Experience versus Reflection

The original intention for Charissa’s car was for transportation out to and back from the west coast. Now it’s been commandeered as a support vehicle and going through the rigors of such. Her Scion has been treated more like an off road vehicle than a sports car. As a quick aside, Charissa’s car could use some body work on the cheap when we get home.

There have been times when I drove her car in support with white knuckles, squeezing between rock fall from the cliff on one side and the edge of the cliff on the other. Yet that has been better than the alternative. I can now answer the question as to whether experience or reflection brings greater sadness.

I help Cindy put her boots on each morning; she puts them on, I tie them. Usually this works well enough but on occasion she will try to put a boot on a foot that already has one, or put the boot on one foot and try to take a sock off the other. A little bit of sadness accompanies this, along with other emotions that range from sympathy to frustration.

For the most part Cindy appears unaffected. For those times when her confusion upsets her there is always the lighthearted joke, the kiss or the hug that will bring her around … or at least make me feel better from some kind of action.

With reflection, which occurs in abundance when one is alone as the support person, there are no avenues of action. I used to be in my element being alone with my thoughts, usually solving the world’s problems in some form. I once thought that after Cindy passes I would hike around the world to witness and report on kindness and community. Now I fear what such alone time might bring, reflection on how helpless I was for Cindy’s last chapter.

We are now at Crater Lake again, this time to head south to Ashland. Our good friend Mike Hinckley is about to join us for a couple months. We very much look forward to that. These days the more company the better.