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Weak XVIII

30 April 2016

No. 3,829 (cartoon)

I have a number of options.

What’s the problem?

The number is zero.

1 May 2016

A Hundred Trillion Dollars Poorer

Well dang; I awoke this morning a hundred trillion dollars poorer than I was yesterday. That’s because my Zimbabwe hundred trillion dollar bill became worthless at midnight. The zeros say it all: I just lost $100,000,000,000,000 dollars.

The Zimbabwean government no longer honors the currency, so I’m out almost one U.S. dollar at current exchange rates.

Oh well, times are hard all over. At least I’m not in Zimbabwe.

2 May 2016

End of the Line: Aurora Maria Sanchez 1925-2016

For longer than I want to remember, I’ve wished that I could spend lots of time with a beautiful, charming woman who’s usually a delight to be with. My wish came true three and a half years ago when I met Aurora. My relationship with Aurora is a perfect example of, “Be careful what you wish for.” In retrospect, I should have wished for a woman younger than ninety who didn’t have dementia. In practice, it didn’t matter; we grew to love each other.

Aurora is my friend Lydia’s mother, who found it impossible to arrange for enough competent caregivers to keep Aurora in her home in Santa Fe. When Lydia brought her to San Francisco, I offered to help take care of her for a couple of months while she found a home for her. In retrospect, we found a home for her the day she arrived: Lydia’s flat, which is a ten-minute bike ride away.

Her condition declined very slowly over the years. When she arrived, she was perhaps like a six-year old. She could dress herself with the clothes we laid out for her, read books, use the toilet, et cetera, without assistance. Two months ago she needed help with everything, and had trouble speaking coherently. Nevertheless, she was usually amused if not smiling broadly.

I have no idea where this came from, but on the afternoon of 22 February we had a thirty-six minute conversation ... or as close as we came to one in a very long time. She made references to the end of life, so I asked her what came next. “There is no next,” she replied. She was happy, smiling, and remarkably lucid in saying she had “done everything, everything,” and that she was out of energy. She said she didn’t fear death, and was looking forward to starting anew. She said she was happy and wanted nothing. Essentially she told us that it was time for her to leave. I recorded it; it was a remarkable, lovely gift.

A couple of months ago she apparently had a stroke that resulted in a loss of equilibrium. She could sit on a chair without falling off, but needed someone to provide balance when she walked. Her physical condition deteriorated quickly and she stopped eating and only drank a couple of teaspoons of water before she refused more. She turned inward, and kept her eyes closed more and more although she wasn’t sleeping.

Two days before she died on 25 April, I asked her if she was OK. “Yeah,” she said with a smile, then started laughing without opening her eyes. That was the last word she said to me.

For the last weeks, I slept on a couch beside her. I was half awake and half asleep at dawn when I heard a very high-pitched sigh that I can't describe or mimic; it was neither relaxed nor unpleasant. That was the last sound Aurora made; she was dead when I checked on her a few seconds later. She died peacefully a few minutes before six in the morning. I helped Lydia wash her body; it was a beautiful ending to a great life for Aurora, or “goddess of the dawn.” I can only hope that my loved ones and I are that peaceful at the end of the last chapter.

I made a couple of photographs of Aurora for her family. One is from 12 February showing off her corn chip sculpture. (She made exceptional ceramic pieces before the dementia set in.) Her puppy was her constant companion.

I made the other nine days before she died; she was in her deathbed. She looked at a photograph of her parents for a minute or two before smiling and closing her eyes again.

I had my second drink of the Rainier Ale: The End of the Line series at dawn this morning, exactly a week after she left.

3 May 2016

Olympian Sewage

Athletes at the summer Olympics will have to compete in waters polluted with raw sewage and worse. I’m not the least bit interested in the Olympian drugfest, but I have to wonder if raw sewage is better or worse than cooked, steamed, or chocolate-flavored sewage. I suppose it doesn’t matter; the team with the best chemists always wins.

4 May 2016

Health Care Is Bad for Your Health

Dahlia said she heard some bad news at the medical clinic.

“Let me guess,” I said. “The doctor found something wrong with you.”

“Did Enrico tell you?” she asked.

“No, he didn’t have to,” I replied. “Your mistake was seeing a doctor; they can always find something wrong with you.”

I added that if you don’t have a medical problem when you arrive, there’s a good chance you’ll have one when you leave. If you walk out alive, that is. Medical errors cause almost ten percent of the deaths in the United states, second only to heart disease and cancer.

I stay in good health by not checking on it, and by taking reasonably good care of myself by steering clear of hospitals. Health care is bad for your health.

5 May 2016

End of the Line: Charles Gatewood 1942-2016

As Brendan Behan noted, “There’s no such thing as bad publicity except your own obituary.” And so, I’m afraid I have to give Charles Gatewood the worst publicity: he died a week ago on 28 April.

Charles earned his reputation as an artist by making artwork that spoke for itself. I’m glad that’s the case, since I just wasted half an hour trying to succinctly describe a half-century of diverse work in a variety of media.

I met him when he moved to San Francisco in the late eighties. I was expecting someone intimidating or maybe even a little scary based on the people and cultures he photographed. I could not have been more wrong. Although we didn’t spend much time together, every time I saw him he was charming, with a perpetually mischievous smile.

I made an Internet site for him to use as a calling card when he was selling his archive. (It worked; you’ll find it at the University of California’s Bancroft Library.) With typical generosity, he gave me the Leica he used to make some his best photographs as a token of his appreciation.

I had my third drink of the Rainier Ale: The End of the Line series admiring his work. With three friends dead within a week, I’m now halfway done with the project, something I never imagined when I came up with the idea. I hope it will be like so many other of my works in alleged progress and remain uncompleted for a very long time.

6 May 2016

Manstruation

Abbie told Byron that he should wear a different outfit for tonight’s punctuation party at The Center for the Book, so he asked my advice. The alleged costume consisted of a one-word sign attached to his shoulderbag, “Manstruation.”

“I don’t see what that has to do with going to a punctuation event,” I admitted.

“It’s manstruation,” he explained, “that’s why I’m missing my period.”

“Ha ha full stop,” I replied.

“Abbie told me I’ll get in trouble if I wear that,” he continued. “What do you think?”

“She’s right,” I agreed, “so that’s why you must do it.”

I was shocked when he said he’d take my advice. Poor Byron, that should be an amusing party with lots of exclamation points.

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©2016 David Glenn Rinehart