My husband and I have decided to take turns taking the matriarch to the blood clinic. Today was my turn and, to be honest, I'd rather go to the blood clinic than do lunch. The matriarch wasn't happy but her spirits perked up when she met an old neighbour from her previous neighbourhood. The lady was taking her husband for blood tests. She looked elderly and her husband was on a walker and obviously had some issues; he didn't look healthy. The woman wasn't very pleasant to the matriarch. The two had a brief discussion in which my mother-in-law pointed out, despite rumours, she wasn't dead but was living quite happily with her son. Apparently, this kind of information is never a positive form of communication to seniors whose children aren't so reliable as my husband happens to be...
I watched the two old ladies navigate pleasantries and could literally see the other woman's face turn a different colour as she realized the matriarch wasn't in a home and that she lived permanently with us. No one wants to know someone else's family fulfills family obligations when their own children are absent. The poor woman needed some help with her husband. Even the nurses at the clinic attempted to be accommodating but the couple sort of rushed out in the way only seniors pushing a walker can. The matriarch retained her perkiness as only someone who knows she is in a better place than others can. That satisfaction even lasted through dinner.
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