A Tribute to my Mom

I've been somewhat negligent about writing the past two weeks.  That's because my Mom has been here playing Florence Nightingale and I didn't want to spend my time with my nose in my laptop instead of being with her.

I know that it wasn't the most interesting trip for her. Every morning she'd get up and oil my incision site, get me dressed, put on my anti-DVT bandages, prepare my breakfast, put on my socks and shoes and take me for my morning walk. 

And that doesn't include bending over to pick up the hundreds of things I drop in a day.  Little Man says I have holes in my hands.  Inevitably, anything I am holding lands up on the floor. 

In the afternoon, she'd prepare some lunch, water my garden, force encourage me to do my exercises, have a short nap, put on my socks and shoes and then take me out for my afternoon walk. 

At night, we'd do our exercises again, then she helped me shower and get ready for bed, oiling my incision and helping me into my pyjamas. Tedious really.  I am quite sure that she'll need another vacation to rest after having to walk up and down the four flights of stairs three times a day on this one.

Little Man did take her out a couple of times to the Museum and the Mall but mainly her daily schedule revolved around mine. Not terribly exciting.  But she's my Mom and so I can understand her wanting to be there for me.  And although it was somewhat mundane, I don't want to make it sound as though we didn't enjoy each other's company or have fun together. 

We talked and laughed a lot during our walks.  She turned me on to Smash, the new TV show. I moaned, she listened. And we drank a lot of coffee.  For me, and I think (hope) for her too, it was a pleasant respite from our normal lives.  A time when we got to just be together with nothing else to do and no outside pressures to interrupt us.  An oasis.

So as a tribute to my wonderful Mom for coming out here to take care of me, here is a pictorial recap of our time together.

Chasing the sunshine.  

The first few days she was here were so cold, she didn't take off her winter coat.  

Here she finally took out the lining and the sun sure felt good on our faces. 

Getting ready for our walk to Bnei Brak.  That is not a fashion statement!  We wanted to look the part, so we dressed modestly.  The walk took us up a steep hill and we debated turning back but we persevered and it turned out to be the highlight of Mom's trip. 

We took a bus back!

Getting our daily fix of java on a morning walk.

This was after missing my pedi appointment at the coffee shop on Sderot Yerushalayim.

Oops.  How did that get in there?  

My Dad and Rella were in Hawaii that week and we heard from them often. 

Respite in the garden after our afternoon walk.  By now, it was so hot that it was a pleasure to sit in the cool garden after walking a 1.5 km & before climbing up the stairs.

Everything's cooked, table set, showered and dressed, waiting for the guests to arrive. 

Hag Sameach.

At the neighborhood Geniza.  Yes, we actually have one. 

Mom couldn't believe it either.

At the local supermarket, curious to see all the hametz covered up and checking out the prices of the pesadika products so prominently displayed.

Smiling our "Sian" smiles.  Bottom teeth showing.

Who knows what we were laughing at here on one of our many walks. 

We laughed a lot.

We stopped to photograph the pansies (Amnon v'Tamar) and the woman who lives here actually invited us in to see her garden.  Only in Israel.

Thanks Mom.

You're the best!

<3