I am taking a short break from the Carole and Eric story to share a bit of my life here in Laramie and one of my favorite things about it—the crows. I love them, and in some small way, I think they love me too. They started showing me their
Continued from last week… Everyone was talking about the Great American Eclipse. “It will be the experience of a lifetime,” Carole’s sister Lily told her. Not since 1918 had a similar eclipse occurred—with totality stretching across the US from coast to coast. “It’s just a three-hour drive to be in
Here is the second installment of the Carole and Eric story. It’s long so I broke it into two parts. I’ll post Part 2 next Wednesday. My plan is to post weekly on Wednesday or Thursday. If you want to be notified by email when I post, you can subscribe
Back in 2017, I started telling the story of my journey with Gary on this blog. My posts were few and far between because the demands of caregiving left little time for writing, editing, illustrating and posting. But I discovered a storytelling medium that worked for the tiny pockets of
Recently while working in my garden and listening to the Deva Premal channel stream through my phone, I noticed the streaming inexplicably got stuck playing one song repeatedly—every other song. It was Familiar to Me by Joe Zawinul. Hearing that song once transported me back in time. Hearing it many
Hello everyone. I know it’s been about seven months since I have posted. Sorry about that! In my last post I wrote about being in the soup–the deconstruction of the caterpillar in the process of becoming a butterfly. That all-consuming stage lasted a bit longer than I had hoped—with lots
When a caterpillar becomes a butterfly, it tells a story of profound transformation. I particularly like the metaphor to describe BIG transformation because the process requires the caterpillar to completely give up its original form. In the chrysalis, the caterpillar disintegrates into a metamorphic soup before reforming itself into a
It’s 11:37 p.m. and I’m about to embark upon another episode of The Secret Life of Diane Sontum. Gary is asleep. It hasn’t always been easy to get him to sleep, but we now have a routine that seems to work. We lie down together and listen to his CD,
Last Friday played out as the perfect TGIF day—two productive and fun meetings at work, a great workout at the Rec Center (using my new birthday-present-to-myself membership) and arrangements made for a house cleaning service to help me keep up with day-to-day demands. Heading home, I felt a satisfied sense
When I first envisioned writing a blog about my journey with Gary, I saw it as a way to memorialize his life—who he is, who he has been, and who he is becoming. I wanted to capture everything—his work as a musician, potter, artist, teacher, skier and his roles as
We’re getting married in Saint Matthew’s Episcopal Cathedral—the oldest and (IMHO) the most beautiful church in Laramie. I have been part of the congregation for about four years now. At the time I started to attend, I was a happy and committed non-church goer. Gary subtly encouraged me to try
Early onset Alzheimer’s Disease with behavioral disturbance. That’s what the PET scan revealed and the neurologist said to the three of us seated in his office last month—Gary, his brother, and me. Strangely, my first response was relief. At last, we know what has been vexing Gary’s brain for the
Join me as I experiment with the main characters Carole and Eric and their journey through the quagmire of Lewy Body Dementia.
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