Lyrics change meaning in altered circumstance. I found this song on repeat on my inner soundtrack, not in reference to a lost love, but instead to both my memories and lost life and you new friends struggling with dementia as well.

So many things still to learn, but the learning takes a drawer of spoons these days.

I haven’t stopped trying. I am taking Tae Kwon Do. I started a new support/coping skills group at the VA mental health as well as an eight week course on moving and balance from the PT department. I use my new breathing machine at night. I read, slower and with frequent need to reread. I paint. I knit. I work to write, to play my video games, follow Lego instructions.

I can no longer drive nor take the bus. I can no longer safely cook or babysit my grandkids because I cannot think quickly enough or stay focused enough to do either safely. Alone I get too easily lost or baffled. In stead of minutes or hours to make a post, knit a scarf, read a few chapters; it takes a couple days. And even then the mistakes slip in at higher rates.

It has been a year since I acknowledged something was wrong.I am still grateful. I still strive to be kind and useful. I still laugh regularly and face my challenges.

I cannot control what is happening to me, but I can continue to choose how I respond.

“Going away with no words of farewell, will there be not a trace left behind…”

Holding on to who I was, what I could do, is like a fist full of sand.

To all my friends and readers and to the self that is slipping away I sing “I could have loved you better, didn’t mean to be unkind, you know that was the last thing on my mind.”