Mothers

It has been six months now since my mother returned to the area. She went to stay with my sister in New Mexico after my father died, but came back for a visit and decided to stay.

At first she lived with us. That was a challenge in many ways, but we knew it was temporary. We found a Continuing Care Retirement Community for her nearby and she was placed in assisted living. While physically very active, she is declining mentally and needs help with many little every day things.

Her apartment is 25 minutes away from my home. There are many, many places she could have lived in that were closer. Some of those met her first two basic requirements: no religious affiliation and no buy-in. But her biggest requirement was to live in a place where she can walk every day the weather cooperates. Most of the winter, I bemoaned the fact that the drive to see her was longer than I wanted it to be. Now, I am grateful and believe we made the right decision.

My mom isn't one of those little old ladies who is content to walk to the duck pond and back. She wants to go for a few miles, walking nearly an hour at a stretch. Her community boarders a large park system. Her walk takes her past baseball and soccer fields, a skate park, water park and huge community park with two ponds and a creek, picnic shelters, nice hills, beautiful flowering trees and some wildlife. She loves her walks. Because I can't be there every day to walk with her, we have hired help to take her out. This walk is essential to her well being, the days she only gets to the exercise classes or the fitness center are not good days for her.

I really enjoy the days when I am able to walk with Mom, particularly now that I am not as worried about how cold she is. Sometimes we have a three generational walk with one of my kids along, most of the time it's just the two of us. We catch up on our news and then mostly walk in silence, Mom walking a step or two behind me. I think she does that to make sure there is nothing to trip on, no matter how I alter my gate, she remains a bit behind.

We saw a family of geese the other day and many nesting ducks. We also heard chorus frogs near the tennis courts. Mostly we just walked in silence and enjoyed the day. I am glad to have her living close to me.