Van Nuys
January 30, 2016
Our latest visit with Margaret was a quiet picnic in the backyard of the board and care home where she lives. She spent four nights in the hospital this past week, admitted for a bleeding ulcer but kept for observation and treatment of cardiac issues. As Meredith’s sister Kathleen wryly observed, it is like taking your car in for an oil change, only to have the mechanic find other problems.
In any event, we did not want to tire Margaret out with an extended outing, so we brought in sandwiches. After lunch we called the Seattle granddaughters on FaceTime, and gave them a chance to chat with Margaret. Then we played a cooperative game of Happy Traveler with her. HT is a long out of print game from the early 1990’s that we enjoyed playing with our kids on car trips in the past. Categories such as “things associated with trains,” “types of vegetables,” “things at a fair,” and “summer things” prompted input from Margaret, and she shared several memories. She told us about her Girl Scout summer camp Wayaka in Maine, and we compared notes about favorite things from country fairs in the past.
Before the hospital admission we had planned to take Margaret to see the new exhibitions at the Craft and Folk Arts museum on Wilshire. We may go there on our next visit, if nothing else comes up in the meantime.