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kitewithfishI meant my last post to be more about the circumstances I've just been advised are awaiting me when I return home. My English ran out halfway through: I don't make any promises for now, but I am slightly less dead, so hopefully I'll make it through.
Earlier this year my Grandmother had a pulmonary embolism while she was visiting my aunt, her daughter, in California. This has been stabilized appropriately with medication, but she cannot drive or drink alcohol.
I just got some emails from home about what's going on there, and what to expect as I get home. It turns out that some of my grandmother's earlier health problems (mostly kidneys and some related calcium problems) are possibly the result of an underlying medical problem.
There are right now two options: the most common cause of her problems would be operable, if she could get off the blood thinners. The other option is inoperable and incurable. The second option is also something that is generally diagnosed by elimination, so that it's going to loom ever larger above our heads until we find out what's going on. I have more details on this stuff, but for the moment, I don't want to get too deeply into it. Grammie will be getting some more tests about this on the day that I'm getting home, and if it turns out to be the monster behind door number 2, I will be walking right into the beginning stages of dealing with it for the summer.
My mother, as she always does, is taking care of Grammie: this will inevitably cost her a lot of stress to deal with, whatever the outcome of the next few weeks of doctors visits and testing. When I'm at home, I tend to slip very neatly once more into my habitual role of my mother's helpmeet and confidante. This is in some ways highly gratifying: I am good at helping her and anticipating her needs, and she is profuse with her thanks. But it's hard to watch her be so tired and scared. The last of her children just graduated from high school- this should be the time when she's dealing with empty nest syndrome or something equally frivolous.
I still want to get home. I emailed someone at the college library about a job in their conservation department- the advertising was posted in May, but it may still be effective for Fall 2008, and the fact that I could get trained over the summer might help me there.
I also need to get back in the saddle with my Latin- I'm signed up for an intermediate level course in it. This semester drove home why it's important to have a good background in Latin, but I found that I have serious troubles with the way that they teach Latin- one is not so much expected to speak or write in it so much as decipher out of it. If this year has taught me anything, it's that I cannot learn a language by sitting around and reading it in a book: I need to be writing in it and getting that writing criticized and corrected. My German comprehension is about as good as it was last semester, but my composition has improved immensely since then. I've been writing much more in German than last semester, and that has made all the difference.
Earlier this year my Grandmother had a pulmonary embolism while she was visiting my aunt, her daughter, in California. This has been stabilized appropriately with medication, but she cannot drive or drink alcohol.
I just got some emails from home about what's going on there, and what to expect as I get home. It turns out that some of my grandmother's earlier health problems (mostly kidneys and some related calcium problems) are possibly the result of an underlying medical problem.
There are right now two options: the most common cause of her problems would be operable, if she could get off the blood thinners. The other option is inoperable and incurable. The second option is also something that is generally diagnosed by elimination, so that it's going to loom ever larger above our heads until we find out what's going on. I have more details on this stuff, but for the moment, I don't want to get too deeply into it. Grammie will be getting some more tests about this on the day that I'm getting home, and if it turns out to be the monster behind door number 2, I will be walking right into the beginning stages of dealing with it for the summer.
My mother, as she always does, is taking care of Grammie: this will inevitably cost her a lot of stress to deal with, whatever the outcome of the next few weeks of doctors visits and testing. When I'm at home, I tend to slip very neatly once more into my habitual role of my mother's helpmeet and confidante. This is in some ways highly gratifying: I am good at helping her and anticipating her needs, and she is profuse with her thanks. But it's hard to watch her be so tired and scared. The last of her children just graduated from high school- this should be the time when she's dealing with empty nest syndrome or something equally frivolous.
I still want to get home. I emailed someone at the college library about a job in their conservation department- the advertising was posted in May, but it may still be effective for Fall 2008, and the fact that I could get trained over the summer might help me there.
I also need to get back in the saddle with my Latin- I'm signed up for an intermediate level course in it. This semester drove home why it's important to have a good background in Latin, but I found that I have serious troubles with the way that they teach Latin- one is not so much expected to speak or write in it so much as decipher out of it. If this year has taught me anything, it's that I cannot learn a language by sitting around and reading it in a book: I need to be writing in it and getting that writing criticized and corrected. My German comprehension is about as good as it was last semester, but my composition has improved immensely since then. I've been writing much more in German than last semester, and that has made all the difference.
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no subject
Date: 2008-06-21 04:23 am (UTC)I saw your dad today
Date: 2008-06-21 08:45 pm (UTC)something equally frivolous
Date: 2008-06-21 08:48 pm (UTC)