Mom, A Life: Part One

The Roaring '20s
Woodrow Wilson was president. The average wage was $15-$20 per week. Rent (3BR, 1B) was $25 per month. Despite the availability of electricity, the house was heated by a coal-burning kitchen stove which was never allowed to go out. Coal was bought a ton at a time and delivered to the cellar in 80lb. bags. Gasoline was 5 gallons for $1.00.

Mom was born in West Haven, Connecticut, a suburb of New Haven, in a "private surgery" in a Victorian house, delivered, apparently, by a Dr. Henry Rodgers, the second (living) child and eldest (living) daughter of Charles Chester Davis and Fredericka (Freda) Farr. (Charles' and Freda's first-born daughter died in infancy.) Mom was born Katherine May Davis on June 7, 1920. She was originally supposed to be "Frances" after a grandmother but was named for an aunt instead. She hated her middle name, and especially being called "Katie May" as a child, so never used it and went by Katherine Davis Rosinus (unhyphenated) once she married.

She had an older brother, Chester a.k.a "Chet," and a kid sister, Shirley with whom she shared not just a bedroom but a bed. Her father, Charles, was originally an auto mechanic although sometime in the 1920s he became a motorman on the New Haven streetcar system which was lucky since it proved to be a steady job throughout the Depression.

Her mother, Freda, worked, after she was widowed, as a hosiery buyer for the W. T. Grant department store. (I remember, as a child, visiting her there with Mom, where she showed off the ladies' dress gloves.) Freda met Charles when they both worked in a different department store owned by Charles' father.

When Mom was four, she had her tonsils removed. Her tonsillectomy, however, was not done in hospital. Back then doctors made house calls, even for surgeries and Mom had her tonsils out at home, on the kitchen table.

Her parents got her into her pajamas, the doctor came over with his nurse anesthetist, and they laid her out on the table which had been covered with pillows and padding. The nurse put a wire cage type mask over her face and covered that with a cloth laced with ether. She woke up without tonsils but with the promise of ice cream.

Mom suffered from mastoid infections throughout her childhood and underwent four operations at ages, 7, 9, 10 and 13. All were performed in hospital.

West Haven was home to Savin Rock, a shoreline amusement park agglomeration of carnival-type games, rides, roller coasters, food vendors and a long fishing pier with a restaurant on it. Mom's grandmother would come into town once a year for a "shore dinner" consisting of chowder, lobster, little neck clams, corn, potatoes, salad, rolls and dessert. Price $1.00. One year the roller coaster, made entirely of wood, went up in a spectacular blaze. Charles, who it seems was something of a fire-bug, bundled up the kids in the middle of the night and drove down to Savin Rock so they could all watch. The fire was way beyond the capabilities of the fire department and the coaster, part of which looped out over the ocean, burned to the ground.

There was a balloon factory across the street from Mom's house but it went out of business sometime in the late twenties and was torn down in 1928 or '29. Mom and her sister would go into the empty field to pick wild strawberries for themselves and greens for their pet rabbits.

The Great Depression

Mom was nine when the market crashed. As a kid the Depression never hit her as hard as it did the adults in her life. Fortunately, her dad kept his job with the Connecticut Company as a trolley motorman. In fact, he saved enough money that the family, which had been renting until now, could afford to buy a house of their own. The downside was the girls could not keep their pet rabbits at the new location and gave them to the neighbors before moving only to find out the neighbors rather enjoyed a good rabbit stew.

Despite being employed, money was still tight. Charles owned a metal cobbler's last upon which he repaired the family shoes. Replacement half-soles were available at the local five-and-dime store. Ladies from the Eastern Star came by one day with food donations but Freda informed them in no uncertain terms that "we can take care of our own." Mom played basketball (guard) in school and triangle in the school band.

(It was around this time that Mom's future husband brought home to his mother one of the first loaves of sliced bread offered in the area. She was furious considering it an insult implying she was too lazy to slice her own bread.)

Once a year the church youth groups would all pile onto special trolleys for a day-trip to Double Beach in Branford with singing, dancing, swimming and picnicking. Literally hundreds of laughing, screaming, crying kids of all ages plus their parents/chaperons took part and Mom wondered why her father never volunteered for that run.

One winter in the mid-1930s, New Haven harbor froze over from shore to shore. If not for a shipping channel cut through the ice it would have been possible to skate across the entire harbor. Charles took his kids as far out from the West Haven side as they could manage.

(In a true "Christmas Story" moment, Mom came home one afternoon to find her mother bashing her brother Chet's BB gun to useless shards and screaming, "You'll never see another gun again!" He had shot himself in the finger. Chet later became a Marine and was wounded at Iwo Jima.)

Hallowe'en in the '30s was almost entirely tricks and very few treats. The tricks were mostly innocent (depending on the age of the perpetrators): ringing doorbells and running, peppering victims with spitballs and peashooters, and the responses usually consisted of being chased with brooms and doused with buckets of water. The older kids could get creative, however, including disassembling fencing and wagons and reassembling them elsewhere (with the favorite place for vehicles being the roofs of barns and garages).

Mom had already graduated high school and was working edging lenses and assembling eyeglasses for a local optometrist when news of Pearl Harbor came.

To be continued . . .

The Shortcut

My brother went across the river yesterday to buy a couple of tires, one for himself and one for me. He picked some little hole-in-the-wall shop no bigger than a two car garage that specializes in cheap tires. He came home empty-handed.

Just as he pulled into the alley where the shop is located he heard a loud explosion. It seems a full size semi-tractor trailer rig had, instead of simply going straight out to the street, tried to take the diagonal through the back lot of the tire shop where the low hanging power lines slid up and over the wind spoiler on top of the cab and dropped down between the cab and the trailer catching there and pulling down the power pole, snapping it into six pieces and blowing up both of the transformers attached to it. When people went to investigate, they found the idiot driver out of the cab and trying unsuccessfully to push, by hand, the wires back over the top of the trailer, presumably so he could continue on his way.

With power out in the neighborhood, my brother came home mission unaccomplished.

He went back this morning after calling to confirm that electricity had been restored. The owner was so grateful/desperate for business he called back to ask what sizes we were looking for so he could have them ready and waiting when my brother arrived.

The Continuing Bureaucracy of Civilized Death (Now With Sweet Tea From the NASCAR Bar)

Mom's memorial service was Friday. On Saturday we picked up her ashes from the cremation society and delivered them to the cemetery. She will be interred on Tuesday.

The memorial service was held at the local Congregational church Mom and Dad had joined years ago and as far as I know never attended. At least, I know Mom never went after Dad's service fourteen years ago; they might have attended during the first few years. The minister, who was not there for Dad's service, found their names in the church records so all was well. A few of Mom's friends who live nearby and are capable of getting around came as did cousins from the Atlantic side of the state. Afterwards, almost everyone came back to the house where friends of my brother who own a NASCAR themed racing bar delivered lasagna, salad and two jugs of iced tea, sweetened and not. We mixed the teas together to forestall the diabetic coma that would have resulted from anyone drinking the sweet stuff and everyone sat around going through family pictures.

Saturday morning my brother, my Other Brother and I picked up Mom's ashes. We had to sign a number of receipts, chain-of-custody acknowledgements and permissions (including one allowing us to take her across state lines even though we were only going to take her across the river). Her temporary transportation urn had a metal seal on it to be broken only by the funeral home. This was placed in a box which was put in a bag which we took in the car for the six mile trip to the cemetery. Once there, we had to sign another stack of acknowledgements claiming the right as next of kin to be doing what we were doing, the contract for disposition of Mom's ashes and the purchase order for her personalized brick to be placed next to Dad's.

And then when Mom was legally out of our custody and her interment scheduled (subject to rain delay but the forecast is favorable) the three of us went over to the NASCAR racing bar to say thanks for the catering job and have lunch.

The Bureaucracy of Civilized Death

When I found Mom Monday morning it was obvious to me that she was gone. Nevertheless, I called 911 and not the regular police line. That was apparently the correct thing to do. Within minutes two EMTs and two police officers showed up. The EMTs went in to check on Mom while the officers asked about time of death/discovery and whether or not she had a DNR on file. The officers also made it politely clear that they were there for the duration.

I could not find Mom's living will or the official Do Not Resuscitate form (which we had not yet posted on the refrigerator per doctor's suggestion because, really, who expected it would happen so soon?) but after a couple of minutes the EMTs came out and said it wouldn't be necessary right now because there was nothing they could do for her anyway although I would probably need it soon or the Medical Examiner might refuse to release her to the cremation society. Everybody wanted to see a photo ID of Mom, her Social Security number and some other vital statistics like birthday, medications and such.

I called the cremation society and gave them Mom's member/contract number which she always kept in her wallet. They said their people would arrive in about forty-five minutes. My brother came home and the police asked him a couple of questions and warned him not to touch anything before letting him see Mom. The EMTs had already moved her to the floor.

The grief counselor arrived and the EMTs left. It was well choreographed. The police stood around. The grief counselor had a checklist of things we needed to remember to do such as canceling Mom's health insurance and Social Security. The Medical Examiner called the police and told them it was O.K. to release the body after which they became noticeably friendlier. Not that they were unfriendly, but they relaxed a bit after the call. Apparently, because of Mom's age, the ME decided our lack of paperwork was not a hindrance. Right after that my brother found the living will and DNR (right where they were supposed to be) but nobody was interested any more.

Two gentlemen in suitably somber attire arrived from the cremation society and we were advised to wait outside while they put Mom on the gurney (because, they did not say, the turn from her room into the hallway was too narrow for the gurney to fit into her room and they didn't want us to see them manhandling her onto it in the hall. That was fine with us).

After that we were allowed back in to say our final goodbyes to her there on the gurney before they wheeled her down the driveway and into their station wagon. The grief counselor gave us her card and left. The police gave us their cards and left.

The cat came out from wherever she'd been hiding and she and my brother and I just stood in the driveway under the warm sunlight and fluffy clouds for a while. The system had been so efficient there didn't seem to be anything else for us to do just then.

A Civilized Death

Mom died Monday morning, at home. It was a Civilized Death, meaning it was not accompanied by violence, either criminal or military, nor did it go unnoticed in the larger scheme of things. It was still a surprise, although not unanticipated, and did not happen as we would have wished.

Dad's death 14 years ago was also Civilized and also did not go as wished for. Dad was being treated (successfully) for a tumor that had wrapped itself around the back of his stomach "like a loaf of bread." His chemo was working and the doctors noted the steadily shrinking mass on successive x-rays until, with no warning, something they called a "wildfire" blew up inside him, growing as they watched. It took him in less than a month. He ended up in the hospital with his wife, kids and grandkids surrounding him, holding his hands, wiping his brow, hugging him, whispering in his ear and watching as his last breath left so softly.

Yet, all he wanted was to be at home. It just wasn't possible to get the necessary equipment installed in time. We couldn't even make arrangements fast enough with the hospice before the cancer took him.

Mom, on the other hand, was at home, in her own room. She was mobile (with a walker), articulate, had two of her sons there to cook and clean and keep her company. And yet, in the end, she died alone. She died while my brother was out paying a utility bill. She died while I was either showering or eating. No one held her; no one said goodbye. I found her quickly enough, I suppose. Her body was still warm. But it was still too late.

Would fifteen minutes earlier have made any difference? I don't know. Probably not. Death, even Civilized Death, is just something it seems we can never get completely right.

Katherine D. Rosinus 6/7/1920 - 3/12/2012

I am not of the generation that is comfortable blogging or tweeting or otherwise commenting on life events while they happen.

Mom passed away yesterday morning, at home, in her room.

I will post more later, when things are under control and I can celebrate her life properly.

In the meantime, here are some photos of Mom (and family), some dating back to 1939, that Other Brother just put up on his Facebook page.

Another Piece Disassociates

The part of Mom's brain that controls decision making ability and initiative seems to have disconnected. She is having the hardest time deciding what to do, whether or not there is anything that needs doing, and, if so, how to do it if it involves more than one step.

In her room: "What am I supposed to do?" "Get dressed."

Ten minutes later: "What now?" "Put on your pants."

On the couch: "I can't figure out what I'm supposed to do with this*?" "Nothing. Leave it alone. It's O.K. right where it is." *"This" can be anything within reach, pen, fingernail file, newspaper, used tissue.

None of this indecision, however, prevents her from going all OCD when she does decide to do something. An hour can be filled easily arranging, rearranging, making and unmaking her bed and carefully setting out every article of clean clothing she owns in neat piles on it or dipping a nail file or pen in a glass of water repeatedly and dribbling liquid over tissues, writing paper and the table itself.

The Consequences of Progress

The road crew has started on the northbound lanes of our main road.

(Not the tree in question, just an example.)

Meanwhile, ensconced in the shade of the mature sugarberry tree in the median just south of us and covering the newly repaved southbound lanes, as per my brother's prediction three days ago, lounges a motorcycle cop with a radar gun.

This is how we pay for our road improvements.

An Unexpected Turn

Well, that ended on a weird note.

I took Mom to her doctor's appointment this morning. This one is her GP. Of course, she was up and down all night long ("Is it time to go, yet?") but she managed to get up and dressed in time to have breakfast and still be early to the appointment.

Which was a good thing because it was the first visit of the year with this doc so his staff had to spend ten minutes making sure all Mom's records were updated.

The only anomaly was her blood pressure which was high. We don't know whether that's a permanent change (it was low last time) or just a temporary spike due to the stress of two appointments in two days and the second one in the morning and being up half the night worrying about not getting up in time.

So the doctor takes a look at her BP readings and says, "Does she have a living will?" "Yes." "Does she have a DNR on file?" "Yes, I believe so." I know she has a Do Not Resuscitate order but whether or not it is on record with the appropriate people--all that was done long before I moved down here.

"You might want to tape it to the refrigerator, where they can see it," he says.

What just happened?

He gives me an open authorization for a blood and urinalysis work-up at the hospital and tells me to order it if I see a sudden deterioration in her cognitive functions. I mention having to give her step-by-step instructions on how to dress herself these past couple of days, but that, apparently, is not a serious enough decline.

It seems the doc is unable to just come out and say that the high blood pressure, if it continues, may cause her to have a fatal stroke. As warnings go, that was pretty subtle. Would someone else, who isn't the child of a nurse, get the point?

I've informed my brother. I'll look for a copy of the DNR later.

Layers

Just got through taking Mom to her dermatologist. We had a good session. Overall, the doctor was happy. He took scrapings of pre-cancerous bits from her face and head and something from her ankle to biopsy and scheduled another visit for six months from now.

The best result from my point of view is that I was finally able to convince Mom to stop wearing the blue fuzzy pullover she's had on for the past week. I laid out a complete set of clean clothes for her and gave her specific instructions on how to put them on (she's been known to wear her underwear on the outside occasionally) and she still managed to put on a pair of shorts before trying to get her pants on, too. I managed to catch her at that and then had to re-give step-by-step instructions for removing the two shirts she was wearing in order to put on the clean one I had set out. Fortunately, I had started her early so, even with the detours and restarts, we got to the appointment on time.

A couple of nights ago I tried to change her Exelon patch and couldn't manage to roll up her sleeve. (She gets a new patch daily on alternating shoulders.) Turns out she was wearing five shirts, all pullovers, at the same time. She claimed it was unintentional and didn't recall doing it. I don't know whether she put them on all at once or incrementally over the course of the day. I made her remove three of them before replacing the patch. She spent the next two hours folding and refolding the extra shirts, laying them out singly and in a pile, and rolling them all together as if to fit in a backpack before I convinced her to go to bed.

This appointment was at 1:00 in the afternoon. She has another tomorrow at 10:00 A.M. Getting there on time will be an interesting challenge.

Our Efficient and Dedicated Public Works Crew

That's not sarcasm.

I seriously misunderestimated the capabilities of the crew out repaving our main road. I expected them to finish the southbound side today but, instead, they completed paving both southbound lanes, smoothed and compacted them both and finished a preliminary striping pass, all before 6 P.M. Saturday evening.

This morning the paint truck came by again twice to finish striping the bike lane. Now they just need the bike lane stencils and the detail work for the dedicated left and right turn lanes at the end of the road.

It looks beautiful and has been noticed already. Last night we heard laughter and yelling and looked out to see several kids zoom by on skateboards. Kind of like skiers discovering virgin powder.

Now we'll just have to wait to see how long before they do the northbound lanes and the median crossovers.

Progress

The city road crew came through yesterday and today, yesterday scraping down the asphalt on our main connector street, today laying down a new layer. The speed at which this is accomplished is impressive.

Scraper trucks traveling slightly faster than a street sweeper pared down the rough patches with one pass down each southbound lane (the road is two lanes in each direction with a landscaped median. Walking work crews followed behind sweeping up chunks too large for the truck to ingest. That was yesterday and they easily went from one end of the road to the other.

Today, the paving trucks rumbled down the inner lane trailing, and leveling, a three or four inch layer of fresh asphalt. They were followed by a train of steam rollers smoothing and compressing the new surface. At the rate they're going they will have one lane complete by the end of the day. Monday for the second lane and then it's just a matter of repainting the stripes.

I remember, when I was a kid the asphalt was dumped one truck load at a time, and guys with shovels and industrial rakes would spread it out before the rollers came and progress was measured in yards per day, not miles.

Once In a Blue Moon

Had to explain to the RN at the hospital today that 60 is not "old" as she originally stated, nor is it "older" as she amended. I told her I take it personally. I don't think she believes me but she won't argue with a donor.

This assertion on her part, and my defence, arose because I was at the hospital for my fourth-weekly (bi-fortnightly?, once every four weeks) platelet donation during which I noticed my favorite pointy stick (the one with all the mini-skulls shish kebabed on it) that I use to reset the apheresis machine when it fails to draw sufficiently fast had a serious split at the base of the handle. It's basically a wooden dowel (with mini-skulls threaded onto it) and someone could easily get a cut or major splinter from that.

The nurse agreed to tape up the handle and then stated she would contact the creator of this particular pointy stick, a 60-year-old ex-Marine with a mild skull fetish, about making a new one. It was then that she described Mr. Ex-Marine as "old," upon objection revised to "older."

Other than having to use my pointy stick a few times, the donation went quite well. Since I go every four weeks and this is the first of the month, I will be back again on the 29th, the only month this year with two visits. Thus the "Blue Moon" allusion.