So, I’ve come to realize I’ve misspelled Niagara at every opportunity. The spelling in this post title is correct, in the video captions at the end . . . not so much.
How did Niagara Falls get its name?
“One of the earliest native tribes called themselves the “Onguiaahra”. It is a name from which the “Niagara River” originated.
The French explorers that came to Niagara gave this Indian tribe the name “Neutrals” because of their position and status as peace keepers between the two warring Indian nations – the Huron’s and the Iroquois.
Niagara Falls State Park is the oldest state park in the United States of America, established in 1885 as the Niagara Reservation.
In 1969, an earthen dam was built across the head of the American Rapids, dewatering the American Falls. For six months, geologists and engineers studied the rock face and the effects of erosion. It was determined that it would be too costly to remove rock at the base of the American Falls, and that nature should take its course.
The Falls are capable of producing over 4 million kilowatts of electricity, which is shared by the United States and Canada.
The Niagara River is actually a strait, connecting two large bodies of water, Lake Erie and Lake Ontario.
Four of the five Great Lakes drain into the Niagara River, (Superior, Michigan, Huron and Erie) before emptying into Lake Ontario. These five Great Lakes make up almost one-fifth of the world’s fresh water supply.
At one time, before Goat Island became part of Niagara Falls State Park, there were suggestions on what the island could be used for. Mr. Vanderbilt planned to use the island as a pleasure ground for people riding his trains to the falls. P.T. Barnum wanted to turn Goat Island into circus grounds!
People over the falls
Over the years a lot of people have gone over the falls intentionally as a stunt, intentionally as a suicide attempt, and accidentally. Most don’t survive.
Daredevils:
“Between 1901 and 1985, ten people went over the Falls in a ball, barrel or rig. Seven were successful while three died in the attempt. […] Thus far 15 people have challenged the Falls of Niagara between 1901 and 1995. Five have died.” (http://www.niagarafrontier.com/faq.html#why)
Suicide Attempts:
“Niagara Falls has earned a grisly reputation as the suicide capital of the U.S., second only to San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge. […] Experts estimate there are between 20 to 25 suicides at the Falls each year.”
“In June of this year, a 51 year old woman who had been swimming in the river above the falls got swept into the rapids and plunged down horseshoe falls. It was believed to be a suicide.”
“A 19-year-old Japanese student apparently fell to her death after climbing over a safety railing for a photograph at Niagara Falls. When local police and firefighters went searching for her, they instead uncovered the body of an unidentified, unrelated man from the whirlpools at the bottom of the falls.”
“The simple answer is – yes they do. They do all the time and most survive the rigorous journey. The fish is for the most part is much better built to survive the journey than most humans.” (http://www.niagarafrontier.com/faq.html#fish)
This video was made using iMovie and iPhoto on a MacBookPro and then uploading it to YouTube.
As we approached Niagra Falls on the highway, I saw off to my left what looked like a broad stretch of steam rising from the ground. From a distance, the Falls announce themselves like a boiling pot of water from which only the steam is visible. But the Niagra water droplets shooting into the air are not hot, they are a cool, fresh mist that rises as the water falls.
As I stand above the falls, the mist rises up and arches over, spraying me with a light and cool sprinkle that wets my hair, and clouds my glasses and camera lens.
The water’s fall is awesome in its power.
The mist’s rise is magical.
The American Falls on the Niagra River as viewed from Goat Island in Niagra Falls State Park — August 28, 2011The mist rises up from the Horsehoe Falls viewed from Terrapin Point on Goat Island — August 28, 2011
“As traditional ideas of high and low art have been redefined, art forms such as crafting, (including such extensions of craft as yarn bombing), video art, digital art, street art, and graffiti have made their way into national and local galleries. Instead of diminishing classical standards for art, the emergence of these art forms has created a wider acceptance for new media and methods of expression.” Jill Greenberg, Artvoice
Our son Matthew had his first art showing at a gallery this past weekend in Buffalo, NY. He was fortunate to receive nice press coverage with a short article in the Buffalo newspaper, and a feature in Artvoice, a popular weekly newspaper distributed for free in the local area. A large picture of the above mural appeared on the cover of this Artvoice this week.
This publicity was a big deal, as we came to realize over the course of the weekend through our conversations with Matthew’s friends and acquaintances. It was fun because our hotel lobby had a stack of Artvoice with Matt’s painting on it. We soon realized his artwork was spread throughout town as we encountered the publication at grocery stores, restaurants and the local college cafe.
We arrived in Buffalo Friday afternoon to help Matthew with the last minute preparations. His show consisted of paintings on boards, pen and marker sketches on paper and paintings on carpets.
I might describe Matthew’s artwork as whimsical with an edge. He creates captivating characters like the little dog in the striped sweater in the above mural, but places the little dog with his buddies in the mouth of green creature with jagged fingernails. Matthew says that he throws things into his artwork to make people a little uncomfortable. He wants to allow them to explore their discomfort. The jagged fingernails really get to me. I don’t understand why.
Some of his artwork contains social commentary. Frequently he uses letters in his paintings and sketches that form words that are not always readily apparent to the casual observer. The animals in the above mural spell out the name of his show — Ogre Hungry.
This slideshow requires JavaScript.
In an interview with Franklin Aquilina, Matthew “says that he gains inspiration for his work everywhere. ‘I’m an avid reader,’ he said. ‘I also surf the net a lot, and draw inspiration from everything. Lately I’ve been influenced by Mayan art.'”
A few days before the gallery showing I asked Matthew if he was going to show my favorite piece. When he said he was, I put dibs on it. I’ll be framing this and hanging it in my home soon.
Claude Monet is one of my favorite painters. I love impressionism. Monet spent a lot of time at his home in Giverny, France surrounded by beautiful abundant floral gardens. His gardens inspired his fabulous paintings. You can read more about Claude Monet and Giverny here and view samples of much of his floral artwork here.
One of the highlights of my 2004 trip to Europe with my daughter and her high school group was a stop at Giverny.
A flower among flowers — My daughter Anna at Giverny, France 2004
The list of my dad’s ailments, challenges, or disabilities is daunting at times.
He’s had urinary incontinent since he received radiation treatment for prostate cancer ten years ago. More recently his incontinence has expanded to include occasional bowel accidents. I understand it is possible this too could be a result of all that radiation years ago. It also could simply be a progressive symptom of his Alzheimer’s.
Dad has difficulty walking. He has arthritis and had knee surgery years ago. Some of this could be attributing to his difficulty walking. He can use a walker for short distances if he is monitored.
My mom has to help my dad get in and out of bed. He seems to lose his coordination or strength and is no longer able to sit on the side of a bed and lie down. Mom discovered that the best way to get him in bed is to have him crawl up from the foot of the bed. He likes to sleep on his stomach, so this removes the problem of getting him to roll over in a small space. When he gets up, Mom has to encourage him to roll across the queen-sized bed from his stomach to his side. When he is on the opposite side of the bed, she helps him get his legs down to the floor and lets him pull himself up by holding onto her hands as she stands bracing herself against his pull.
It’s not ideal, but it works.
Part of the problem appears to be that Dad has lost strength in his left side. In fact, we are becoming more and more convinced that in addition to Alzheimer’s, Dad may have also suffered a small stroke at some point leading to the loss of strength on his left side. When Dad initially went to the doctor with cognitive problems in the middle of 2008, he had an MRI that ruled out a stroke. But he could have had one since. A stroke could also be contributing to the fact that Dad cries very easily and fairly often now. It could be attributing to Dad’s problem with eating and swallowing food and the fact that he sometimes “pockets” food in the side of his mouth during a meal.
I suppose a stroke could also be responsible for Dad’s seeming inability or reluctance to speak.
Who knows? How would you tell if his problems are stroke or Alzheimer’s related? What difference would it make?
Mom also believes Dad is depressed and has been for some time. I would be too.
Sometimes when we try to get help for Dad I feel like we are a ball in a bumper pool game. One professional evaluates and then bumps us to the next.
We started with a visiting physician because it has become so difficult to get Dad in and out of a car. Visiting physicians come on a monthly schedule. They don’t have time for unscheduled visits. So if Dad is sick it has to be handled through phone calls or some other way. We recently suspected Dad had a urinary tract infection, which is common with the elderly, and almost a chronic condition for Dad as a result of the side effects of his prostate cancer treatments. We called the visiting physician’s office who asked Mom if we have a visiting nurse.
After a few phone calls and a house visit, we now have a visiting nurse who will stop by and check on Dad weekly. The nurse who assessed Dad’s needs told us she thought he might benefit from therapy: physical, occupational, and speech. She talked about therapists coming three times a week at first. Three therapists, three times a week, a weekly visit from a nurse and a monthly visit from a physician is quite a lot of visits, especially when you consider my dad takes a lengthy nap in the middle of the day.
Mom settled on having just the physical therapist come for now.
The therapist happened to come yesterday to evaluate Dad’s needs when I was visiting my parents . The therapist thinks they may be able to problem-solve Dad’s getting in and out of bed issues and also help him some with his walking.
Here’s where the expectations come in. While the therapist was here, Dad was able to speak one-word answers to most of her questions. I start hoping. I think, maybe most of Dad’s problems are stroke-related. Maybe he can greatly improve with therapy.
And then the therapist started asking him questions: What’s your name? When is your birthdate? Who’s the president? What’s today’s date? How many children do you have? What are their names?
Dad did surprisingly well with many of the questions, although he had to use his little calendar reference to answer the date question and he couldn’t tell her the year. But he didn’t know how many children he had. And at first, he could only give the therapist my sister Annie’s name, who he refers to by her full name, Diane. When I stepped back in the room and he saw me, he was able to tell her my name. I suggested that he start with the oldest and tell her all our names.
“Who is your number 1 daughter?” I asked. Dad used to refer to us by our “number” if he was introducing us to someone. I’m the number 3 daughter. Dad got my oldest sister’s name correct, but was stumped when I asked, “Who’s next?” He struggled for a while and said, “Is Jerry next?” My brother is the youngest. With some additional prodding and some clues, he eventually was able to name all five of us.
Here’s the thing. I can’t allow myself to be falsely lured into believing that Dad is going to get better in more than an incremental way. I have to keep my expectations realistic and under control. I’m not going to get my Dad back.
Maybe therapy will help my dad get in and out of bed a little bit better, but it’s not going to help him always be able to remember my name.
I’m going to share a few tips with you I’ve learned about putting pictures on the web, and about WordPress in particular. If you use Blogger or some other software, I don’t know how much of this will apply, but you might pick up a tip or two.
Sometimes I find inserting and formatting images into posts the most frustrating challenge of blogging. You may already know all of this, and more. Feel free to move on, or stay and enlighten us with a comment about a tip or two you may know. Don’t miss the Eiffel Tower photos at the end.
Let me start by saying I am far from being an expert. What I know I’ve learned largely from trial and error.
Here’s what the WordPress “Add New Post” screen looks like. I got this photo from taking a screen shot on my Mac by holding down the keys: command-shift-3. The computer saves a png file of the image on my screen to my desktop. I can open the saved file with my photo editing software, in this case photoshop, and crop it to whatever I want. PCs come with a “print screen” button that saves the image to your clipboard where you can paste it into a new file in your image editing software like photoshop or elements. I learned this about the PC this morning from this website where I also learned a few more tips about saving a screen shot on a mac. I’ll go back and look at it in more detail later.
Beside the circled Upload/Insert Image button, are the other buttons for uploading and inserting video, audio, media, poll, and custom form. I might have uploaded a video before, but otherwise I haven’t tried out any of these other buttons. When you click the insert image this is the next screen you get:
The tabs across the top: From computer, From URL, Gallery, and Media Library are the places you can upload or insert a photo from. I use the default, “from computer” 99% of the time.
When I want to use a photo, first I edit it and crop it in Photoshop (but other image editing software will work just as well). Then I resize it to 1000 pixels wide for landscape and 700 pixels high for portrait orientations. The smaller the picture size, the less memory space it consumes. (You can see how much memory space you have left at the bottom of the screen pictured above. I have (89.1%) left. As the monitor screen size limits the actual viewing size of the photo it is pointless to upload huge photo files. My particular WordPress theme has a 590 pixel post width. So technically I could resize down to that. I leave my images larger, at 1000 pixels, in case someone else has a larger viewing area. (I also think if someone clicks on the photo they may see a larger image this way, but I haven’t checked that out.) I resize the vertical dimension of portrait oriented photos because I don’t like to have to scroll down to see the entire image. I think 700 fits fairly well on my screen.
This is important. I save the photo with a unique name on my desktop. I learned this the hard way. At one point I thought it would be easier to just number my photos for any given post to save time in thinking of and typing names for each of them. Here’s what I learned.
Photos are uploaded into your media library and stored there. If I upload a second image with the same name as a previous image, even if it is from months ago, the new image will replace the old one in the media library and in the post it was originally uploaded to. So it’s important to give your photos a unique name. I have 870 images in my media library at this point in this post. I can’t possibly remember what I’ve named all these photos, so I’ve started using today’s date, including the year which makes it unique, as part of the name for each photo I upload today. For example, I named the image directly above “01-02-add-an-image-08-24-2011”. (The 01-02 at the beginning are just my way of keeping the images in chronological order in my image folder.)
Once my images are ready to go, named, and saved on my desktop where I can easily find them, it is a simple matter to click “Select File” on the screen above and browse to the photo I want to insert, at which point I will get the following screen:
The items I’ve circled are descriptors I can use with each photo. Mostly I leave these empty because they take time. But if I wanted to be thorough and use every tool at my disposal to advertise my blog, I would take the time to fill these in. Using a good descriptor of the picture for its title will add important key words to your post for the search engines. If this was the Eiffel Tower, for example, and I titled the picture “Eiffel Tower,” that is one more time those words are on my post adding emphasis to them and helping their rank in the search engines. The more times something appears on the page, the more emphasis it gets in the search engines. The same holds true for the “alternate text” above. This is text that will show up on a reader’s computer screen if they have turned image-loading off for the sake of speed. If I type “Eiffel Tower” here, it is one more place to get those words into this post.
The caption shows up at the bottom of the photo on your post. Again, descriptive words are good to have here if you are trying to maximize your exposure.
To be truthful, I’m not sure what happens if you use a description. I’m going to have to play with this one and find out. Do you know?
Finally the link URL is just the address your little picture has on the great world wide web. If you select and copy that, you could paste it in an e-mail for example. When the recipient clicked on it, they would see your picture. I use it if I want to reuse a particular photo in a post, like my little manuscript image that I use in my Successful Self-Publishing posts.
Gosh, it took me along time to get to the part I really wanted to show you, about positioning your photo on the post.
You can actually do a little photo editing in this window if you click on the “edit image” button at the top. You can crop, and flip photos for example. I never use this because I edit my photos earlier.
You can do the initial formatting of the picture at the bottom of the “Add an Image” window. You can choose the alignment here and the size of the picture. I typically use “none” and then center the image on my screen (which ends up being the same as if I just selected the “center” button). Since my photo is wide enough to take up most or all of the space, this keeps all text above and below the image. If I chose “left,” the text would wrap around the image on the right side. You can see in the small graphic beside each choice what the text-image relationship will look like.
I also usually use the full size for the image, unless I want to wrap the text around it, then I use the “medium”. (I’m not even sure if the “large” button works.) If I use a smaller size, like medium or thumbnail, the reader can always click on the small image and will be able to view the original larger image I uploaded if they’d like. The “Link URL” will take them there.
You can do more formatting on pictures, but first you have to save all changes, and go to the picture on your blog post window. When you click on the image, two little buttons show up. (I couldn’t capture them with my screen shot.) One button looks like a small photograph of a mountain (edit image) and the other is the circle with a slanted line for “no”, as in “no smoking,” (delete). If you click on the edit image button, you get the following screen:
The important thing about this window, is the “advanced” tab at the top. That’s where you have a few more options.
At the top, along the left, you have the option of changing the size of the photo as it appears in your post by a percentage. I’ve used this when I’ve aligned an image to the left and wrapped text around it. I may think that it is a bit too large, so I may reduce the size to 70% or less. Only the size of the image in the post changes, not the size of the original file.
In the “Advanced Image Settings” you can see the source of the photo (which is just its URL), and the size of the photo. CSS stands for Cascading Style Sheets, which are directions a programmer or user can give to tell the computer how to display the information. CSS rules for fonts, for example, might include the name like Times New Roman, the font size like 12. This comes in handy if you have a website and you want to keep all your headings the same size, and style. You could create a CSS rule for “main heading” and define the details. Then use that “main heading” rule whenever you wanted to put in a heading. For most people’s purposes it’s not necessary to understand, but if you have pages and pages on a website, it helps to keep things uniform.
In this case the CSS class just tells me what I’ve already defined. The size is “full” (as opposed to “medium” or “thumbnail”). I’m not sure about the WP-image-3113, but think that is a WordPress standard. Do you know? And finally, the “aligncenter” I chose from my alignment options.
You’ll notice that under “styles” in the image way up there, I have a solid black border that is 3 pixels thick. I put the border around my photo by using this advanced editing window. In “Image Properties” border box, I simply typed a “3” which told the computer to put a 3 pixel wide border around my photo. I didn’t have any choice about the color. (For the image to your left, I used a 1px border).
The “Image property” I like the best is the “horizontal space.” This allows me to insert a small space between the image and the text if I have left- or right-aligned the image. I just type a number, and that’s the amount of pixels that will separate the image from the text.
The first image of the Eiffel Tower does not have any horizontal space (although it appears WordPress has automatically added some for me, which is nice, I suppose). I added 30px horizontal space to the second one, then went back and edited the CSS to delete the “margin left” leaving the 30px margin on the right. I also added vertical space. I had to fool around with this for a while to get something I liked when I previewed it on the web. What I see on my “add new post” window does not look exactly like what I see when I actually post it. I usually preview my posts so I know what I’m getting, at least on my computer.
All of this might look completely goofed up on your computer. If it does, could you take a screen shot and send it to me?
I hope you’ll share with me the tips you know about how to use photos on the blogs.
I haven’t been able to give you an update on my self-publishing progress in a while, and I still can’t today. I am in a holding pattern while I wait for design work to be completed. I hope to be able to share my cover design with you soon.
Instead of writing about my progress, or lack of, I decided to write about the progress of one of my blogging buddies. JoDee Luna writes a blog at JoDeeLuna.wordpress.com. She is an educator, a writer, and artist, and an extremely creative individual. She calls herself a creative eclectic and has written a book entitled Refrain from the Identicalthat she is in the process of self-publishing.
Below I share with you an abbreviated version of her journey towards self-publishing, with links to the longer posts if you would like to read more. The story I’ve included begins about a year and a half ago, although JoDee’s journey started well before that. JoDee shares not only the steps she’s taking towards self-publishing, but also the emotional ups and downs throughout the process. I think you’ll enjoy her story.
(February 21, 2010) — ” . . . I anticipated the package to contain vital information about my editor’s decision to agent my first book. The package finally arrived yesterday but not as I had expected. Instead of waiting by the door, it was crammed into our tiny mailbox slot. As I tried to pull it out along with the other mail, I could see the large envelop was torn open and the manuscript had partially fallen out. [. . .] The editor had decided to “wait a little bit” unsure that a large enough market for my book existed. She suggested that I self-publish in order to maintain control of the rights and encouraged me that people would buy my book.”
(June 30, 2010) — “I’m in the Valley of Publishing Decision and this barren wasteland stretches out as far as my eyes can see. Back in March, I bought a self-publishing package from Createspace, Amazon.com’s new self-publishing company. I’ve gone back and forth struggling between whether to draft a nonfiction book proposal and try to pitch my first book to traditional publishers or to self-publish.”
(July 13th, 2011) — “I’m braver in the morning. What curls my toes come nightfall, wiggles them when the sun peeks over the horizon. Most new projects overwhelm me before my head hits the pillow; but in the morning, I dare to dream big. [. . .]One morning this week, I took a giant step and pushed right through a big puddle of fear; I uploaded my first manuscript file to Createspace. Now there’s no going back. I’ll spend the rest of the summer working with the interior design team.”
(August 5, 2011) — “I’ve completed all of the questionnaires for the Createspace design teams: interior design, cover design, and media press release. I never dreamed there would be so many pieces to the puzzle.”
(August 16, 2011) — “Six years of intense mid-flight writing has exhausted me. My first book’s debut is soon; Refrain from the Identical: Insight and Inspiration for Creative Eclectics will enter the world with a spine and white pages.”
(August 21, 2011)— “The publishing of Refrainfrom the Identical progresses at a steady pace. The efficiency of the createspace design teams amazes me. I approved the reformatted interior design mock-up and the full interior proof of the book has just arrived. The next step is to print the pages and reread for formatting and convention errors.”
I wish JoDee the best of luck with her project. I will be watching and learning.
I hope to have a book printed to proof sometime within the next month. You’ll be the first to know. You’ll probably hear my “Halleluia” from your little corner of the world, however distant it may be.
A sixteen-year-old was shot and killed by a police officer in downtown Cincinnati on Saturday. Following a tip from an off-duty police officer who witnessed guns being tossed over a fence at an event at Sawyer Point on the river front, the police tracked several teens into downtown Cincinnati. One police officer struggled with a teen they had followed and then the teen drew his gun. The officer fired two shots into the teen, one of which pierced his aorta. You can read the entire story, Officer had no Choice by Sharon Coolidge and Dan Horn at Cincinnati.com.
The incident occurred on Fountain Square in the center of downtown where hundreds of people regularly gather to enjoy live music, have a meal at surrounding restaurants, or watch videos on a large screen television. Armed with impressive statistics regarding the reduction of violence in the urban area over the past nine years, police and local officials are busy doing damage control calling it an “isolated incident” and saying that gunshots on Fountain Square are “an anomaly.”
The city and developers have put a lot of money into rebuilding and renovating the Fountain Square area. The improvements have been successful at attracting people downtown for entertainment. Developers and city officials don’t want a sixteen-year-old with a gun ruining the renaissance the downtown area is experiencing.
This shooting followed closely on the heels of a another police shooting near Findlay Market in the Over the Rhine area of downtown Cincinnati on Friday.
Fortunately no one is opposing the police officer’s action on Saturday. In the story linked above, Coolidge and Horn write, “Former NAACP President, Chris Smitherman, a City Council candidate who has been critical of police in the past, attended the chief’s press conference and commended him and the mayor for their handling of the shootings.”
What I want to know is, why does a sixteen-year-old have a gun?
How did he get it? Who is providing weapons to teenagers? I just don’t believe all these guns are stolen. I think someone is selling guns to kids. Maybe someone should be focused on the source of the guns.
More than how he got the gun, though, I’d like to know why does he have it? Does it make him feel big? Does it give him status? Does he feel he needs it to protect himself?
The sad irony is, this gun did not protect this sixteen-year-old kid. This gun got him killed.
Paula bursts into my parents’ house like a ray of sunshine. She’s full of energy and optimism and greets my mom and dad with a bright smile. My dad, who is a man of very few words these days says, “How are you to day?” A regular monolog for him.
Paula started helping my parents as a home health aide about nine months ago. She started by coming two mornings a week to help my dad with his showers and to help my mom with the extra laundry and sheet changing as a result of my dad’s Alzheimer’s and incontinence issues. At first Mom didn’t want to have a home health aide there every day. After two weeks, Paula was coming five days a week, every weekday.
Paula knows how to do everything for my dad now. She pitches in and gets him up out of bed if he hasn’t risen by the time she arrives. She helps him into the shower and monitors him while he’s there. She cleans up any accidents he has or messes he makes in the meantime. She helps him change his protective undergarments, helps him dress, transfers him from his walker to his wheelchair. Pushes him to wherever he wants to sit inside the house. Sometimes she prepares his breakfast and sits with him while he eats. Meanwhile she usually has a load or two of laundry going. Sometimes she does small household cleaning chores like vacuuming the carpet or mopping the floor.
It’s a physically challenging and dirty job at times.
But Paula keeps her sense of humor and her smile in place. She treats my dad with sensitivity and compassion and extends support to my mother who often struggles with her caregiver responsibilities.
I’ve watched Paula with my dad and I believe she genuinely cares about him. She seems amused by him at times in an affectionate, non-patronizing way. She’s respectful of his wishes and treats him as an adult, even though often he is silent in return.
There’s no question that Paula is a significant help to my mother just from a purely physical stand-point. But what has surprised me is how much more than that she is.
When Paula’s there, my mom can rest. Mom often lies on the sofa and puts down her responsibility for my dad for a few hours because she knows Paula will carry it for a while.
When Paula’s there, my mom seems more relaxed. If something unexpected happens she has confidence Paula will know what to do. When we were still taking Dad out to see his doctor, Mom started scheduling the appointments for when Paula could accompany them.
When Paula’s there the whole energy of the household shifts into something much more positive, much more optimistic.
When Paula’s there I feel like we might just be able to get through this.
Even with all of that said, the most amazing thing about Paula is that she has chosen to be part of my parents’ lives for this time. I mean, let’s face it. Alzheimer’s is a heinous slow march downhill to oblivion. We are on the path of a final goodbye with many small endings along the way. Frankly, sometimes I’d like to run as fast and hard as I can in the opposite direction. If I didn’t love these two individuals I call my parents, I’m not sure I’d choose to be involved in their lives. Paula did.
Paula understands the way this gig is going to end. And she chooses to be here anyway. That’s really saying something.
So I’d just like to raise a glass to Paula and to all those other home health aides in the world who truly make a difference in the lives of others.
Christine M. Grote 