snakes redux

Normally when I get here in the evening, Dad has finished his dinner, but tonight he has only eaten his salad, which was sitting on the counter, and forgotten his main course, which was sitting in the microwave. I reheated it and heated my own meal. “You don’t make a sound while you’re eating,” Dad said. “I’m finished eating Dad,” I replied. “You’re a speed demon,” said the man who takes an hour to eat a meal.

One of the harder parts about Dad’s condition right now is that he’s still together enough to be aware of his deficits. Tonight, he said, “Have you noticed my speech is not very good anymore? I used to go bing bing bing bing bing . . . “

Dad and I are talking about money. “Cats?” says Dad, confused, “I never had a lot of cats.” “Not cats,” I say, “cash, like money, cash.” I can’t tell if these misunderstandings are due to hearing loss or breakdowns in the auditory processing centers of his brain. I guess it doesn’t matter that much. The net effect is the same.

“You are my favorite person, whether you kick me out or not,” Dad says. Nobody’s said anything about kicking him out. “Why would I kick you out?” I ask him. “I don’t know,” he says.

“You know what I’m afraid of?” Dad asks me. “That you’ll vanish, disappear.” “I’m not going to do that,” I reassure him. “Why would I disappear?” I ask him, wondering if he has something in particular in mind. “I don’t know,” he says, “I guess I’m scared.” “There’s something about you that gets me, I don’t know what it is, he tells me. “Maybe because you’ve known me all my life,” I suggest. “Maybe that’s it. I think somehow or other, you’re a very powerful person, you know what’s what ,” he says.

“I think the average should be 3. Everyone should have three kids,” declares Dad. “I don’t need children, because I have cats to take of,” I tell him. I have him to take care of, too, but I don’t say that aloud. “There’s a difference between kids and cats, right?” he asks. “You don’t have to buy clothes for cats,” I tell him, though that’s not the crucial difference, obviously. Dad laughs. “That would be 14 . . .” he says. “Pairs of sneakers,” I fill in. Then I correct myself, “Actually 28 because cats have 4 legs.” Dad laughs some more. He can still enjoy a bit of silliness.

“Do you know what I’m afraid of?” Dad asks again. “That you’ll leave me.” “I’m not going to leave you,” I reassure him again.

“Are you playing checkers?” Dad asks, out of the blue. I guess the sound of my fingers on the keyboard reminds him of checkers clicking against the board. “No, I’m typing,” I tell him. “Typing!” he exclaims. “ I don’t hear any noise!” “Computers type more quietly,” I explain, thinking of his manual typewriter packed away in the closet and how much force you have to use on the keys.

“I see snakes all the time, if I just think about it,” says Dad. “And they always disappear. I think I’m going crazy. Do you have anything like that, something that’s with you all the time, in a sense?” He wants to know. “No,” I tell him. “I wonder what caused this snake thing. Are you scared of snakes?” he asks. “Yes,” I tell him. “I am, too,” he says. I’m surprised. I always thought he liked snakes. “All the time that one snake curves around a corner. This has been going on for years and years and years,” he says. “You must be used to it by now,” I say. “I am, doesn’t bother me at all. It’s always the same, a snake curving around the corner.”

“I do think that my apparatus is kind of crazy,” says Dad. His apparatus? “Your brain?” I ask. “Maybe my brain, no, I don’t think so. I keep seeing certain things about, things, over and over and over and they never stop, they keep repeating themselves and I say, ‘here it comes again’ and it lasts a few minutes and then it goes.”

I get out Ruth Reichl’s “Comfort me with Apples” and read him a couple of chapters. We have it on tape, but the player’s acting crazy. Afterwards, Dad says “Ho, ho, ho,” quietly, and for no apparent reason, “not the way to go.” He says this every now and then lately, not in a meaningful way, but apparently just for the rhyme. He uses “where you at, kitty cat,” in the same way, saying it even if the cat is sitting on his foot or in another equally noticeable location.

Dad’s questioning Kate S. about the sex party thing again. Now, his primary concern is whether conversation is different when you’re clothed vs. nude! You never know where his focus is going to wind up.