Mother and Daughter (#5 of 6)

Mama

I spent time with my dear mother today. They are bittersweet, our visits, these days. Mama is in the throes of Alzheimer's. Her more vivid memories now, are of her childhood, her mother and father, her siblings and Grandmother and Granddad Vaughan. In the last few years, she seemed not always to recognize photos of my father, her husband of 59 years. Today, however, she talked of "your dad", and looked and looked at a photo taken 12 years ago. They were sitting with Dad's arm around her under the arbor in the back yard. She wasn't sure that was her husband because "your dad wasn't that heavy". She embraces older memories of when they were young farmers, when Dad ate like a horse but worked it all off. He was slight of frame and slender then.

She has been a widow almost nine years. And we have come full circle.

Her daughters are her mother now. Daughters divvie out her medicine from a locked box. We buy the groceries. We make sure her hair is combed and that she bathes. We check to see if she is eating and ask nosey questions about her bowels. We clean up after her. We boss her, encourage her and tell her what to do, when to do it and why. I find myself talking to her as tho she is a toddler, explaining, reminding and preparing her for the event ahead.

Mom had a bad day yesterday. She couldn't get her front door open to get her afternoon newspaper. She was scared, shaking and trembling when my brother and his wife came by. They couldn't calm her. She needed to call someone! My brother helped her call, Mary, her youngest daughter, two blocks away. Mary came and helped soothe her. Now the talk is of nursing home. Our aim had been to keep her at home just as long as possible.
What is the best for our dear mother? The noise and commotion of a nursing home where strangers will tell her when to dress, when to eat, when to use the lavatory instead of her daughters? What if she tries to leave the nursing home to find her "real" home -- the home that she sometimes looks around now and says "how did I get here?" because in her mind, she is living in a rural farm house with a slightly built, handsome , young farmer? Or would it be best to leave her be , leave her to mostly quiet days at home until she forgets the next thing or can't get the door open and is scared and shaking and out of control? But forgets later about the terror, the panic. I pray for the answer -- but my siblings may make the decision for me. I sense the tide going out. I sense the swing. I dread the nursing home where strangers will judge my Mama.

Tonight, I give Mama a bedtime snack. I pull her bedspread back, fluff her pillow and lay out her nightgown. I wait for her to do her nightly hygiene, ingrained for 86-1/2 years. I kiss her goodnight.

Good night, Mama. I love you.

Dale and Leurine Hofmeister

Leurine Sychra married Dale Hofmeister on May 11, 1942.

This photo is dated July 4, 1942 so they were newlyweds. This might have been taken at one of their parents houses because there are yard chickens in the background. Leurene never told me the the details about this photo but weren't they a handsome couple!

They first met at a dance out to Williamson. I think they watched each other awhile and finally managed an introduction and danced together the rest of the time. Before the night was over, Dale asked, and got permission to take Leurine home. The rest, they say, is history.

They fell in love and married during the Second World War. Dale first worked in an aircraft plant in Kansas City. Leurine joined him there in a small apartment and from the little Leurine told me, it was a very happy time. They had a motor scooter and zipped around the city. They socialized with friends, laughed and enjoyed their marriage and each other.


Dale entered the US Army on April 15, 1945. Leurine and their 18-month old son, Larry, went back to stay with Gramma Sychra while Dale attended flight school. Dale wrote some letters while he was there -- to his folks, his sister and his brothers but the love letters he wrote to Leurine were seen only by her.
I first met my new inlaws on my wedding day. I had dragged their son out to my folks a few times but he had never "taken me home" to meet his parents although Lanny's Mother caught us on the street once in Creston and I was introduced to her there! I'm sure they must have been surprised when Lanny brought me into their home and said "this is my wife". Maybe, he said "this is my wife, Nancy" !! There were congratulations all around and I'm sure a few questions, but not many. I was bashful and a little uncomfortable and we didn't stay long and we were soon back in the car and driving towards my new home in Sioux City.

But the introduction, the welcome and the unflappablity of this wonderful couple set the tone for our relationship in the years following. They were always warm and hospitable, calm and caring, responding with help and advice when asked but never critical or complaining. They admired and loved our babies, took us in without hesitation when we showed up on the doorstep unannounced for the weekend. Leurine washed baby faces, gave baby baths and powdered their little behinds. Dale walked little ones around the yard and sat them on tractors, lawn mowers and boats.

The folks helped us move many a time and Leurine always made sure the beds were made up that first night in a new home, with clean sheets. Dale helped shingle, made a coat rack for the preschool, threatened to spank the older girls when they wouldn't leave "Tanks" and would meet us at Williamson at 10 p.m. when Johanna wanted to stay with Gramma and Grampa but couldn't quite do it.

Now, this October, Dale has been gone 5 years and Leurine almost 10 years. Those years have flown by -- it seems as though it was just yesterday that lovely, smiling Leurine reached out her hands for a baby . . . and proud Dale held Morghan Grace on his lap and saw newborn Jack in the hospital.

Leurine set a high standard -- but if I can do one thing, I hope that I can be the same kind of parent-in-law that Leurine and Dale were for me.