Jack and Nana
Motherhood did not come easy for me. After needing two hands to count the number of miscarriages and knowing that my vagina had been known to doctors from coast to coast, countless rounds of drugs and crazy procedures, we got a dog.
Jack was our baby golden retriever and he did look a lot like me. We had similar personalities. We both loved food and going for hikes. Naps were good too. We were both blonde and needed to loose a couple pounds. When we had to move to Vancouver for a year, Jack went with us. He would prance around town doing naughty puppy things like stealing sandwiches from toddlers and running through picnics of unsuspecting beachgoers. Yes, beach, as in wet and sandy, naughty puppy running through your carefully laid-out lunch. We were not popular.
You might have guessed it by now, but Jack became my baby. We went everywhere together. There were moms that were with us and they’d ask me to join in activities, and and Jack and I would show up. One activity was berry picking and Jack was an excellent berry picker. He could find the juiciest blackberries, hidden beneath the leaves and the prickly branches, and he would crane his neck down, use his nose to move things out of his way, then his gigantic tongue would wrap around the tasty berry and he would swoop it into his mouth and enjoy it. Jack loved berries. He loved to pick blueberries also and got so excited he once fell into a muddy ditch. Hyper, 100-pound dog, covered in stinky ditch water and mud, with a tummy full of berries riding in your car…Don’t think we were ever asked to go berry picking again. Popularity score dropped again.
Eventually my mother came to visit. She decided to take Jack out for an early morning walk. She put his leash around her wrist as they headed out onto the front porch, at the exact same time a tabby cat was on his morning walk. As soon as my mom got the door open, Jack spied the cat, and, well, pick most any cartoon cat and dog chase you can remember, because that’s exactly what happened. Jack took off after the cat, the cat started to run, my mother went bump bump bump down the front porch steps, unable to let the dog go because the leash was wrapped around her wrist.
Eventually she got him under control and got back inside the house but the damage was done. I took her to the emergency room and she was banged up but seemed okay. What we didn’t know was the fall had bruised her liver, which days later, and after she had made it back home, landed her in the hospital. What started off unreal became a hospital nightmare of misdiagnosis and tests and procedures that lead to more trauma, the hiring of private nurses, and airplanes to fly her to different hospitals with different levels of care (Yep, you can put a plane and staff right on your credit card. Once on mine; the next time on my sisters. Twice.)
My mother ended up near death more than 3 times over the next few weeks, but ultimately, being a strong-willed person, made a full recovery. Or so we thought.
You see, after that, she was never the same. This marked the beginning of her mental decline. She seemed fine but she was not. When we look back, we can see what was happening but understanding her day-to-day behaviors at the time? Well, we just didn’t see it. She had always been so independent, an expert at getting by.
What none of us knew was that she had used her financial relationships to go crazy and buy properties and make all kinds of “deals.” They were very bad decisions. So bad that she ended up loosing her entire fortune — everything.
Finally she had to go to a specialized facility and ended up becoming an escape artist in nearly every Alzheimer’s unit we could get her in. She got kicked out the minute she figured out the way out until she became too impaired to try.
Jack ended up with so many stories of swiping steaks and sticks of butter, and just like his grandma, he didn’t stop until he just couldn’t any more. They both were real characters, full of life, until the life in them halted and they were just there, not really living, not themselves.
Eventually real human babies became my children and they had a few good years with both Jack and Nana. Jack would swipe the food they had, and Nana would send crazy gifts like hammers and nails or old lady jewelry for the babies.
I live with the guilt that maybe if Jack hadn’t almost killed my mother, we may have had the real Nana for more years. But we only know what we know. We loved them both very much. They were full of life until they weren’t. Now they both are gone from this earth.
Jack is probably chasing a few cats, in between swiping steaks and pancakes and sticks of butter and berries. Nana is probably thinking about inappropriate gifts to send her grandchildren. I hope in whatever reincarnation she is now, she won’t be taking any dogs out walking.
