Same Song, Second Verse

Well, where to start. Dad is upset. He told the Senior Center he would tune their piano, but he doesn't have his tools, they are in storage, and so he can't. Even if they were out of storage, he couldn't, but he doesn't accept that. That makes me the bad guy again.

Today he had to go to the dermatologist. He has small growths on his face which she thinks are cancerous. Nothing serious, they simply need to be taken off. Jacque took him today and he didn't want her to go in with him. After a few minutes the doctor came out and asked her to come in. Dad doesn't communicate on someone else's plane. When she asked him questions he basically ignored her and talked about what he wanted to talk about and couldn't understand the things she was saying. He wasn't happy that Jacque ended up in the room, but that is just the way it is. Even with Jacque in the room he still tried to stay on his own thoughts and interupted the doctor to have his say on anything that happened to be on his mind. That was me, of course. I am stealing his money. He can't understand it going into the bank with direct deposit. He doesn't want it in the bank because the bank steals it too. That seems a common alzheimer's thing.

We went to the library today because he asked to go. He always likes to look at the World War II books. First we got him his own library card. We had to use my identification to get him a card. He told the lady that I looked so bad in my driver's license picture because I had just gotten out of jail. Then he told the lady at the information desk that he wanted some books. He said he wanted book on ....... not World War II, but on names. The librarian looked at him curiously, but of course he couldn't explain it better than that, and I had no idea what he was talking about. I asked him if he didn't want to see some books on WWII and he looked at me like I was an idiot. At that time I certainly felt like one. It was turning into a delightful trip. He had asked Jacque for some books on alzheimer's, so we asked for some of them as well. While the librarian was frantically trying to figure out what kind of books on names he wanted, Jacque went and got him some books on Scotland. The librarian did find some books on names, not what he wanted, but no one is quite sure what he wanted and she gave him two books on alzheimer's. On the way to the reading table he stopped by two kids playing chess and told them they were doing it wrong. When I got him to his reading table he was well supplied with books which kept him occupied for about an hour.

In one of the alzheimer's books there was a series of pictures on the changes in the brain. He told me that after looking at the books he knew that he didn't have whatever it was that they were about. But, then he showed me the pictures of the brain to prove it. I reminded him that the doctor had taken pictures of his brain last summer, something which acknowleged that he could "sort of" remember doing. I told him that that was how the doctor knew, in part anyway, that he had alzheimer's. He looked at me and looked at the book and read the subtitles. Normal, mild, moderate, severe. He looked at me again and said, "how do they cure it?" They don't. "Oh," he said. "Well, I don't have it, because God just healed me," and he closed the book. That ended our trip to the library for today.