Today, I was in the office for the whole day for the first time since last Thursday. The workday was a living hell: I had multiple open issues, and I had to act like a customer support chat, replying to multiple people simultaneously. Plus, scheduling a couple of mom’s follow-ups, a CT scan, etc. Working on multiple issues was the worst, though.
Still, it’s a first step toward returning to normal. I stayed at work a little bit late, but then I went straight home and talked to my mom only over the phone. And I actually browsed the internet for the first time in several days. I am not 100% sure what I did, but I didn’t have to go/do/watch, and for the first time in a week, I started to think about what I would be doing after work.
I have several posts that have been in drafts since my trip two weeks ago, so maybe I will finish them over the weekend.
A side note: I credit myself for two responsible actions. First, when I got a call that my mom fell and was taken to the hospital, I ate before rushing there. And second, when she was already home on Saturday, I asked Igor to stay with her for an extra hour and went to the beach because I knew it was my last opportunity of the season. I said thank you to the lake, to the warm clean water, and to that amazing summer.
Those were the last two responsible actions on my part. Although the second CT scan didn’t show any negative dynamics, the doctor still didn’t want to let my mom go back home. All the doctors kept telling me about horrible things that could happen if my mom fell one more time and insisted she had to be supervised 24/7 if we wanted to take her home. Mom didn’t want to be supervised, she didn’t want to make any changes in her routine, and she repeatedly said that she better die than like “like that.”
It was great that Anna could come over and stay until Tuesday afternoon. Mom was thrilled to see her, and I could take breaks and even do some work. However, we still struggled to make mom use assistive devices and exercise caution.
Taking a shower using the bench was the hardest, and I almost yelled at her. She kept saying that she was not used to washing herself sitting, and it was inconvenient. But then, I came up with a great strategic idea. Mom often states that I don’t remember how it is to live without a shower at home while she lived like this and had to go to the public baths once a week. In fact, I do remember: I had to go to public baths when I was in summer camps and when we stayed in the countryside in summer. So when she repeated that “she never washed herself in a sitting position, I said: Wait, what about the public baths? Didn’t you sit on a bench then? And this was a trigger. She said yes, and you had to wash the bench before sitting on it!
Then she got into the shower as I instructed her, and then I saw through the door crack that she was washing herself while sitting, and then she got out of the bathtub in a safe way. I said: good job, mom! You learned a new skill! For that she replied: there is nothing new in it!
By some miracle which I am not going to question, he got at-home physical therapy twice a week and the nurse’s visits once a week. She already had one PT session and did the exercises once on her own, so the progress is outstanding.
I am planning to go to the office for tomorrow afternoon.
There are many ways to decide when the summer ends. I have already posted more than one “End of Summer” blog. Before I left for London I thought that my swimming season was over (having that I would miss the next weekend and one after) so I washed and stored away my swimsuit and beach towels, but I was happy to pull them out again last week.
I want to say explicitly that although we have an ongoing situation now, and my weekend plans had to be canceled, I can’t say it was a bad week. In fact, it was a gorgeous summer week, filled with all these bitter-sweet “last” gelato, “last” balm evenings, an incredibly warm lake, and fun in the sun. Also, I want to see ‘Harry Potter” and the opening of the season of the Chicago Symphony with a violin virtuoso Benjamin Beilman.
I have nothing but thanks to the Universe for this gift.
…for friends because the family already knows. Mom fell during her Friday morning walk and hurt her head really badly. She was taken to the ER, and since I had my phone in her phone as an emergency contact, somebody called me, so I went there right away. Fortunately, that was this once-a-month thing when I worked from home (I had a seasonal furnace tune-up).
We thought it would not be a big deal because although there was a lot of blood, they didn’t even need to stitch her, just glue the wound. However, the CT scan showed brain bleeding, so she was left in an ICU overnight. I spent eight hours there yesterday and came there in the morning. They released her home with 24/7 supervision, so now we are figuring out how to make things work.
This show just opened last weekend, and I saw it yesterday. I have just one word – FANTASTIC! Everything they write about this show, and better! Everything you can see in this promotional video, but better because it’s had to capture the fire on stage – it is way cooler than it looks!
I meant to write this post at least three weeks ago when the actual events happened. I consider it my personal achievement because I won the battle with customer support.
Here is what happened. When I learned that my talk was accepted for PG Day UK, I wanted to book the flight immediately, but I had to wait for almost a month because our firm was switching to the new reservation system. The next day after the switch happened, I found out that I needed to book it on my own because it wouldn’t be reimbursed anyway, but the best prices were not available anymore. I rushed to book whatever was available, and since I used the BA website, I forgot to switch to the Finnair Plus loyalty program. As it turned out, it was impossible to do it in the “Manage reservation” menu, so I had to call customer support.
The first time, I called immediately after I made this reservation and realized the mistake I had made, but after waiting for forty minutes, I decided to give it another try. I made a second attempt two days later and, once again, gave up after almost an hour of waiting. Meanwhile, I have activated Avios transfer between BA and Finnair, but I still wanted to get points from my preferred program, especially because my anniversary is on September 30. I decided to make the third and final effort during the Labor Day weekend.
First, I spent almost an hour waiting. Finally, somebody picked up and then went on hold, verifying my trip locator, and finally disconnected. I was determined to follow through, so I dialed again and waited for another forty minutes. This time, finally, everything worked. Not only was my loyalty program updated, but they also listed all the extra bonuses I had with Finnair Plus. In the end, it was worth it, spending all this time, but I was ready to give up at least ten times!
The last three days were a non-stop sequence of events! I had an almost disastrous flight to London, then a very good conference in London, and another great day there, and now I am in Amsterdam, ready to give another talk tomorrow. I have a little bit of details on Instagram, and I hope I will fill in the blanks here in a couple of days!
I tried to do a couple of things with my mom last weekend. I always try to take her to places because I believe it’s at least stimulating and, sometimes, gives her positive emotions. On Saturday, I took her to the Art Institutes – the Georgia O’Keeffe exhibit will be closing soon, and I never took her there. I was hoping she would like it, even though she never heard about Georgia O’Keeffe.
This went really well. First, she didn’t want to listen to me, like literally tuning herself off, and when I asked her why, she said that “she won’t remember it all anyway.” I told her I just wanted to give her a perspective on time and place, and then she listened, and then she actually liked the paintings.
After we saw an exhibit, I took her to the members’ lounge, and we had coffee and sandwiches. It was the first time for me to get some food there rather than just free coffee. I loved the prosciutto and pear toast!
Then I walked my mom down by the Bridgeway, and we stopped at the Bean:
And then I walked her home. The total time for me was almost five hours, almost twice as much as I planned but I do not regret it: it was a positive experience.
On Sunday, I took her to the Glenwood Street Market. That was something I wanted to do it for a while since they give coupons for Link Cards, and they double the amount. So I was hoping that she will finally stop saying “everything is so expensive” and get something for herself.
We achieved a moderate success, because as it turned out, her assistive device can’t move on the cobblestone surface, and without it, she can’t take a lot with her. But at least I convinced her to exchange $100 in EDBT card for $200 coupons to be used at the market, and we were able to spend some of them! When I stopped by on Monday, she didn’t try any of the produce we bought, because “she had something she bough earlier.” I hope that it won’t go to waste at the end! Again, this whole outing took twice more time than I planned, but again, I thing it was worth it.
Summer is over. It was still very warm during the week: I spent some time at the beach on Thursday evening, and it was 82F, and the lake was warm. And today was the first fall-like day: it was only 55F in the morning and very windy. I still went for a semi-log bike ride, but even though I switched to the warmer biking jacket and put on the gloves, it was not exactly enjoyable.
The Labor Day weekend went great. I didn’t go on any trip; instead, everything I’ve done during these three and a half days was a good combination of picking up loose ends, finishing things I didn’t have time to finish before, and doing many things I love doing.
On Friday, I went to a Howard -Evanston CC End-of-Summer event (being on a Community Board there is a new thing I started in 2024 to make a difference close to home). It was a lunchtime event; I worked from home for a change and took a half-day off. Then I returned home and spent time with a friend who lives on the other side of the world in Oak Park. We planned her visit for months, and then had to reschedule because she was afraid to travel during the DNC.
On Saturday, I went escorting for the early morning shift, and I had a private yoga class with my teacher and made a plum cake
Sunday was Bike the Drive, and I had coffee with my mom, and on Monday, I went to Fort Sheridan.
I talked to Boris for about an hour every day of this long weekend. Every day, I visited my mom. Every day, I was at the beach. I watched three movies that required some concentration: Atlantis, Nuremberg, and Filmmakers for Prosecution. I finally changed the light bulbs in both bathrooms (it was not like I was sitting in the dark, in both cases, one of two bulbs was burned, but it is the whole project to change them). I won two battles on the phone with two customer services (more details to come – maybe!), and I finalized my conference presentation.
I feel like all these activities represent an accurate wrap-up of what I was doing this whole summer. Summer was very busy, but not like I was too busy to enjoy life. I had life and a lot of it!
Hettie's Reflections 