Sour Dough Bread
Sour Dough Bread
Once upon a quiet summers evening - the car drops me at the glass doors with the tinkling
chimes.
I carry freshly plucked Marguerite daisies from the furze
yellow hedges around the ridged chocolate fields. There is also ice-cream
wrapped in a deli-foil bag to keep it
cool so I open the door to my Mother’s room with my chin.
A pretty blonde woman
in a blue tabard is kneeling on the floor,
both of my Mother’s hands in hers,
craning upwards to see the face under
the flopping fringe.
-
Kin you
tell me if there is anythink I can do for you?
She speaks with an accent that as a race we have become
familiar with,
although one is never sure if it is Croatian, Serbian, Polish,
or Lithuanian.
I am at pains to mark my territory,
and inform this stranger
that my Mother does not,
cannot speak.
I throw the flowers onto the patchwork quilt and make a production
about getting a vase, a saucer and spoon.
How very dare she - I
wonder
and stalk up the miles of
carpeted hallway
saluting and calling
into the various open doors at the residents beyond.
It is like a nursery for forgotten dolls.
Some lie sideways in railed beds with bolsters at their
backs.
Some sit sideways in wheelchairs staring out the window or
at the Rte Soaps,
all 50 rooms
simultaneously playing the opening theme of Eastenders.
DOOM doom de de deh de de
A drumkit falling down a stairs.
Surely a carer should know that someone with late stage Alzheimers cannot speak - I think,
as I pull the huge green crystal
vase out from the very back of the
hairdressing press,
where it has
been shoved away behind the rollers and
the hairsprays as it is too massive to balance on a window ledge.
I am nothing
if not controversial.
I fill it with icy water in the double sink of the hospitality
room,
where brown bread and scones and cheese
and ham,
are laid out with a checkered cloth
over them,
when a family are waiting for a death.
I know this as I have
been coming here for years.
I also know the bed gets pulled out from the wall to make
space for people to get in at the doll.
On the way back to my Mothers room I hear her soft Eastern
European voice in a soothing sequence of rhetorical questions.
-Dass ZO mush bitter now eh? she whispers as I walk back in the room and
see she is massaging my Mothers temples.
The small blonde woman and the smaller woman in the big
chair have connected on a deeper level than language.
I recognise the movements of Reiki and Shiatsu
and the
gentle way she has of rubbing the scalp,
the tension in the cords at the base
of the bent neck,
released under her loving touch.
Her name badge says Anna.
We talk for 20 minutes about care of the elderly,
about
connection and family,
about holistic treatments, movement and manipulation,
about people and place,
about love and language and loss.
I thought she would
be the type of woman I would like to go drinking with.
Or call friend.
I never saw her again.
On the last day of Winter, the brown bread and scones, the
cheese and ham, were laid out under the checkered cloth for Us.
The bed was pulled out from the wall for Us.
And the Banshee
gale that had been shrieking for 4 days around the long house nestled in
the frosty fields, blew my Mother out of the massive chair,
and carried her off
in a gentle breeze, and it grew calmer,
then silent and a full moon rose in a lilac sky.
Last week I went shopping, trying to coerce and convince
myself to engage, to re-stock the empty kitchen, to tempt myself with something
delicious.
I want sour dough bread
- toasted - with cold butter.
Or maybe a beautiful mini pot of strawberry jam.
I wander the aisles of the over bright supermarket listening to the tannoy paging staff ,
customer service and the tinny muzak of the advertising jingles.
I have almost
forgotten what I have come in for about ten times and there is a wealth of
nonsensical fruit that will be trashed when it softens and
washing powder bulging out of my basket.
Twice, I walked the length of the
bread aisle, feeling only that I had no top layer of skin on, and that if
anyone looked at my black ringed eyes they would think I was insane.
I hope I’m not on CCTV and there is not a security man
watching holding his sides.
I throw caution to the wind and head down the bread lane for
a third time.
Fuck the begrudgers.
There is brown and white bread.
There is real white and
half white and half brown and half white mixed together.
There is low fat, gluten free, handmade, homemade,
There is bread that costs a King’s Ransom and bread that is
so cheap for a large sliced it is probably made from re-cycled rubber .
There is bread with nuts in it, and seeds on it, there are
rolls and Ciabatta and Panini, there are French sticks, and Tiger breads, cobs,
turnovers, barrel pans, soup rolls, salad rolls, crispbreads and croutons.
There is not a screed of a sour dough loaf.
I look around for some help and see the Deli Assistant
loosely plopping egg mayonnaise into the salad bar with a giant spoon.
“Whose leg do you have to hump to find the sour dough
bread around here?” I ask the back of her.
She turns and smiles in recognition.
-
Oh,
Halloooooo she says brightly
I smile quickly but am more concerned with the business at
hand,
namely finding the curse of Jasus bread
and ultimately leaving the supermarket as fast as my small aching legs can
carry me.
People who read me often know me, although I often cannot return the favour.
I am worn out.
-
How is
Siobhán? She asks reaching out to touch me on the elbow.
-
She died I answer baldly, making no
attempt to colour the statement as this is not the first, and assuredly not the
last time that someone will enquire how my Mother is.
She looks off into the middle distance and squints and I
notice her blinking, and then the tears that quickly form in her pretty blue
eyed face.
-
Oh Gott, I’m zo surry
And I wonder at her reaction, the grasp of her hand on mine,
and take a moment to scan the supermarket badge on her left breast.
Her name badge says Anna.
MDM May 19th 2015
Your words really tell it as it really is Michelle. So many people will take comfort from those words. They will realise they are not alone; that another has walked this path; has shared their sorrow. Me too. I can see the future in your words. My Dad has Alzheimers. My mother is the powerhouse who looks after him with the help of my brother.Sometimes I worry more about her than I do about him. TY and take care. <3
ReplyDeleteThanks so much Mary.
ReplyDeleteI am writing the last chapter of the book at the moment and it's as heartbreaking to document as it was to witness.
Be well x