So, Mom wants me to pull the plug on her when the time comes. She doesn't think Karen will do it.
"I'm just worried it will be too hard for Karen," she told me, "and she won't be able to let me go. I'm counting on you because Karen is so...you know..." Her voice drifted off.
I waited.
What? Karen is so...what, Mom?
What is Karen that I am not, that would make me the obvious daughter to pull the plug? It makes it sound like, between the two of us, Karen would be keening in the corner, pleading with the doctors to prolong Mom's life, and I'd be, all, "hey, Karen, I just pulled it; how about us going downstairs to the cafeteria? They have a nice tuna sandwich."
I suppose Mom is right. I don't think it would happen the other way around. Karen is never hungry. She isn't the kind of daughter who, sitting vigil by her beloved mother's side, would think about food.
Whereas I cannot think of a moment that I haven't thought about food. In fact, I started this post last June but I got hungry after I typed the words "tuna sandwich" and I took a two-month lunch break after the fifth paragraph.
The other day at the market, the woman in front of me at the deli counter asked the guy if he would open the package of tofu sausages so she could buy just one.
"It's just me," she explained to me, "I just need one for dinner."
I laughed - you know, that convivial, sarcastic, unifying kind of "Right. Good one," snort that brings strangers together at the deli aisle, and results in world peace.
Then it dawned on me that she wasn't kidding. She was only going to eat ONE tofu sausage for dinner.
Fuck. I eat ONE sausage while grilling the other ones for my dinner. And then I eat another one while cleaning up from dinner.
On an unrelated note, my underpants are getting tight. I think my dryer is set too high.
When your underpants are too tight, nothing is right with the world. I swear, I could get a call right this second saying that I won a billion dollars, that my novel is going to be published, war has been eradicated in the universe, and cancer has been cured, and I would think, "My underpants are too tight."
I should probably do something about it.
I meant to get in shape in the early 90's but I never diet during Republican administrations. I feel one should beef up when social services are at stake. Just in case.
And then in '08 I read in snopes that Curves is owned by right-wing, Tea Party reactionaries, so I canceled my membership even though we had just elected a Democratic president and I wanted to look hot for him. I took one for the party. I stopped working out. I'm kind of an ironic activist that way.
Anyway, luckily, Mom is going anywhere. She just celebrated her 90th birthday with a Zumba party. And I Googled the Zumba corporation and read that they just donated a lot of money to fight world hunger. Which I support because I know the pain of hunger. I just ate five tofu sausages and I'm hungry.
Let's end hunger. I'll pull the plug.
Then we'll go get something to eat.
Laughed my ass off. Keep writing. Where have you been all my life
Posted by: Michel Eisner | 08/14/2014 at 05:11 PM