October 2, 2009
Today is my Grandmother's birthday.
I went to Morristown Manor today to see Mom and was stopped a the front office by Mary, the Social Services rep. She was concerned that Mom has been distressed the past few evenings by stories of her Mom. She hasn't said much about her being a whore this time, but she is distressed about the fact that she was sure her Mother was raped. Mary said Mom went into great detail about her Mother being gang raped in front of her and some other children and that she got the other kids in another room and kept them safe during the rape. That her Mother was drinking and didn't know what she was doing and about 30 men raped her and there was blood all over. She said they went to trial and that some of them got off scot free and that Mom was doing the different voices of the people involved.
So, an elaborate story, or is there some shred of truth to any of it? There is just not many people living who would know. We guessed at a million things it could be, where she concocted it all, including the fact that some of it could be from sundowners, a syndrome common among AD patients. In the evenings they can sometimes be excitable and distressed, more confused. But when I went back to see her at 10am she was upset about it then and wanting to tell me all about how her Mother was raped and there was a trial and I had to calm her down and tell her that it was years ago and in the past and not to talk about it now because it just upset her. But the pictures of her Mother, my Grandmother, seemed to trigger her story so I had to take them all down while I was there. I left with them and she never even noticed.
My sister told me a few days ago that if Mom ever said anything about an Andrew, she wanted to know about it. She said, “I sent my Guardian Angel to be with her while she's there and his name is Andrew.”
“How do you know his name is Andrew?” I asked her the obvious question, although I wasn't questioning that his name really was Andrew, I really only wanted to know how she came to find out what it was.
“Years ago, when the kids were little and I was reading a story to them about guardian angels, it said if you want to know the name of your guardian angel, just ask them and they will tell you,” she said. “So, I asked mine his name on several occasions and I never heard back, so I forgot about it. And one day I was doing the dishes, not even thinking about him and suddenly it just popped in my head, 'my name is Andrew.'”
I believed her. And if you knew my sister, you would believe her, too.
Mom and I were just sitting down in her room when the lady from St. Joe Parish came in and introduced herself to me. Her name was Carolyn and she was a volunteer layperson with the parish and went around and dispensed Communion to the Catholics. She opened her book to begin the ritual that started with a prayer and the reading from the Mass that morning followed by a blessing over the Sacrament and ending with Communion and a prayer.
“Today is the Feast Day of Our Guardian Angel...”
Carolyn sat and chatted with us for a while and after she left, Mom picked up her latest art project. It was a small glass votive holder lined with twigs that had fall leaves glued onto them. It was just her kind of project. As she handed it to me to inspect, a pin fell into my hand. It was one of her many pins she wore, but this one was her Guardian Angel pin. I looked at it, trying to see Andrew's face. I laughed and told Mom that maybe it was a good sign.
“What is your Guardian Angel's name?” I asked her.
She actually thought about it for a long time and finally she looked at me and said, “I'm not sure I know what his name is.”
It was worth a shot.
I got most of the pictures of Gramma down while Mom was in the hallway, working on a picture of a butterfly. There weren't many, but one was part of a large collage and it was one she looked at quite often and would say, “and there is my beautiful Mother...”. I didn't want to take the whole collage down so I searched for a picture that I could just cover that one over with. None of the small ones seemed to fit over it well. I looked on her bulletin board and saw the obvious cover. A postcard from the Padre Pio foundation. On the card was a beautiful picture of a Guardian Angel. There was a long quote underneath from Padre Pio that went something to the effect of, 'whenever you need me call on me and if I can't be there I will send my Guardian Angel to be with you...”
