When Your Mom is 95

Mother & Me
September 2010

My mother, who lives on her own six hours away from me, turned 95 in May.  What are we going to do with her?

Last Thursday evening, my sister in San Diego placed a worried call to me about 8:30 p.m.  "Hey, I've been trying to reach mother by phone since 4:30 our time.  Do you know if she went anywhere?  Have you talked to her lately?"

I replied with, "Yes, I spoke briefly with her around noon today.  She seemed fine.  Didn't speak of any plans.  She was just telling me about two baby skunks who had died in one of her window wells and how she'd called an animal control person to come out and get them."

As we continued to speak, we decided that we did have reasons be worried about her.

• She had not been "reachable" for three hours.
• We didn't know of any plans for the evening.
• She doesn't drive, so she wouldn't be out on her own to dinner.
• She doesn't go out with friends in the evening much.  She usually goes to lunch if she is going with friends.
• Church meetings are not usually held on Thursday nights.
• We didn't know of any family members who might have driven into to town and taken her out to dinner.
• Perhaps she had been in the yard, had fallen, and could not get up.  (She does wear a life alert device, but you never know.)

"Will you call her neighbor?" my sis asked.  Soon my brother called from Colorado Springs.  "I think we should also call one of her friends and see if she knows where Mother might be."  So, I, the dutiful sister and daughter, made phone calls and alerted those who usually know what Mother might be doing.  

The neighbor went over to the house, checked all the rooms, looked all over the yard and found no trace of her.  He decided she had gone out for the evening.  Her friend said that she had no idea where she would go.  She then said she was heading over there pronto.  Three and half hours was a long time to be gone.  It was nearly 9:00 and no one had any idea where she was.

A little after 9:00, Mother called giggling like a school girl.  "Can't I go out without getting permission?" All those I had alerted were there when she got home asking where she had been.  It turns out she'd been to dinner.  My sis said, "Three hours is a long time to be gone for dinner."  "Not if it is at a friend's house," my mother replied.  A friend had invited her and another couple of friends over to her home for dinner so they could visit with a missionary who had just come back to the country after serving overseas.  

Reporting back to my sis, I commented, "Just because we are in our pajamas and settled in for the evening in the middle of the week doesn't mean our mother isn't out having a great social life."  My sis then posted this on facebook: "Why is it that you are settled in for the night and your 95 year old mother is out on the town?"  Mother's comment on facebook read, "Hey, Just because you guys don't have a life."  Yes, at age 95, she is on facebook.  What are we going to do with her?