All the Lonely People

I didn't return to work on December 2nd.  

The third was a hellish day.  Alec and I were up and on the road by 5:30am.  We had to drive south to the dog boarder's house and pick Hunter up by six.  Then, we had to drive him to the Blue Pearl by Georgia Tech for drop off between seven and eight.  We stared straight ahead, bleary eyed, driving down unfamiliar roads.  A couple of hours after drop off, the vet called and said the CT scan machine was broken.  Could we bring him back Wednesday or Thursday morning?
"Look."  I answered.
"The dog is being boarded a half an hour south of the city.  I have a broken foot.  I know, I know that YOU didn't break the scanner, but it is really difficult to reschedule this.  Are there any options?"

The vet said a repair guy was coming in the afternoon, that if they could fix it, Hunter could probably stay overnight and get his scan Wednesday morning.

"Okay.  Please call me after the repairman comes.  I would like to delay decision making until that point."

Grady started calling.  They decided to release my mother.  I argued with a doctor and a social worker when they said physical therapy had said that she didn't need to return to the physical therapy rehab.

"Look, she is constantly on the floor.  I know I need to find some alternative for her because of the way she's been living.  I was counting on this, I guess, counting on the P.T. rehab to buy some time...."

"I know this isn't what you wanted to hear."  the doctor responded.

"But she doesn't need physical therapy."

The same morning, Tuesday, Alec drove me to my follow-up appointment with the foot surgeon.  He said it was healing well and offered me more documentation for my FMLA requests.  He looked shocked when I randomly started crying.  I turned my face toward the wall.

"I'm glad it's doing well and thanks for the documentation.  There is just a lot going on right now...."  I said, staring at the wall.

The vet called.  The machine was fixed and Hunter would be getting his CT scan that day.  He would be available for pick up around four, right in time for rush hour traffic.

I submitted more FMLA paperwork, though work had gone radio silent in regard to my documentation.  I started getting worried.  Was I going to get paid?  Was I going to have a job?

The dog boarder called.  She wanted Hunter dropped back off by 4:30 in Riverdale because she had other appointments that afternoon.  I knew it would be impossible if he couldn't even leave the vet until four o'clock.  Alec and I picked him up and started driving to Riverdale.  We arrived nearly two and a half hours later.  

My mom was released.  My sister and her husband went by her house and intercepted a bottle of booze being delivered.  My sister begged her not to drink, to text us is she had urges, that we would support her.  

I laid on my bed that Tuesday night, texting my mom and sister on a text chain.   We really wanted my mom to stay sober.  The dog boarder started texting, saying Hunter was acting weird.  She wasn't sure if she was equipped to keep boarding him after he got his surgery.  I asked if she could at least keep him until Friday morning, the day of his surgery.  She agreed. 

My sister and I spent Wednesday and Thursday at my mom's, sitting there all day, talking to her about sobriety.  I started looking at her mail and realized there were a lot of things overdue.  The county put a lien on her house because of overdue property taxes.  Medicare open enrollment was about to end and she had to pick a new provider for her part D.  Some of her utilities were overdue.  She let me look into her bank accounts and she was paying hundreds of dollars a month into weird subscriptions she didn't use, as well as an exorbitant amount for a car note and insurance though she didn't drive.  I convinced her to transfer money into her checking account so that I could pay off some of this stuff on her behalf.  She agreed.  

Friday morning, my sister and I left for Riverdale around 5:30am.  We picked Hunter up and dropped him off at the vet by 7am for his surgery.  We spent another day at my mom's sorting through her things.  I figured out how to sign-in to her county account online and paid her property taxes.  I started calling people, trying to figure out how to do Medicare open enrollment.  My mom couldn't remember her sign-in on the .gov account and I got locked out.  I couldn't use her laptop to do any of this because she couldn't remember the password to that, either.  The vet called when Hunter was out of surgery.  He had lost a lot of blood.  They wanted to keep him overnight until his blood counts improved.  I sat on my mom's couch, filthy because bathing was so difficult, rubbing my face and trying not to cry.  

My sister and I came back Saturday morning to my mom's house.  Everytime I move, I have to use a knee scooter.  My sister walks to my house and helps me crawl up the stairs into my backyard and drags the knee scooter up there.  I hop on one foot into Alec's car and she loads the knee scooter into the back seat.  And then, she drives us.  And does it again and again, day after day.

We sat at my mom's house, trying to figure out her shit and talking to her about the benefits of not drinking.  We threw stuff away, her house was filthy and smelled horrible.

"Janet Key."  my sister said suddenly, late in the day.  She had a half empty bottle of rum in her hand.  It was hidden in a cupboard in the kitchen.  It was like a horror movie.  I hoped that there was dust on it, that maybe it was a forgotten bottle.  But no.  My mom had been drinking the whole time.  She had been drinking every night, after we left.  For days.  She had ordered two, the night she got out of Grady.  My sister intercepted one and missed the second.  I was shocked.  She sat there, talking to us for four solid days, knowing full and well that she was drinking the whole time.  She was lying to our faces.  We got up and left, me rolling on the scooter and my sister lifting it into the car and driving us back to our houses. 

Sunday morning, we picked up my mom's dog from the vet.  He had a drain releasing fluid from the area where the mass had been cut off.  It had to be emptied multiple a day.  He also had numerous stitches.  He couldn't go outside without being on a leash, to stop him from running or climbing stairs.  

We drove Hunter back to my mom's house.  My sister's husband brought an air mattress over.  I didn't have clothes or a toothbrush.  My sister and I sat on the couch trying to organize my mom's accounts and cared for her dog.  In the night, we set up the air mattress and slept on the floor in her living room so that we would know if she ordered booze.  I'd roll around, kicking my sister with my air cast.  

This went on for almost two weeks.  

*Title, Neil Young, depressing Pulblix commerical