Tuesday, April 14, 2009

A Pirate Story with a Happy Ending

My mother is almost 89 and suffers from dementia. Morning is her best time. She gets up, her aide helps her get dressed and have breakfast, and then she sits down with her morning paper and her pen. She busily underlines and checks off every article on the front page of the New Jersey Star Ledger, while calling out phrases from the articles to any and all within hearing range. This sometimes includes my father, who sits just inches away, but is quite deaf.

She had a ball with the newspaper yesterday. "Pirates!" she happily declared, "Captured by pirates!" I am not sure my mother always recognizes chronology or knows the difference between reality and fantasy, but yesterday I was having a little trouble with those things myself. On the same page as articles regarding mass unemployment, more bank failures and a couple of multiple murders, we've got pirates.

And three U.S. Navy snipers, with three perfect shots, rescued a merchant marine captain from those pirates. Thomas Jefferson would be proud of those snipers. So would Peter Pan.

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