Chocolate: the opiate of old age

Mother is sitting at a table by herself. Her fingers rest on the edge of a cup and saucer half full of spilt tea. Her eyes are open, and her head is tilted backwards, perhaps thirty degrees. I can’t tell if she is gazing up a slight incline towards Heaven or is asleep. Whichever itContinue reading “Chocolate: the opiate of old age”

Do I owe you anything?

It’s Easter Sunday. I’m visiting Mum in the nursing home. The sun has a smile on its face wider than Jurgen Klopp’s after his FA Cup semi-final win yesterday against Manchester City.  ELO’s Mr Blue Sky is booming out of every radio station. Hey, hey, hey. Choirs of lollipop men At the roadside, daffodils swayContinue reading “Do I owe you anything?”

A bad dementia day

At the nursing home my mother, like an eccentric monarch interrogating a much-missed servant, starts hurling questions at me. I haven’t  even stepped over the threshold of her room. Her questions merge into one current of untamed thought. Words cascade from her like one fluid sentence from James Joyce’s ‘Finnegan’s Wake’ or some other impenetrableContinue reading “A bad dementia day”