When I was younger I thought it was ridiculous to talk about how brief life is. It seemed to stretch out before me forever. Even when I was in college and thought I was pretty much an adult, a school year seemed very long. When I registered for classes in the fall, Thanksgiving and Christmas seemed a long way off. And the spring and end of the school year were waaaay out there. Now a season passes before I realize it arrived. Oh, wait, that’s because I live in Washington.

Anyway, this morning I hopped around at my Zumba class and then went, with the help of my good husband, to pick up my Mom and take her to the beauty parlor. Mom is ninety now and deep into dementia. Sometimes when I look into her eyes she seems to be totally gone. Other times there is still a hint of the twinkle that used to betray a wicked sense of humor. She’ll ask me if Daddy died. I say yes. Then she says she’s seen him every day for a week, that he’s living in a nursing home now. Then she smiles a little bit and says, “I’m nuts.” Which tells me she knows she is experiencing dreams or delusions– she knows he’s really gone.

It’s all so sad. We got her into the car and hauled the wheelchair along. We wheeled her into the salon and a sweet young woman took care of her. Mom didn’t know why she was there. I said she needed her hair cut and styled. She asked why. It finally dawned on me that she thought there might be a special reason, a birthday, or a holiday and she hadn’t remembered. No, I said, it’s just because. She told us numerous times that she could be at home taking a nap. But she seemed pleased when she saw herself in the mirror. She looked so much better and I felt as if I’d done something a little bit right for her this time.

Dementia is hard. The person I knew as Mom is no longer available to me. But I still try to honor her just as she is. The woman who whipped up fantastic holiday meals, who baked and canned and read to me, who told funny stories and wrote satirical poems for her workmates, she’s not around any more. Instead I search for a memory that she can reach out and grasp. We can talk about the naughty things my brother did and we laugh. We say all the good things we remember about my Dad. He was a good Dad, he was a hard worker, the dimple in his chin showed when he was teasing. We miss him.

Ninety years is a long time, but I’ve already lived 67 years. That doesn’t seem so long. Now I know that life truly is like a grass that withers, it really does go by fast. All the more reason to enjoy every day and try to get the important things right. I’m glad I took Mom to get her hair fixed though she didn’t care as much as I did that it looked better. She just wanted to get home and take another nap. Life is fragile, life is short.