Better visit...

 Okaasan MUCH better on our visit this week.

Sitting up straight, eye contact...eyes not all strange and filmy...

Still not much conversation, or actual verbal response, but eye contact, strange mouth opening and closing like a goldfish (does she think this is talking?) and smiles and waves.

We are relieved. Still we are only allowed a 15 minute visit, because it is the holiday season and there are other families and a big ban on people from out of state big cities , such at Tokyo and Osaka.

AND....get this....in such worrying times....when hospitals and care homes (and shared dormitories at high schools etc) regularly appear as COVID-19 cluster locations...this care home has decided to hold a Families Meeting this weekend! One of those 50-60 people crammed in a room listening to speeches affairs!

Like. Really?

At a time when you are restricting visitors to the care home, connections between people. Is is really a good plan to have 50-60 people from all over the region come to the building and cram in and out of the elevator? Sit together in a room for over an hour listening to speeches?

Really?

I put my foot down. Told Dear Son he shouldn't go. Stupid plan. They can send him an email or a newsletter. His time would be far better spent, prepping to come with me to a friend's small BBQ party....5 people from two families eating and drinking in a garden is a better use of time...and safer in Covid-19 times.

Post-party blaahs?

 Okaasan not  so lively this week.

Exhausted after the excitement of party last week? Suffering from the heat, although living in an air-con bubble?

Not sure. But, she was quiet and slumped to one side during our visit this week. Her eyes seemed somehow filmy...not quite focusing on us sometimes. Sleepy?

She did smile a bit and wave when we left.  But she wasn't so great.

We could only stay 15 mins. It's the main family-visiting/dead relative honoring festival in Japan now and the care home is being careful. Shortened visit times, and requests at the care home doors to NOT visit if you had come from OR recently visited: Tokyo, Osaka, Nagoya and Fukuoka etc

Hmm. I have read a bit about people's eyes before death, that they somehow go glazed or filmy, or watery.....maybe I am over-reacting. But I told Dear Son we should try and go and see her again this week. Didn't tell him directly why.

It's a quiet and very hot holiday week. I have some classes - online and in person - because some students said "well, I am not going away or having family to visit, so it's just an ordinary week!!". Kind of my feeling too.

I am meeting a few friends, for coffee in a park, or tea in a garden. And we have visited a local restaurant with a huge dining out discount. I've started watching Game of Thrones...eight whole seasons of that monster drama to keep me busy. i'm reading a book. I write summer greeting cards to old students.

Quiet time.

Our virus numbers are hovering around 10 new cases a day. In Tokyo it's 200-250 new cases a day. Tokyo people, poor sods, are having to stay near the city in then sweltering heat. Next year - maybe- the Tokyo Olympics will finish around now....

Next year. When will we all climb on planes again?

A pandemic birthday...

Okaasan has reached 90 years old!

Little Kazuko, the oldest daughter of the haulier's family of longtime ago Kawagoe, has lived thru three emperors, a war, a country's rebirth, a technological revolution....and a Pandemic.

Well, we HOPE she lives thru the Pandemic!

If she does, we can actually take her beyond the care home front door, into the sunshine. Out to a cafe or a little lunch of crab.

But for now we can't. So, 30 mins in her care home bedroom. Singing Happy Birthday and clapping. Masks and hand sprays.

We ordered a tiny cream pudding from a cake shop, they topped it with a biscuit iced with "Happy Birth-Day" letters and the date. We took in paper plates and plastic spoons, and napkins and had a 15 minute party in her bedroom.

Of course, the staff nixed the idea of lighting candles, because none of us wanted to test the care home and hospital sprinkler system. I stuck two tiny candles in the top of the tiny cake...in fact Okaasan probably can't remember is she had in fact just blown them out....and in Covid-19 times maybe not a great idea to encourage her to blow on the food the three of us were about to share!!!

And so we celebrated. She enjoyed it. Smiles and claps. Tucked into the cream pudding and scraped away with the spoon on the pot.

Then the staff came and told us "Time Up", another family were waiting for their allotted 30 mins of Visit Time. So we hurriedly packed up the cake plates and headed away.

Happy Birthday Okaasan.

So sorry we can't take you out to eat crab.

Rising cases of this disease in our region, up to 10 plus a day in this city...and worries about how the traditional hometown travel of the Obon Festival next week will impact it all. In fact, many Japanese people have cancelled their hometown visit plans.

It's a hot, humid summer. Wearing masks and sweaty....

But Happy Birthday Kazuko! You made it so far :-)