dad lives one foot in this world and one planted in a place I cannot see.  Maybe that’s why Daddy’s legs are so shaky.  And though Dad has a walker to help him walk, I wish he had a talker to help him talk.  Dad’s speech is shakier than his legs, as he struggles to string two words together.    

One afternoon a week is spent with daddy, where within companionable silence, I do a little housekeeping and we watch a litle television.  When it comes time for me to leave, he hoists himself up from his recliner to send me off with one long hug.  He sometimes acts as if he doesn’t want to let go, as if he’s holding on for dear life.  But then I find it’s my life he’s holding onto, as he struggles to tell me to drive safely.  Last week he had weightier matters on his mind—so he pulled me close to whisper into my ear a string of words spoken so fast they bumped into one another as they tripped to get out of his mouth.  I caught their semblance if not their exact meaning.   And this made him happy.  But not as much as when Christi walked through the door from her day of work. He may hold onto me for dear life, but we all know that Christi is his life.

It’s been a day of midwifery rather than housewifery, as I’ve  intervened to bring about or keep life within this world.  Eve is now resting comfortably with six little mouths to feed.  Max has ejected all the rocks but has a surprisingly mild case of Parvo – we are told he will recover ‘just fine.’  And Daddy’s about the same.  With me wrapped in his arms, Daddy’s holding his own.