Special Moments With My Mom

I took my mom last night out to dinner and then to services. She was excited to go, but also nervous about being out of her place. I had to be really flexible with everything both because of the timing of getting from her place to services and traffic and mom's mood. I originally planned to take her to the Cheesecake Factory, but we were running late, so I just took her to Boston Market. She is the kind of person who is just as happy somewhere casual as somewhere fancy. Afterwards, we had extra time, so we went to have hot tea. Then she got nervous about where my dad was and why wasn't he there, etc. So, I just called him and had him talk to her and say that everything is fine. Then, she was fine. She did really well at services with me finding transliterations for everything until we got to the Torah portion. Then, the Rabbi likes to read from the Torah and translate as he's going, going back and forth between languages. Mom got agitated that she couldn't follow along and kept talking pretty loudly, so we just left. I figured that it wasn't worth pushing it. When we left, she kept telling me over and over: "You know, I wasn't bat mitzvahed." I kept telling her that I didn't think that anyone minded.

Throughout the night, she kept saying that she wanted to go home. I was nervous that she was talking about the house and not the facility, but when we got back to the assisted living facility where she lives, she was okay about it after asking me once or twice: "Now you're going to sleep at the house? And I'm going to sleep here?"

I got her to participate in activities a bit even though she just wanted to lay down in her bed. She cracked me up that she kept asking me to do stuff for her. As soon as I'd sit down, she'd think of something else I could do for her. It reminded me of when I used to do this to her as a kid, that I'd just want the attention so I'd think of things she could do to take care of me. Anyway, eventually we layed down in her (twin) bed together. She asked if we could cuddle and then turned to her side and hugged me and petted my arm and told me "You're a good daughter." "You're a good mother," I replied.

She showed me this photo album that my sister made for her, and almost every picture of my niece, she said "that's you." Ha ha, that made me smile because I really love my niece, and I think that she looks a lot like me. Once she did say though "that's me" to a picture of my niece.

I'm still torn about whether or not to take her to see her mother. I got her to talk about it after she showed me a picture that had her mother in it. She said that she thinks that she should see her mother. Mom thought her mom was still out of town and was angry with her mom for not calling. I tried to explain that her mother couldn't call her, but that doesn't mean that she doesn't love her.

Every night, I tuck her into bed, and she gets really excited about it. After I have put her under the sheets, she lifts up her arms and smiles and says "tuck me in." I come over and play with sheets a bit/ruffling them up, and then give her a kiss and say "sweet dreams." Then, I get up to go and she says "are you going to tuck me in?" We usually go through this about three times before she's satisfied. It is pretty funny.

Oh, the other funny thing is that while she was showing me the photo album, she walked by me, and without saying anything, just tickled my feet. (Tickling each other is something we used to do.) I said "you tickled me?!" She looked back and giggled. It was very cute.