Stories from the Resthome (1 of 2): A story of someone's birth.

The other week at the resthome, the one resident who's a retired music professor shared that he was born a few days after the stock market crash back in '29.

He said his parents just weren't sure what to do since it was a horrible time to bring a child into the world, and they hung on as best they could for a number of years, but it was hard times.

He said that when he was 4, the family lost their house up in [a major Midwestern college town], and they had to move to a small third floor apartment in this brick building. His father was a tailor and had just worked for years, he said, and then one day it was just gone, the house that they had bought and had lived in.

Me and the one resident who I have a running joke with were sitting with him, and we just shook our heads and were like, "Wow," and he confirmed that losing the house was one of his earliest childhood memories.

I also pursed my lips and was like, "That's the worst post-partum depression story that I've ever heard."

The joke fell a little flat, though they didn't seem to be angry. I'm not sure they entirely got the reference the first time that I said it.

I need to be more careful with my jokes, sometimes.

Memories of two people who are now deceased (2 of 2): More presidential dissatisifaction.

The other week, the (aged) mother of my one friend with the cat passed away, I'm not sure of what, though she had bad dementia the past few years.

(I had met her mom once or twice.)

She said that all her life her mom wanted to fix things - she went back to school and took care of her family after her husband passed away tragically at a young age, and she was involved in integration fights way back when in the urban area where she was raising her family - but that she was getting madder and madder the past few years that she couldn't do anything about Trump.

Till, one day she told her daughter that she wanted to take him out.

"Mom, you can't do that!", my friend was like, to her mom.

"No, I'm perfect," her mom told her.  "I'm an old lady, no-one will suspect me, I can get close to him."

After the first time she said that, she began saying that every once in a while, in her dementia, and she and my friend her daughter would repeat that conversation.

Memories of two people who are now deceased (1 of 2): Presidential dissatisifaction.

The other week I was thinking about the one resthome resident who really wanted to die, how I had that running joke with her that we didn't want her to die, but if she did die, she had to take Trump with her.

One time, I said that, then I said that the only problem with that is that they were going to different places.

"I'll push him down," she was like, sitting in her little armchair and making a pushing-down motion in front of her as she held her elbows out.

Another time, I said that whenever she did pass, if Trump was still president, she'd have to see if she could pull a few strings up there and see what she could do about it.

And, she held her fingers out like a machine gun, and she made a shooting choo-choo-choo-choo-choo-choo-choo motion down in front of her, like she was shooting a machine gun down from heaven.

(The reason she came up is because my one [cool] [Muslim] [Ethiopian] coworker said that she misses her, "She was so nice," and I shared those stories with her.  She laughed a lot from them.  I also texted the stories to the reisdent's daughter, who I still stay in touch with, and she got a kick out of them and shared the text with her brother, too.  They said that they appreciated the visuals.)

A story of Eid al-Adha.

The other month, I was asking my one (cool) (Muslim) (Ethiopian) coworker about celebrating Eid al-Adha, since it was that day and she was at work and I had wished her a happy Eid.

She said that her auntie was texting her why she was at work, she should be with her, but she said that she doesn't care, she wants to work, she misses her mother so much she would rather work.

"Because you don't want to think that it's a holiday, because a holiday makes you miss your mother so much?", I was like.

"Yes," she was like.

She then showed me some pictures that her aunt was texting her, from her apartment like half a mile south of us.

"There's the table, but you can't see the food," she was like.

(I had been asking her about what dishes they make up, and she had been telling me about some chicken dish with hot red peppers.)

Then, she swiped to the next picture, and she showed me her aunt and her husband and another uncle of hers and their four little kids.

"See, special Ethiopian coffee tradition," she was like, and she pointed out this small ornate multi-stepped stand with all this special coffee apparatus stuff all over it.

"And traditional Ethiopian clothes," she was like, pointing to her auntie with her hair done up and in this wrap thing.

"Is that traditional clothes?", I was like, pointing to her uncle and like this matching fabric pants and vest suit thing he was wearing.

"No," she was like, "Only her."

"Why only her?", I was like.

And, she shrugged.

"She wants to wear them," she was like.

She also said she was going to stop by their apartment after work to get some food, along with her husband once he got out of work, too.

News from the local grocery store.

Last time I was at the local grocery store that I go to, I was asking the (Latina) counter woman if a lot of people were boycotting Goya.

She said yes.

I also asked her if a lot of people were talking about the Goya boycott, when they came through line.

She also said yes.

Discussing Jerry Falwell Jr. with an Assisted Living Client.

This week, I was talking about the latest Jerry Falwell Jr. scandal with my one assisted living client with disabilities.

She didn't quite know the whole details of the story, so I was telling her about how what had been previously known was that Jerry Falwell Jr. set up a Miami pool boy with a hostel as a joint venture.

Like right after I said "joint venture," she was like, "You mean the wife?"

That got me, but a minute later I followed up and was like, "Yeah, the pool boy did the day-to-day work, and Falwell was the overseer."

A tale of two cats:

1) I miss that cat at the resthome; it was so much fun to stop in and pet her when I had 5 minutes of downtime on a shift.

2) With my one assisted living client's with disabilities skittish cat, I have this game where when I come in I get a few cat treats to give to her, and sometimes I put them on the floor and flick them and she goes and chases them and finds them, and she really likes that.

The other week, the treat ricocheted off a wall and then bounced underneath my client's nightstand, only there was some crap around the bottom where the cat couldn't get the treat right away, and so when I left the room I saw her positioning herself around the nightstand and trying to reach in at different angles with her paw, so that she could get the treat.