Dave Iverson - Winter Stars: An elderly mother, an aging son, and lifes final journey

Title Page

winter

stars

an elderly mother, an aging son,
and lifes final jouney

Dave Iverson

Durham, NC

Copyright

Copyright 2022 Dave Iverson

Winter Stars: an elderly mother, an aging son,
and lifes final jouney

Dave Iverson

dwiverson@gmail.com

www.daveiversonauthor.com

Published 2022, by Light Messages Publishing

www.lightmessages.com

Durham, NC 27713 USA

SAN: 920-9298

E-book ISBN: 978-1-61153-449-8

Paperback ISBN: 978-1-61153-448-1

Hardcover ISBN: 978-1-61153-463-4

Library of Congress Control Number: 2021950535

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, except as permitted under Section 107 or 108 of the 1976 International Copyright Act, without the prior written permission except in brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

All royalties from the sale of Winter Stars go to support: The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinsons Research; Dance for PD; and Avenidas, a San Francisco Bay Area organization providing caregiver support.

Dedication

For Adelaide

Eileen and Sinai

and Lynn

Prologue

In the fall of 2013 , I walked into the kitchen of my moms house in Menlo Park, California. She was 101 years old, and the early stages of dementia were beginning to take hold. She looked up at me and said:

I think there are two Adelaides. Theres the good Adelaide
the one whos pretty and smart and knows how to do things.
And theres the bad Adelaide
the one whos ugly and stupid and cant do anything.

Im not sure which one is here right now, but I think its the bad Adelaide.

z

My mom had always been a force. Shed graduated from high school at age sixteen, from college at twentyand at the top of her class in both. Shed been a teacher, a devoted spouse, a mother of three, a passionate sports fan, a loyal friend, and a powerhouse volunteer. When she was ninety-four, she threw out the first pitch at a Stanford University baseball game. At ninety-six, she made phone calls, in her own distinctive style, urging people to vote for Barack Obama.

Now the long arc of her remarkable life was turning in a new direction, yet shed been able to describe what was happening to her with searing precisionand without tears. She was like that. She didnt blink, confronting most challenges with a firm, no-nonsense demeanor. No one ever trifled with Adelaide Iverson, and that included me.

Id moved in with my mom six years before. After my dad died, shed lived independently for thirteen years. But at age ninety-five, she had a difficult bout with pneumonia and couldnt manage fully on her own. I was a broadcaster and filmmaker, living in nearby San Francisco at the time. My life was full but flexible, and it didnt take much deliberation to decide that it just made sense for me to move in and help. My mom and I had always been close. We shared interests and passions. But more than that, thered always been a certain ease to our relationship. We understood each other. We were a comfortable pairing. And with that, at the age of fifty-nine, I moved back into my boyhood home.

But there was a great deal I didnt know. I didnt know I would become so exhausted. I didnt know I would be capable of getting so angry. I didnt know that I would be tested in ways Id never imagined, or rewarded in ways Id never dreamed. I didnt know that someone with dementia can still be poetic, or that Id get proficient at transferring my mom from bed to commode and back again, but never quite master the intimate skill of changing diapers. I didnt know Id be joined and strengthened by remarkable women caregivers who became my teachers, my comrades, and my kin. Or that Id discover that the Parkinsons disease Id been diagnosed with a few years before would present fewer challenges than being a caregiver. I didnt anticipate that during this time, the two most meaningful professional experiences of my life would take place, or that Id wind up getting married. And I never imagined that after I moved back in, my mom would live for another full decade, before passing away at the age of 105.

The ten-year caregiving odyssey we shared affected me, humbled me, and reoriented me more than any other experience in my life. And during that decade together, my mom and I drew closerId like to think, both to each other and to our truest selves.

This is the story of our journey, and of the remarkable women who accompanied us and changed our lives.

I
SETTING FORTH

1
The Ten-Second Decision

Everyone thought my parents had a terrific marriage, because they did. My dad had a wonderful career as a professor and dean at Stanford University, but everyone knew it was my mom who was the real force to reckon with. My dad knew it, too, and he loved her for it.

World War II may have delayed the start of their life together, but that long separation also fueled their romance and forged their lasting bond. My parents adored each other. They were Adelaide and Bill. Always. Nothing could change that, including my dads final years with Parkinsons disease, which they managed as theyd managed everything. Together.

My parents had been married just over fifty years when my dad passed away in 1994, at the age of eighty-two. We had a lovely memorial, attended by hundreds of friends and family.

At the close of an emotional service, my mom remained sitting for a few moments, and then she stood up smartly and said, Well, lets get going.

Shed loved my dad with ferocious loyalty, but she was never one for lingering goodbyes. She always focused on what she was going to do next.

For the next thirteen years, my Mom led a determined life, living alone in the Menlo Park home where my brothers and I had grown up. For more than half of that time, she continued to driveand she drove well. She visited friends and family, attended Stanford University sports events, League of Women Voters meetings, movies, and the theater. Once, she told me how she still missed putting her arm around my dad at night. But she didnt pine for their shared past, even while continuing to cherish the life shed had with him.

And she was that way about her own life story, too. She remembered everything: what she wore to a ball at the University of Michigan, what score she got on a particular test, where anyone and everyone went to college. She had an interior card catalogue for all of it, but the past didnt orient her daily priorities. It was the same with old grievances. She was fully capable of holding onto grudges, but she didnt nurse or cultivate them. She just filed them away on the shelves of her prodigious memory, and only brought them out for display when she felt it was useful to do so.

She carried her life story with her, but she didnt want to live there. I think thats why she read The New York Times cover to cover every morning until she was past a hundred years old. She was attached to the present, and as important, to action more than interior reflection. She was a very smart person, but hers was more a life in motion than a life of the mind.

And as I think about what contributed to her vibrant old age, perhaps no quality mattered more than her lack of apprehension. She didnt long for what was, nor did she fret about the future. Even after the death of my dadthe man she had loved and built her life aroundshe knew shed be OK.