All the Yap That's Fit to Print

It's hard to be a parent, especially when you're the kid. But this is where the Plotnik Brothers find themselves these days. She used to say "I'm sorry, you'll understand when you're older" but now they have to say to her "I'm sorry, you can't make these decisions by yourself anymore."

Mummy Plotnik has taken care of herself for a long time. She is, above all, sensible. That's how she has managed to keep on pushing, as she nursed three husbands through their final days and stood tall like a Monterey Pine for her boys. So it is rough for us all to see how muddled and frail she has become in the last few weeks, continuing a pattern that has been slow to assert itself, but steady in its approach.

A lot of that is due to those horrible pain killers they prescribe to her that temporarily relieve a little pain but whose side effects appear to be disorientation and confusion.

But this is to be expected. Doctors do not treat elderly people, they patronize them. They don't even like to see them taking up space in their waiting rooms. When Mummy P.'s long-time internist retired she lost someone who knew and cared about her. His son took over his practice. He says "Rose, what can I do for you?"

But it's not his fault that age doesn't let anyone slide.

No one who knows Schmeckl Plotnik will be able to imagine him getting mad enough at his mom that he ends up yelling at her on the phone, and no one who knows The Great Plotnik will be able to imagine him doing the same thing, but in the past two days that's what's happened.

For Mummy P. it's all about trying to maintain control over her life.

For the Plotnik boys it's about trying to fight their own denial while at the same time doing battle with their mother over her refusal to accept more permanent help. In the end the help will be hired, the extra bedroom will be converted into more comfortable living space for a full time housekeeper and those systems that are all too familiar to us boomers will be humming along as well as they can.

But if Mummy P. doesn't want someone living in her house with her she will hate her. She will. It's automatic. It could be Florence Nightingale, it could be Antonio Banderas, it won't matter. And when she hates this new woman she will make herself sick.

And when she's made herself good and sick she will either get over it or not.

We think this is hard? Just wait.

(Call her and say hi, those of you who might do so now and then. Not all at once but when you think about it. Just hi -- that's plenty.)

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As Plot has alluded to recently, his blog is basically for himself and his family and friends. He knows he doesn't have to write about this stuff. But when that's pretty much all that's happening in his life, what other choice is there?

Silence, or yapping. That's it, silence or yapping. It's yap for now, but, you know, only all the yap that's fit to print.