Setting up, tears , loss, arrival, small town ambience

19h03 Wednesday:

Been a l-o-n-g day.

I’m tired and kinda’ sore, but I’m feeling good.

Tomorrow Noreen will be bidding adieu to St. Mary’s Hospital and being taken to her new place of residence at le Vivalis in Pointe-Claire. Coleen spent the day with her at the hospital. Mom and I were at Residences Place Moritz (For those of you who noticed, this is the proper name. I screwed up in the previous entries by calling it Saint Moritz, but what the hey? Just about everything in QC is named after a saint, purported or otherwise.) trying to get as much of Noreen’s inmediate necessities packed up so as to make the transition as comfortable as possible.

Noreen’s a bit scared, but who can blame her? Well, I can, but then I think she’s been coddled all her life anyways, so just ignore me.

There were some tears shed while she passed her time with Coleen, who soothed Noreen’s fears to the best of her ability, but I can guarantee that there will be more. She is after all, in her late eighties, and a five foot three inches, the world can seem awfully bug and scary.

She’s sad that she will be giving up more of her belongings, like her mahogony dresser, and her….well, we’re not quite certain as to what it. Mom thinks it might have been a liquor cabinet at some point in the past, but as long as we have known Noreen it has served as a TV cabinet. The Rock maple round wooden table and chairs… gone.

The worst part is not being able to sell the to the antique dealers, but they say the market has crashed, to an extent in part due to such television shows as the Antique Roadshow which, although popular (my Mom and Dad were on the Canadian version when it came to Montreal a couple of years ago) has flooded the market with all sorts of crap and sometimes causing prospective sellers to hold out for ridiculous prices.

So, for now, some of Noreen’s stuff will go into storage without her knowledge, until she has time to aclimitize to the new changes in her life.

I’m certain however she will adjust quickly. The staff and management at le Vivalis are superb. I would move in tomorrow, given half the chance. Mom and I are just family, and le Vivalis was so quick to cater to any of our needs while we were there this afternoon trying to set up Noreen’s room. Imagine how they’ll be hopping for Noreen, who’s paying the bills?

I think the one problem Noreen (and Mom and myself) will have problems with is the LG plasma screen HDTV. Noreen has enough trouble to trying to use the telephone, now that all Quebecois have to dial ten digits. How the heck is she supposed to be able to figure out a remote controller with forty-five buttons? We picked up an RCA universal remote from the new Wal-Mart in Vaudreuil-Dorion on the way home to see if we can stem any possible hysteria over that.

Other than that, I really can’t see this being too much of a problem, and although Mom may not mention it to Noreen immediately, Noreen does have the option to move to a larger accomodation, once the building starts opening up the other floors. Because it is a new establishment, and is just establishing itself in the West Island community, they are not speading the staff to thinly by haphazzardly placing new residents throughout the building.

13h24 Thursday

Decided not to bother completing my entry for yesterday. I just wasn’t in the mood. I was tired and in bed by 22h30.

I do enjoy journalling though. It’s fun and a means of relaxation and putting stuff into perspective through the written word. When I use links to highlight specific sections, I spend a lot of time using search engines, such as Google or Answers.com to find the web page or site most appropriate to what it is I’m trying to describe. I just don’t pick one at random.

I do the same thing with stationary cards, etc…. They need to have some meaning to both myself and the person I’m sending it to, otherwise what would be the point?

Mom’s been gone since this morning. She’s with Noreen, hopefully by now, at le Vivalis, getting her established, letting her meet the staff and management that will see her to day to day requirements. Mom will be touching base with the nursing staff there, to update them on what will be needed to ensure that Noreen stays healthy, both mentally, emotionally and physically.

Coleen has spent the morning dusting and sweeping the main floor of the house. The dogs and cat have been demanding to go in and out so much that it would have been smarter to have an electric door monitor installed. Dad’s been going for walks up to the Canada Post superbox, where the neighbourhood mail is delivered. Spring fever is definitely here.\

15h50

Got off the phone with my mother after checking to make certain that Noreen’s new phone line was up and running. She’s tired. Noreen is as well. They had lunch at le Vivalis after arriving via medi-bus at around 11h30. Noreen anjoyed her meal. A good sign for as fussy an eater as her.

She’s not too impressed with the plasma screen television, and misses her own, probably because she knows how to use it. Understandable.

I’m hoping now to convince Mom to take the next couple of days off now, except maybe to drive in onto the island to pay visits. There’s nothing that really needs doing for now, at least until Meldrum the Movers deliver Noreen’s furniture and belongings sometime early next week.

Dad and I drove into the town proper of Saint Lazare, to the Sears catalogue center. A shack behind one of the local restaurants which doubles as a photocopy shop. Got to love small towns.

There’s a bunch of what Dad refers to as "tempos" all over the place. Covered extensions to people’s garages that provide additional coverage for the winter snows out here. They all need to come down as of April the 1st, or they can be fined. Plastic eyesores is what I call them. I can understand their use out here, where the snows can be extremely heavy. In the cities though, I feel they should be banned outright.