Sunday

Given that Mum was so calm and lucid yesterday, I was surprised to find she was already at the Sheets And Pillows Everywhere phase of her Sleepy/Active cycle. She hadn’t yet made it to the Legs Over The Bedrail phase but she didn’t seem far off it.

The first thing she said to me was that she didn’t know where Nicholas had got to. He was “messing around out there somewhere” and I was sent out of the room to tell him that she’d been “waiting since twenty-five past nine” and that she was “really annoyed”.

The standard operating procedure when being sent out on an urgent errand is to leave the room, count to ten and return to report that the task had been completed.

“He’ll be round here in a minute Mum.”

“Oh.”

“You know what Nicholas’s problem is, don’t you?”

“What’s that?”

“He’s as daft as a brush.”

“Yes. Yes he is. And as for his stupid brother, well…”

I never did work out who she thought I was.

I told her about my day. How we’d met a man with a metal detector when we were out walking The Dog this morning. How he’d told us that he hadn’t had any luck today but that he’d found musket balls and the metal ends of the tools Civil War soldiers had used to clean their muskets in the area before. How he’d once found some Roman coins.

“I heard about someone finding Roman coins once.”

“Did you Mum? Where was that? Here or at home?”

“Don’t know. Anywhere.”

Mum was uncooperative the whole time I was there. Offers to remake her bed, get her a drink and open the window were refused with a resolute “NO!”. She did accept the offer to flip the main pillow over so she got a cool, fresh side.

“Shall I read to you for a bit Mum?”

“Might as well”

“It’s up to you you know. I don’t have to…”

She just laughed.

The current story was about the parish priest getting alternative (less boring) suggestions for the topic of the book he was trying to write. When he decided to stick to his chosen topic he thought it would be a good idea if the providers of the alternative suggestions wrote their own books as they were so passionate about them. Sorry, I should’ve put a spoiler alert before saying that.

Mum stayed engaged throughout the chapter. Especially so once she stopped interrupting me.

“They’re good little stories these aren’t they?”

“Yes, they are.”

“They make you think.”

“Yeah.”

“You should write a book Mum”

“What?”

“Why don’t you write a book? You’re always coming up with great stories about the escapades your uncles got up to. You should write a book about them.”

“Yes. I could. I’ll do it this afternoon.”

I had been trying to work out where Mum was in her Sleepy/Active cycle. She’d really only woken up properly yesterday so it was way too soon to be behaving like this. But the strident attitude, the impatience, the lack of cooperation, the chattiness and the cheerfulness in spite of not having a good word to say about anyone were all hallmarks of Peak Active Mum. However, the fidgeting and fussing with her bedclothes were all very low key and slow motion and there had been no Other People with us so I had my doubts.

As soon as I had the thought about there being no Other People, there they were. She asked me about the children sleeping at the bottom of the bed.

And then, suddenly, she was falling asleep.

“I’ll leave you to get forty winks Mum and I’ll come back after you’ve had a kip”

“Alright”

As I was leaving the room, she came to briefly.

“And don’t be long!”

Bloody hell.

Bibliography

Tales from the Parish: 31 humorous short stories about community, family and village life, set in the English countryside

Kindle Edition

by Stefania Hartley

Author’s Note

My Mum is in a nursing home in a small village in the Thames Valley. The photo is not of the home. I used an AI image generator to give the reader some idea of the home she’s in.

All, some or maybe even none (you’ll never know!) of the names have been changed to protect privacy and hide real identities. If you think you recognise someone then let me know and I’ll edit the post or remove it entirely