How is it that one can be both a
CARETAKER and a CAREGIVER simultaneously? This blog post is not an exploration
of the irony behind certain English words, but rather, the irony of being an
adult-child of elderly parents (ages 79 and 86).
After almost three weeks of a
caregiving stay with my parents in Michigan, following my mother’s knee
replacement surgery, I finally have the urge to write a blog. Sometimes my mind
is too full to write, if that makes any sense to you, and my emotionally challenging hometown
visit was indeed one of those times. I’m sharing here some of my memorable
moments through two new poems:
HEALING TIME
By Susan L. Lipson
The staples that pulled together
the skin over her new knee—
as well as me to her, and her to me,
in a bond renewed by her surgery—
those staples have been removed, and yet,
the bond still holds,
miraculously.
Healing has begun with role
reversal;
bending has occurred with shared
pain and exhausted laughter.
Erosion has ceased, replaced by new
support;
and grace and stability, not
crutches of any kind,
can help
her—and us—move forward now.
And as for the scars that remain,
which will fade in time with tender
care,
those scars will serve as a
reminder:
even damaged things can be
repaired
and renewed.
LOVE, EXPRESSED
by Susan L. Lipson
“You’re
Okay by me” has sufficed
where “I love you” would have been
said,
if my Dad didn’t find those words
too sacred to utter lightly—
or too frightening to utter at all.
But as we round the track of life,
with him holding my arm—
not to pull his wandering child
along,
but to grasp Adult-Me for extra support—
I jar him to a stop by asking if he loves me,
after years of “Me too’s” in reply
to my never-echoed declarations.
And he says, “Of course I do,”
but not “I love you.”
And I point that out, and then ask
him to say it while looking into my eyes.
Those three words bring redness to
his cheeks,
wetness to his eyes,
trembling to his hands,
and an echo from me,
followed by a long hug.
He’s Okay by me.
