We must find pleasure in the familiar

Once more into the podcast

Bella’s voice was plaintive, pleading.

“I want to go home,” she said.

Part of me wanted to give in and cut short our trip to our daughter’s house in Falmouth, Massachusetts for a family Thanksgiving. Part of me was impatient with her irrationality.

“We can’t do that right now,” I said. “Our house is hours away. Everyone’s coming here to Ginny’s — Ginny and Jeff are here; Zo and Ciaira are coming; and Tam is coming. Ringo loves it here. He gets to play with the other dogs. This is his favorite place.”

“I want to go home,” she said, her voice a moan.

“We can’t do that, Honey. We can take a walk,” I said.

Bella had been excited about the trip, but leaving home brings on the anxiety that the familiarity of our house keeps at bay. When your memory has been devastated by Alzheimer’s, as Bella’s has, any place other than home feels new and strange.

So, a few hours after we arrived at Ginny and Jeff’s on Wednesday, Bella marched out to the driveway and got in our car to drive back to Glens Falls. I had the keys, though, and Ginny was watching through the window.

“Mom got out of the car,” she yelled after a few minutes. “She’s walking away.”

I trailed her, staying back 20 yards or so as she trudged through the neighborhood, lingering behind bushes and mailboxes and wondering what people looking out their windows might think. Would I hear the “bwop-bwop” of a police cruiser, rolling up behind me? But then she turned around and caught me in the open.

“Hey,” I said.

Later, we laughed about me following her.

Thursday, too, we took a walk, this time by driving to the beach, where Ringo was able to fraternize with other dogs also trotting on the sand and sniffing at treasure thrown up the sea, like a yellowish piece of the shell of a young horseshoe crab.

Friday evening, we drove to a winery, where an outdoor holiday celebration was being held on a gravel courtyard, at picnic tables topped with flaming warmers. Bella loved it.

Saturday, we drove home, where I unloaded the dishwasher and fed Beans, the bunny, and Scarlett, the fish, then made us hot cocoa, and we sat in the library to sip it and talk about our trip for a podcast (below).

At home, I strive against the entropy of dog hair and dishes. We are not frightened by new experiences here, like we were at Ginny’s when we took a nighttime walk with Ringo on a trail through the woods.

We are challenged instead by the hours of sitting in the same chairs and saying the same things, by noticing what is special in the familiar.

“That sun is so nice coming in the window,” I say.

Bella sits next to me on the couch, petting Ringo, curled up on the other side of her.

“Isn’t he wonderful?” she says.

Ringo scouts the beach in Falmouth, Mass.

Bella, left, and Ginny enjoy the goings-on Friday evening at Cape Cod winery in Falmouth, Massachusetts.

Wandering

This photo is a great example of unnecessary and unfortunate free expression. Not all activities are justified by being allowed. There is no cleverness here, just crudeness — the vulgar pleasure of giving offense. It is the exact equivalent of the drunk crew that goes shouting and stumbling down the sidewalk, raising middle fingers to passing motorists for no reason other than to demonstrate they have the courage to be impolite.

This is not a political message or a clever way to criticize. It’s an insult.

Talking

Bella and I did a podcast called “The Alzheimer’s Chronicles” for about four years while I was working at The Post-Star but haven’t done one for about two years. We decided to try again, at this new point, and see what happens. The audio seems to work, but if there is a glitch, please let me know.