Well, am back on-line... for what it is worth...

Peter was sounding really bad the past few days. And when he learned that my pc went on the fritz, he said he would lend me his, because he didn't really know how to use it, except to look at porno films, and was usually too tired to look at the interesting links I had set up for him.

So I shrugged, and went to Gamlitz to borrow it, because mine is gonna cost me what I don't have. At the moment.

I got him some ice cream from downstairs, and went up, and oh.....

He is really badly off.

I spent four hours just trying to get him to come out of his daze, and nothing worked.

He just clung to the 'crib' side of his bed, in a fetal position, and was .... I don't know... way out there in his head.

Mumbled that someone had been in his room whom I know, but couldn't tell me who. He couldn't remember.... That was fun... And then he dozed. So I went out, and nurse Ksenia told me he'd been cranky, wouldn't take his meds, and was often insulting, but they were trying their best....

And I said, 'I know that... and he would never have said those things before he got sick.'

Was upstairs, he was dozing, and I was reading the paper to him, things that might have woken him up and that he would laugh at... in former days, or have a fun comment about...
Nothing.

All of a sudden, I was reading one aloud and he suddenly asked, 'Is he gone???'

I thought, 'WHAA?'

'Is he gone?'

Well, I am dense enough, I guess, so I asked, 'What HE? No one has been here.'

'Ren' he said weakly.

Yup, another express elevator going down in the Empire State Building.... that sinking feeling....

But I took a deep breath and said, 'I'm Ren... and am still here, Peter.'

Cripes, I hope that was only a preview of coming attractions... I was unprepared, he's always been so lucid, other than an occasional slip....

I have to see if I can get there Friday. It's the Sommerfest, with roasted piglets, drinks and music for all the homies. Just to get him out of the room for an hour. Herrgottnochmal.

He still isn't back to his normal, cranky, know-it-all self. Called today.

It's way bad.

Complained about it being hot and humid, and we've got a very cool day, nearly sweater-weather.

And meandered by my flower lady, and cried on her shoulder a bit. She was upset, she knows us both very well. So I deflected, and asked her about her trip to Russia for vac. She said, 'Well, I'm not going back THERE again very soon. Forget Glasnost and Perestroika.' Moscow was full of smoke from the fires and ghastly.

So I cheered HER up, and regaled her with tales of 'The Venerable', like getting a scooter, and test-driving it in the kitchen, (it's small, ok, a three-wheeler) and him going to a fitness room in the project and overdoing it to impress some widow. (He watches too many Soaps with the buffed-out dudes, who always, always go to gyms, so he went and complained because it hurt after.) And getting me upset with a subject line 'nookie', and by that he meant he had driven off and gotten a kitchen nook for his place, and MY mind was way someplace else when it showed up in the mail...

She LURVS 'Tales of the Venerable', and crosses her legs when she laughs, which is bladder control. HER father is way out in la-la land, so 'da V' is a source of amazement for her. And my tobbaconist... I've been telling her for years about him, and today she said, 'Gawwd, he must be soooo coool.'

So ok, shoot me. I brag about my progenitor. It beats gossiping about local people I KNOW...

So it is my way of deflecting things.

So it made me feel good for an hour or so. And forget for a few minutes.

But.... like being on a bender, it does wear off, and you get stuck with a vile picture in your head, and the problem is still there... bigger than ever. Whaddaya want me to say, hey...

No, it isn't good in any sense, seeing someone in a fetal position hiding against the rail of his bed.

What can I say??? It just is.