Take off your hat, I want to stand up.

Chapter 49: The Lake.

Chapter 49: The Lake.

Ev. I am going to take you out to the lake.

We had a family cabin at Regina Beach since 1958. It looked more like a double wide trailer, but it had the best view of the lake. You could see the early summer storms gather in the North- East and start to roll up the lake. The white caps would dance and sway to the tune of the Gale forced wind. High marshmallow like clouds painted the distant horizon in a storm busting display of natures fury. Lighting would streak across the distance in rapid succession, spider-web high and long, brilliant light and gone. Booming, followed with the grand chorus of thunderous magic, it was poetry.

One spring day I woke to the sounds of a dump truck backing into the yard and a Caterpillar backhoe chipping chunks of deep dark earthen soil out of the ground. I was hungover like a dirty dog. Life at the Beach consisted of going to the Pearly Shells hotel and getting your summer on. Why was there some major action in the backyard?

Ev wanted a pool. She wanted a pool all of her life. She was getting a pool. She explained it was Daddies money so it was her pool. It seemed when she really set out to buy something big she used her father's inheritance money to bring about successful change in her life. Now the money went into getting a pool.

On the practical side of things she was a Red Cross certified swimming instructor. She taught swimming to hundreds of kids each summer. The water at the lake could be too cold, too blowy, too green and as such she would enlist Bobby Neil's pool just to keep the lessons on track. Bobby was the best guy you could ever meet, warm, smart, funny and the best mechanical dude ever. He also could ride anything with a motor, ski-doo, boat, quad, he was a natural, he had no fear. When the pool went in she said she would miss going to Bobbie's pool. But she really wanted her own. Once the pool went in she taught for a few weeks out of the summer then gave it up for lent. The pool stayed.

Now, Ev was a quadriplegic, she was solid weight, she could not aid in the transmission of movement. It was like handling an octopus, lift one arm up the other one falls, lucky she had a sense of humour.

I arranged with my brother, Donnie to take Ev out to the lake to keep her over night. What was I thinking? The van ride in the Chev was by now a practised event. We had taken her out to the lake many times before to catch some wonderful fish and chips at Butler's Blue Bird Cafe, or pizza at Western Pizza. Our slam dunk all time once in a lifetime  favourite of  favourites was to buy an inch and a half thick hunk of Porterhouse steak from the Red and White grocer, Angus Cope. He was the man when it came to selective prime cuts of meat, he custom purchased the meat and let it hang for a full twenty- eight days before he laid a knife to it. The result became legendary, melt in your mouth, mirthful goodness of range beef. There is nothing finer, the bar-b- que is smoking hot and the steak is set to sizzle.

Today, it is payback time.  We were taking Ev out to the lake for an overnight stay. She had counselled us on her detailed care and we looked ready. We were not ready.

We ate, we drank, we laughed, we cried, I even poured her a rum and coke. Even though she is an alcoholic, she had fun with the beverage, like old times. I reasoned she was not going to fall back into her old despotic ways. She just needed a break for a brief time. A reality check.

We were going to put her to bed. It is something to see your mother naked, let alone give her a sponge bath with a soft cloth and rub coco butter on her body to guard against bed sores and skin rashes. It took three of us to horse her into bed and flop her around so she was comfortable, water, with a straw by her side. Light on in the hall door slightly ajar, window open to catch the night breeze, kiss on the forehead, blanket pulled up to her chin so she could move it with her mouth.

One last pillow fluff, arm adjustment a sacred solemn oath to come immediately if she should call or be frightened, a final stroke of her hair, but not too much as it caused her to seize and spasm.

Honest to god, it was like trying to put baby kittens back into a bag, or having twins. It was like going back to when we were kids and our mother would patiently say our prayers and kiss us good night, don't let the bed bugs bite. Really we did not know what bed bugs were or why they would now and then bite, we were guarded against them once we said the phrase. Then we could rest assured.

I was an adult, driving back from Saskatoon, heading to see the beach. I thought of our prayers. I started to say them in my mind, now I lay me down to sleep. inmylittlebedIlie, Heaven, wait, wait a minute I had no idea what the words I was saying were. No clue. They ran together like a Rolling Stones lyric, I can feel the pizza burning, what? So, I had time,I slowed the lyrics down and found out they said, in my little bed I lie, great one of lives mysteries solved. Here I thought it was some secret incantation to keep the boogieman away.

To gather her awake and ready for the morning took us two and a half hours of order following soldier like effort. The nurses at the facility are angels. We never complained about small issues ever again. It seems that when we have a loved one under close care the caregivers take the smallest of issues to task, why? Instead allow the people, who care more than they should, do the job they love.

Yes I do remember all the crazy stories, I said to her, we had fun. When we parted company we were now happy to enter our separate lives. The rehabilitation centre facility was her home. It was in point of actual fact her longest lived home of her entire life.

It makes me think of one of her pat sayings. Each of us need to be happy, thankful and grateful where you are, with what you have at the moment. Learn to be in the present, in the now, too true. Sometimes we wallow in the what might have been or the never to be. Ev said, just be yourself, and things usually turn out for the best.

She always used these times together to be our mom and give motherly advise, we were proud she was our mom.