Gentleman Caller

My gentleman caller came for dinner last night, as he has done from time to time for the last decade. He was entirely himself, the dementia momentarily disappeared.

We did the things we love — ate well, talked about books, laughed over one another’s news. When he woke up this morning he was his old addled self. He wasn’t quite sure where he was, could not keep in his head how he was going to get home, wanted to walk out of the house without his belongings.

He has been the only constant in my life as my children have launched and old friends have fallen away. Once he was an absent minded professor — head in his books, a thoughtful and witty conversationalist.

Then one month he lost his car three times, called the police, they found it on his block — he’d forgotten where he’d parked it. Today he cannot walk ten feet without losing his wallet, keys, phone. But still he is deeply kind and penetratingly intellectual. Even addled he is such lovely company — well educated, articulate, positive, loving in a reserved way.

His adult children are taking over the mechanics of his life bit by bit — confiscating car keys, managing the bank accounts.

One day — possibly soon — he will slip beneath the water line of his neurology. His family will take him away and I will have him no more, my dear dear gentleman caller.