Home alone

Here I thought we were getting along rather well, and then Marie ups and leaves me. Okay, it was a work trip and only for a few days, but what’s a bloke to do? Pine, panic or procrastinate? Anyway, she left me with steaks to fry, English goodies to eat, and instructions for all emergencies and eventualities. The goodies are never quite as good as the mind imagines (NEVER let on I said that), but at least they are plentiful, and the cat enjoys sharing them with me.

But bugger it, I miss her. She’s supposed to be here to jolly me along and pester me into doing things, and to rub my aching back and bolster my flagging mood, and to help me tie shoelaces and put on belts and find keys – and also to hug me and hold me. Anyway, I soldier on. Strange pains go unreported (not to be mentioned at work, as who knows if they are still waiting to pounce and push me out), insomnia goes unacknowledged (okay, the cat knows I’m up at 4am, but is supremely unsympathetic), odd sleeping/waking dreams are not retold and laughed at (I hate it when she does that, but miss it when she doesn’t).

I avoid going out over the weekend. I feel I am beginning to twitch, and though I realize this is probably not visible to others, it feels so obvious to me I can’t believe nobody would notice. My speech is also affected, with a dry mouth and rough throat not helping any – I have been given a referral to see a speech therapist, and I realize I should not put it off much longer. I’ll tell you about it when I’ve pulled myself together and been for an appointment.

Anyway, the big question is: has Marie left me with enough food? You would think so, but I have an impressive appetite these days (it must be the pills). I root around and find various hidden treasures – the ginger nuts secreted for some dark and rhubarby purpose, a forgotten scrabble game made of bad chocolate, the microwave popcorn put away as insurance in case of nuclear winter. I could of course pick as much fresh veg as I like in the garden, but I’m a man for whom VEG means ‘Von Ebner’s glands’ (tiny things to do with saliva).

We never used to call each other every day from trips away, but now Marie calls daily and we talk for much longer than we used to when I was well and she would call only once or twice in a week away. Of course, the unspoken issue for both of us is: am I at risk of doing something stupid or dangerous, forgetting to feed the cat or setting fire to the house, or will I go psycho with lack of sleep and hurt myself? Of course not, no way – but as the Parkinson’s progresses, I can feel myself becoming more careful and timid, avoiding what I fear might be risky situations. Since when was I like that? How dare this disease take away my carelessly accident-prone self?