Month: July 2023

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Sit Here and Go With Him

1920s Victrola

Yesterday Dad was listening to songs by Marty Robbins on a tablet I keep in his room. He shared with me how much he was enjoying the music by saying, “I can sit here and go with him.” Marty and his ballads have been favorites in Dad’s music collection since I was a child. Dad was telling me that the songs were familiar, that he was listening to the lyrics, and that he was imagining himself in the musical stories. It was great to hear this. Dad’s appreciation of music, recognition of artists, and ability to play records by himself has changed dramatically in the past nine months. This isn’t the first time Lewy Body Dementia has affected our music experience. Read the post “Just a Lil Bit Country.”

Dad no longer requests artists by name even if I give him a choice of just two. He rather quickly lost his ability to operate his favorite modern turntable. He began to think he had placed a record to play when there was nothing on the machine. When he did get something playing, he worried that playing the records would lead to him losing them or breaking them and he would turn it off again. A reasonable understanding might be that this was his way of expressing his own awareness about his loss of these abilities. We never know for certain. I decided to make a change when I walked in Dad’s room, and he was trying to put a cardboard album cover on his foot like a shoe and stand up in it. I gradually removed a few albums at a time. Dad didn’t notice they were missing. Of course, the records and album covers were all mismatched. Eventually, I removed the turntable completely. I replaced it with a tablet where I can load a variety of music apps. I particularly like the voice activated ones. Dad likes the ones with lyrics that scroll while the song is playing. At first he read and sang along. Now he just looks at the words and smiles. He can’t keep up  any longer but likes that they are there. 

The artist that remained the longest was Alan Jackson.  Dad recognized his Precious Memories Collection by the image of the church on the album art. Each time I selected this music, Dad would tell me how he was there at the church with Alan when he recorded the songs. This delusion has also since faded. His music experiences are now only in the moment.

On the fourth of July, we played John Philip Sousa’s Stars and Stripes Forever on Dad’s 1920s Victrola Phonograph. Dad waved his arm as if conducting the orchestra through the entire recording. Last week we played Gene Autry. While singing along with “Home on the Range,” Dad swayed left and right, closed his eyes, and sang the chorus. Whether Dad is riding out on the range with Gene, at church with Alan, or on the streets of Laredo with Marty, he is happy in these moments. Music is no longer an independent past time for Dad. It’s okay.  We have been listening to these songs together for as long as we both can remember.  Wherever he goes in his mind, “I can sit here and go with him.”

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My People

Holding a picture of an ancestor near a family tree.

Dad has always had an interest in the family tree. Fortunately, a not so distant relative in Holland did extensive research and shared it with the entire family. We love knowing that just two generations ago, our paternal family immigrated to the northeastern United States. Stories of their business endeavors are consistent with the entrepreneurial spirit of the family. A great-great grandfather was a merchant who sailed his ship through the English channel trading and selling goods. With records going back to the 1600s, there is even a roster from the Queen’s court that includes our unusual family name. There has always been an idea that the family is primarily from the Netherlands.

We recently tested Dad’s DNA. And yes, 28 percent of his ancestors are from Germanic Europe and 31 percent are from England and Northwestern Europe. This includes Belgium and the Netherlands as well as the opposite side of the English Channel all the way to Wales, The Isle of Man, and south to Guernsey and Jersey Islands.

We knew less about Dad’s maternal family. Interestingly, we learned a greater 36 percent of our ancestors are from Ireland, specifically the regions of Kerry and Cork. And, if we look back far enough, variations of the family name date to medieval times and the Knights of the Templar. These ancestors immigrated to Canada before arriving in the northeastern United States.

My grandfather met my grandmother on a rainy day. She was walking or waiting for a bus, and he offered her a ride. Meanwhile, one of grandfather’s friends (or a cousin) had been hounding him about introducing him to a certain lady. When it finally happened a short time later, it turns out it was the same gal he had given a ride, my grandmother.

Although Dad’s parents passed away in the 1980s, he doesn’t remember that they are gone. Nearly every day for more than a year now, he asks me, “Where are my people?” He then shares some concern about their wellbeing or relays a story about a time when they were together. He sometimes asks if he can visit the family home. Today he told me in his own way, “My mother and my father always made everything nice for me there and worked half the night to do it.” I know this because I am blessed to be part of the same family. Over the years I witnessed how my grandparents and my Dad lived, and role modeled a loving close-knit family with an exemplary work ethic to provide and care for loved ones.

For quite a while now, Dad doesn’t remember most of his people. His younger brother, my younger sister and my mother have also passed on, just to name a few. When Dad asks about his people, I show him pictures of children, grandchildren, nieces, and nephews. We practice their names and count how many family members are in the generations of the future. I remind Dad, that each and every one of our people are a little bit of his mother and father, and a lot of him.