I've been looking at (I say "looking at," because I'm generally not a reader per se), a book called, "Hooray for Yiddish" by Leo Rosten. He's also the author of "The Joys of Yiddish" I've spoken about before, that if you ever want a good laugh, pick up and read these books. It's true that if you're Jewish that would help to understand this humor, but even if you're not, you will enjoy the sounds and meanings of Yiddish words. Yiddish is a very old language consisting of Hebrew, German and Slavic languages -- a "fusion" of languages. It was a language I was raised with, since all of my older relatives spoke it and especially spoke it when they didn't want us kids to know what they were saying. Pretty much all of those people have passed on and so this is very rarely spoken in my parent's house now unless she's talking to an old friend. We do say certain words in Yiddish, of course, but I haven't heard a whole conversation in a long, long time.
My mother has another doctor appointment this Wednesday. Their office called to confirm today and I'm glad they did because of what happened last week. My mom had told me that she had a doctor appointment on Monday at 1:30, so I took her over there on time. It's quite a schlep from the car to the office and so I dropped my mom off at the door so she could go on up. I parked the car and then went up to the office only to find my mom standing there sheepish-looking, smiling and saying, "Oh honey, I thought the appointent was today! (Uncomfortable chuckle.) It's tomorrow at 1:30." I sat down to catch my breath and didn't say anything to my mom because I wouldn't have said anything kind, so I bit my tongue. Then, down we went, back to get the car and go home. This has happened more than 3 or 4 times now. So from now on, I'm asking my mom to confirm her or my dad's appointments ahead of time.
I guess I have to blame this on my mom's early dementia. She seems confused about a lot of things, and then clear about others. On Thanksgiving, when we had all those people over, she sat there eating and said only a few words. It was kind of strange, but she seemed perfectly content to just eat and basically ignore everyone. She sat next to me and across from a friend of hers and seemed to be quite comfortable. My dad sat at the other end of the table and was stuck by my mother's cousin who is loud and obnoxious. He looked pretty miserable. My dad also just basically ate and said very little. It was all very odd. My mom's cousin monopolized the whole conversation. I said a few things I probably shouldn't have to this woman because she was getting on my nerves. She brought two pies - a berry and chocolate cream and she kept telling me that we didn't need the chocolate cream one since I made Tiramisu and I kept telling her we would still be able to use it. She kept arguing with me about it and I just put it out anyway. Why did she bring the bloody pie if she didn't want me to put it out? I envisioned pushing the whole pie in her face. Ah, but alas, I'm a grownup and you can't do those kinds of things when you're a grownup. My dad really liked it and I was going to give him some the next day, but it was gone. She had taken it home. Idiot.
I've never really liked my parents' relatives, from the time I was a young girl. Some of them were "too Jewish" or obnoxious or geeks. I guess I thought I was too cool for any of them. I hated family holidays when our relatives came to our house and even worse, if we had to go to theirs. I would hole myself up in my room if they came over to my house. I just sat and waited to leave if we had to go to theirs. It was never fun because my brothers and I had nothing in common with any of them. I really don't know why - we just didn't.
I'm looking forward to going home and spending the holidays with my kids and grandkids. That's who I'm the most comfortable with. Even though we do a lot of arguing and fussing, I missed my family on Thanksgiving. And Christmas is my favorite holiday, and I'll be spending it with them. I love to see my grandkids light up with joy when they open their Christmas presents - it gives me a lot of joy too. It's really true that it's better to give than to receive. That is, if it's not a chocolate cream pie...
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