CHAPTER 203: IMPRESSIONS OF MY LIFE: AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A RECHERCHE POE STORM AFTER STORM 2012

 

CHAPTER 203 STORM AFTER STORM. 2012 

We had laid dad to rest on October 17.  On October 22 Super Storm Sandy formed in the Caribbean as a wave, but quickly became the 18th named hurricane of the season. By October 24 it was a Category 2 storm and on the 25th it smacked into Cuba as a  Category 3.  No one seemed to be certain where it was headed. 

On October 29 it took a west-northwest turn. We were
watching it closely, especially my friend, Ronald Tipton. 

He lived in a  development

called Coventry Chase in Sussex County along the Coastal Highway, Route 1. He worked at a boutique hotel called The Inn at Canal Square in Lewes, Delaware.  The hotel overlooked the Lewes and Rehoboth  Canal, built between 1913 and 1916 it proved a failure as a freight shipment route, and became mainly a leisure boat center and tourist

destination.  The big draw in the area is Rehoboth beach, just about 8 miles to the south of Lewes.   

Suddenly this a target. Forecasters were saying Sandy was going to land near Rehoboth. This was close enough to give pause to those living in Coventry Chase.

However, the hurricane veered more northward and and
made U. S. Landfall at Brigantine, New Jersey instead. It moved slowly inland and was gradually weakening down to a Category 2, but then it was overtaken by  another extratropical storm on November 2 and restrengthened. It effected 24 states and some of Canada before it was through. Damage amounted to $65 billion the U.S. New Jersey and New York were severely   devastated.

The storm didn’t directly effect me. I became involved on

December 8 when a small group of us in my church volunteered with Samaritan’s Purse, Reverend Franklin Graham worldwide relief organization.  We  traveled together from December 8 through January 5th to help that organization muck out homes destroyed by the storm from Tom’s River to Seaside Heights, especially working at Ortley Beach locations on the barrier island, crossing the Barnegat Bay Bridge to get there. 

Ortley Beach greeted us with street after street of 
destruction. All the former possessions in the homes now lined the curbs as waterlogged trash. We went into homes stripped bare and our job was to strip away even door, tearing out the drywall (no longer really dry) rip[ing up the warmed floors and pulling thousands of nails from every surface,

We were forced to wear surgical masks long before the future  pandemic to protect our lungs, which made our work more difficult because these impeded our breathing and steamed up any glasses. It was worse  later in some areas as we were forced into HAZMAT suits because of the mold in the homes.

We service quite a few homes. The owners were glad to see
us come because everything had  been left on them. It was hard labor.  What had happened on the Island was the sea had overflowed from one side and the bay from the other. Houses along the street had  been flooded up to the second floor level. We were there until January 5, 2013 mucking out.   This was our basic regular team, always there.I m third from the left and my daughter Laurel is the second from  the left.

This is  my daughter working on a wall in one home.  She didn’t show any fear. Here she was drawing  through an opening into a house to work on the crawl space beneath it. 

She was tireless. 

At one point she was modeling a HAZMAT
suit for  the other volunteers. 

Her suit would not remain pristine by the end of the day. 

I would have my own

turn in that infernal hot and uncomfortable outfit as well,

Something I noticed though. I was having difficulty carrying out the items, something I figured I could handle. Some oof the younger men were taking these burdens from me. Giving this old geezer some aid, which I didn’t feel I should have needed. I was also getting very tired by the afternoon. This was similar to my experience in 1970 when I was part of the Coldwater Creek crew setting up the new. I chalked it is to age then and more so now.  I was 72 when we went to Ortley Beach. I didn’t consider that exactly old age and I believed I was in good shape.

Damage was very wide spread. The one house was torn right off it’s foundation and had floated until  stopped by other homes below where it had stood. 

e

Here two of the crew carry out a hot water heater from one
house to the trash heap.

We would stop for dinner at a restaurant at the end of the day, Here  was a restaurant with a service station theme with motorcycles hanging from the ceiling and cars as tables in places.

Most of us had ordered Ice Tea, but Laurel ordered a root
beer, which came in what looked like a beer bottle. As she was drinking this one of the men yelled, “Hey, there’s your Biker name — Boozer!” Te nickname stuck and it was off whence walked into church and several voices shoulder, Hey Boozer!” 

During the day as we worked we were often sustained by this lady with the Salvation Army who would make rounds through the streets and provide us with coffee or cold drinks or snacks or candy bars.  

 

You needed a pass just to get out to the Island. You would
go through a check point as you came off the bridge and have to display this placard. Then the police would wave you in.

This was another days crew, fairly large. Laurel and I are in the first row.

CHAPTER 202: IMPRESSIONS OF MY LIFE: AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A RECHERCHE POET STONE BROKE AND FIELD OF STONES2012

CHAPTER 202. STONE BROKE AND THE FIELD OF STONES 2012

 

My mother died on September 23, 2012 at the age of 92.  My father passed on October 11, 2012 just pass his 94 birthday. 

The cause of death for each was given as Atherosclerosis - Heart Diseae.  I doubt this is so. They is what the give as the cause for very old people who pass. This is why heart disease is the number one killed. Doctors just stick it on the certificate because it is an ease thing to say.   My parents, at their age, at a plethora of ailments they could have chose from, but I’ve found doctors often too lazy to sort such things out and you got to give something as the cause of death.

My parents had been married 72 years, but engaged two
years before they wed. They met right after my mom graduated high school. They truly loved each other.  They died less than three weeks

So what happened since I said if this happened there was enough funds to bury them both. 

Well, when both parents went into Pembrooke as Medicare patients it became necessary to reduce their total assets to less than $2,000. I was going to have to sell their house and car and dispose of all their possessions. This seems a daunting task. 

The car was hardly new and the house was in bad condition, especially since I had noticed when I went up to take care of dad that there was a sign on the washing machine in the shed.  It said, “Do not flush toilet if washer is running.”  Apparently a pipe in the basement that was somehow connected to the septic system was broke and if those two things happened at the same time the septic tack  overflowed into the basement.  How do I sell this place? I hadn’t a clue and so once again I prayed and put it in God’s hands.

First thing that happened was the young woman their
church had hired to clean their home asked if she could buy there are. That went pretty smoothly.

Then I got a call from the Realtor I had engaged that another young woman wanted to purchase their property. She wanted to put a shelter in the back yard for dogs, something  I knew would have pleaded mom. Best of all, the young ladies father was going to pay for the place and pay cash. They wanted to complete the settlement by October 1 and since I was cash and no financing was involves this was an easy transaction. I got a company that would take everything in the house at no charge. Thus by the first of October the house, car and all the furniture, old paint cans, everything in the attic was gone.

 I then had the  funds to pay for the funerals just in time,
since my mom had died on September 23 and then my dad died October 11.

My mom had written out what they wanted for their funerals
and I  attempted to give them everything she had asked for, except there was no viewing and no bagpiper.

We already had the plots there at Bethel. I used an undertaker in Phoenixville who had  done other burials for the family. The undertaker took care of everything once I selected the coffins and such.  Each funeral cost over $10,000.  This is not an amount I ever want to spend on my own. 

Dad had a. Military interment. An Honor Guard from the
Navy performed it, playing Tap at the grave site. I was given the flag that had  covers the coffin. I place a photo of his mother he had always kept next to his bed in the coffin with him.

Neither of my parents really looked like themselves now. 

We purchased a tombstone and had a meal after each service. Many people came for my parents were popular, especially dad who had both a number of truckers and school bus drivers attend.

 

It took another year for the estate t probate. The amount I received from my parents passing wasn’t great, but it was
enough that we could make needed repairs on our home so we were no longer the neighborhood eyesore. Most of it  went to replace the old

asphalt siding an add some replacement windows. The house looked quite different than it did when we moved there in 1982.

CHAPTER 201: IMPRESSIONS OF MY LIFE: AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A RECHERCHE POET OMNES MULKIERES ET HOMINS MORIUNTUT 2012

 CHAPTER 201. OMNES MULIERES ET HOMINES MORIUNTUT

 

The children at Bethel Methodist painted a poster to my mother. I hung it on the wall of her room at Pembrooke. My mother had been in the nursing home for six months. The  home had found a room where both of my parents could now betogether. Mom continued to delude herself that she would go home again, but this was impossible for their were no facilities in their house to care for people in their conditions, beside her useless left side would have prevented this.

Money was also a problem. No one had any. My mother had started a fund to collect money for her future death and burial, but they had to use this savings to pay Pennsylvania their taxes.  I became the person in charge of their finances once my mother had her stroke. What upset me was how little they had. If one or the other passed away, there was enough to bury them, but if they both died then there was not enough funds to bury both.

I was rather shocked when I began looking at their expenditures over the past several years. I hd often helped them out and at one point bought them a refrigerator when their’s failed, an expenditure I could barely afford. Now I found my mother had been paying a vast number of charities every month, including such things as an Indian School and a Russian Mission. It appeared that any organization who solicited donations from her were on her monthly expenditures. My parents were giving away a couple hundred dollars a month. It is not that some of these charities were unworthy, just that my parents were elderly people living on a fairly low fixed income and dealing with a large number of medical bills at the same time.

My father seemed to get along fine in the nursing home. He was being well taken care of and he had the charm to quickly make friends and  creat a sort of social life for himself. He was not a complainer about his disabilities. He still continued his lifetime flirting with women, and the nurses and aides hovered about him.  Despite his medical difficulties, he got about easily in his wheelchair and entertained those who shared his table in the dining room with a constant stream of stories about his youth and navy service.

Meanwhile my mom was depressed and deteriorating physically. She was now listed as a hospice patient. She had nurses assigned to her who were trained in palliative care. They visited with her and did what could be done to ease any pain  and keep her comfortable.

In those final days my wife and I left her room and found her
nurse leaning against the hallway wall crying.

“Most patient’s are beyond cognitive recognition of what is happening. But your mother’s mind is clear and she knowns everything and this makes it so painful to me, I had to come out here for a while.

In the end my mother began yelling she couldn’t breath. Nothing  they tried eased this for her. I sat with her that evening, held her good hand and in a quite voice gave her permission to let go.  She died that night.

My dad had been by her bed earlier and he gave her a lot kiss.

My father would live almost another three weeks. He
thanked me, something that never came easy to him. He looked at me, took a deep  breath and said. I love you. I had waited my whole life to hear those words from him. They were his last words and later that night he also passed.

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CHAPTER 200: IMPRESSIONS OF MY LIFE: AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A RECHERCHE POET SEARCH FOR THE ELUSIVE BED 2012

CHAPTER 200 SEARCH FOR THAT ELUSIVE BED  2012

 

Mom was very unhappy, and I didn’t blame her, but I was not sure what I could do.

We were able to bring her cat in for a visit, but it changed nothing.

“Larry, get me out of here.  Listen, I had a friend.”

“Yes?”

“She worked at Valley Maid. When I was there, but she retired. She went into Manatawny Manor. I hear it was nice.”

So Lois and I drove to Manatawany Manor just outside of Pottstown. We had difficulty finding it. The address was 30 Old Schuylkill Road, but I followed that road and it kind of disappeared on me. We drove up and  down Rt. 422. Several times, going from Phoenixville to Pottstown and back.  Then by luck we  found it, kind of up a hill our of the way. I drove up a twisting entreat and parked along one side of the building. The sign said it was associated with the Lutherans in some way, my wife’s old church. 

It entered into a large lobby with many chairs, behind which
was a glass included desk for inquiries. People wandering about seemed fairly independent. But upon questioning we found my mother not have the funds for

the first floor resident spaces. She would have to come in as a Medicaid patient, who would be assigned a small two person room on the second floor.  

We were given a tour and the second floor looks very little different than Golden Living, except people were warehoused in a two person unit rather than a three.  We were informed there was a waiting list and the lady  greeting us had no idea when a space would be available. On leaving Lois and I discussed the place, and we agreed our hostess had been very snorting once she learned my mom had no money. We saw nothing to make us think my mom would be any happier here than where she was.

There were 99 During Homes we checked out in Chester

and  Montgomery Counties.  We eventually narrowed this down to 44, which we visited.  All claimed they had waiting lists and no current rooms.  Some did not like my mother’s Aetna Insurance, an advantage plan. This seemed some form of insurance places rejected.  Some places were nice, but way too expensive for my mother to afford, such as  Bellingham.  

It was funny going to Bellingham for a visit. It was along
Boot Road outside of West Chester.  When we walked into the pace we were taken to a large central room. There were a number of residents sitting here talking, mostly women. As I entered these woman all looked me over and surrounded me, urging me to come to Bellingham. They completely ignored my wife. When we left in our car, Lois said, “My you were certainly a hit.”

“Yeah.”

“Fresh meat!”

They would drive me crazy if I did move it there.

We finally narrowed our 99 homes down to 6 possibilities, but even so, these did not seem to have vacancies either.  It was beginning to look  as if mom would be stuck where she  was.  That night I prayed, feeling my hopes were gone, and I left it to God.

A couple days later I received a phone call from a nursing

home along West Chester Pike just east of West Chester. The lady on the phone said they had space for my mom.

We drove to the place and it was descent inside and out and had a 5-Star Medicare Rating, which is the highest Medicare gave. Every one we met there as very friendly and we were told they  had room for my father as well. 

I had been trying to get my dad into the VA facility in Coatesville, but without success. I could never get ahold with anyone there. I would call a bane I was given and get a voicemail saying they were away and to. Call a different number for the person covering them, but all I ever got from the cover person was their voicemail with a message they were also away. All claimed they would get back to me, but none ever did. So to told this place could take me dad as well was very welcome news. 

The facility was called the Pembrooke Health and
Rehabilitation Center.  I signed up both monad dad, especially after they told me they could eventually get them both in the same room.

Pembrooke made all the arrangements with Golden Living and transered my mom by ambulance. My dad was simply able to be brought there by us.