As Time Goes By

It turns out, in a completely unintentional and unpredictable way, that I have I jinxed things again.  As fate has it, by painting the world one way in my writing it has inevitably played out to be just the opposite.

It used to be that if I declared, on my blog, a certain characteristic of my kids they were bound to dupe me and change said behaviour IMMEDIATELY, thus making a hysterical new mother-liar of out me.  I have been manipulated since the first of them was in utero.  It’s a great conspiracy that has, until this month, never worked in my favour.

As a testament to the craziness of these unpredictable times I’m happy to report that I’ve been theoretically duped again, but this time, in nothing short of a miracle.

My dad did NOT die of COVID.

In fact, the lone man who tested positive in his l home miraculously survived and his ward remains COVID free.  They reported this to us with one nonchalant sentence: “The known COVID case on North ward 3 has since recovered.”  I do feel that sentence deserved, at the very least, an exclamation mark.  How many LTC residents survive COVID 19?  Well…we now know one for sure.

In FACT, his LTC home was recently highlighted in the news as being the first in Toronto to swab EVERY SINGLE resident and staff member.  Everyone on my dad’s ward came back negative.  My father included.  His rejection from other facilities, at the time a figurative kick in the teeth, is now, as we read the escalating number of LTC homes in outbreak, a true blessing in disguise.

My father is safe.

And so my mother is left grappling with a different kind of grief than anticipated.  We don’t mourn our loss, but we face one more rung on the descent of dementia.  He is now bored and alone with no contact from family or friends to stimulate his brain or boost his morale. And once again, we are left feeling powerless and helpless.

My mom has tried calling him on the phone.  Although his caregivers graciously offer the use of their iPhones he has never in his life known such sort of shaped device to actually be a PHONE.  Nor does he have the capacity to listen to and process who the familiar voice belongs to without visual cues.  My mom resigned herself to standing out in the cold waving at his window while he held the phone.  This worked for a little bit but only in the end just made my mother feel worse.

The helpful staff then tried the Zoom app on one of his PSW’s personal phones and dad was able to actually see her face while hearing her voice.  His first reaction was to try to lovingly touch her face.  How he must long for a familiar touch.  How my mother must long for it too.  How loving of him to try!  I believe it made her day.  The second time they tried he had learned that he couldn’t touch her but sill his face lit up.  Once again, my mother could see how much she means to him.

They say it doesn’t matter what facts are presented to patients with dementia, it’s only how a situation makes them feel that counts.  And those moments spent on zoom, though remote, impersonal, and void of personal touch, caused him such obvious joy that everyone benefitted.

Today was our turn.  I haven't seen my dad since the beginning of March when I so flippantly declared that I was “Going to see him before COVID got him”.  How I cringe now at my predictive prowess of the innocent days…

But today we all got to see him.

We waved.  The kids smiled.  He called my mothers name.  The stimulation of all of us together seemed a bit much so I tried something new.

I sat down at the piano and played for him an old classic song that he loves, “As Time Goes By”  

 It wasn’t perfect – zoom is pretty choppy. But we were all there, and we sang together.  It has probably been over 20 years since he has heard me play.   IN truth, I haven’t played much since I left home, but this Pandemic has brought out old skills in all of us, and I have a renewed joy of sitting down to play some familiar tunes on the piano.  It came as a bit of a surprise to the kids and me, that most of the sheet music I own is that of Broadway songs and old timers music.  It struck me for the first time that a lot of what I bought with my hard earned money in high school was music that might appeal to my dad’s era. (No wonder I stopped playing so much when I went out into the world of the 21st century! ) Nonetheless, it came in handy today.  And I have found over the past few weeks that there is a soothing comfort in playing these old songs.

I don’t know how much my dad took from the music – I was focused on playing and not watching him, but I do note at one point he exclaimed “that’s a PIANO” …so he got THAT much for sure!

Shortly after our singsong, we decided it was time to end the call.

In contrast to the times we leave after an in person visit, this didn’t feel like goodbye.  It felt like a fresh start of a new way of connecting.

Who would have thought that my 93-year-old dad, who never COULD figure out email or computers, would benefit from having regular Zoom meeting with 3 generations of his family?  In the midst of such changing, unpredictable and dark times, what a ray of hope and light it brought to tall of us when we signed off and said, “Lets do this again next Friday.  Same time?”

We blew each other kisses before leaning forward to hit the “leave meeting” button.

And just before the screen went blank I saw one last frozen image of all of us.

My mom.

My dad.

My kids.

My husband.

Myself.

Our wide smiles frozen in time with renewed hope,

the words of his favourite song still echoing in our minds,

“You must remember this.

A Kiss is still a kiss.

A sigh is just a sigh

The fundamental things apply.

As time Goes By…”