The VISIT

Tune in now for the next exciting chapter of #COVID19 and the RantFamily: THE VISIT to RantMom’s retirement community.

Please note: this post contains some complaints that RantWoman should probably address directly to the facility. However, the complaints are common enough that other facilities might need to think about the same issues.  This post also contains some data points offered humbly and with realism. Mostly, the RantWoman, RantMom, RantWoman, and Little Sister were THRILLED to be able to spend time together, in the sun under a canopy, on the lawn, with masks on, social distancing. We are terribly grateful that we wound up getting longer than the promised half hour. We are also grateful for an end of visit on-the-fly adaptation (see below) to the prescribed visit protocol. And we are versatile enough also to have gripes.

The Long Slow Easing out of…

RantMom’s retirement community has been slowly opening up its operations after all its residents have now cleared the #CoronaVirus. RantMom has been kind of exasperated by the slow pace of things; RantWoman has been counseling forebearance, figuring as with everything else there are just Things To Work Out. RantWoman does not remember the exact sequence of 10-minute walks in the garden, options to schedule laundry or send it out Are you kidding? RantWoman has reasons to feel very relieved that RantMom is able to be where she is.  RantMom is happy to hold onto brain cells as long as possible. So why would she send out her laundry when she can do it herself? Add in half-hour walks, and most recently, half-hour visits with family or friends outdoors, with social distancing in the garden, the garden being a huge selling point when RantMom was considering retirement community options!

RantMom in the sun
sitting on her walker on the lawn

Understand, the RantSisters were not even first in line on RantMom’s desired visitors list. If schedules had worked, she of course would have been glad for daughter time. But schedules did not work so RantMom grabbed the opportunity for a visit from a buddy RantMom knows from a volunteer gig. Buddy and husband are moving far away to another state where they have family and maybe the cost of living is also lower. Moving Day is a couple weeks out, but the visit still meant a lot. RantMom misses the volunteer gig, now suspended because of COVID; RantMom will certainly also miss seeing her buddy.

The RantFamily's turn and getting there

Rant Family calendars came out. Irrepressible Nephew’s work schedule came up. Two visit dates were settled on, one the one yesterday, and July Fourth. Yesterday, the weather was glorious, sunny, warmish but not too warm. The RantSisters agreed on a meeting place to collect from our bus rides a little ahead of the scheduled meeting time.  

Bus rides? Yes!  RantWoman considers any trip that involves food essential and the Queen of Spades needs a resupply of her preferred canned brand. So what if RantWoman works in the first in person visit with RantMom in three months into the schedule ahead of cat food acquisition?

Further, Little Sister uses a wheelchair. She has a power chair but definitely needs wheelchair accessible vehicles and is NOT a fan of paratransit. RantWoman prefers bus vehicles both in terms of ease getting on and off and in terms of greater cubic footage of air. RantWoman also prefers having drivers who have a better chance of having health insurance than the average rideshare driver. And RantWoman could fly into a rage at any moment due to climate change and traffic congestion issues if she lingered too long on the CDC’s recommendations about riding in cars instead of transit. Come on world, we CAN do this transit thing. We CAN.

Little Sister in  her wheelchair
wearing a wonderful pink hat

RantWoman also appreciates awareness of ADA issues such as wheelchair lifts and access to the "courtesy area." Little Sister uses a wheelchair so OF COURSE Drivers realize they need to open the ADA courtesy area for her. For RantWoman and Ambassador Thwack, things are dicier: RantWoman can see enough to find the second door if for example the ADA area is already full defined as either 1 or 2 riders.  Yesterday was a lucky day though: RantWoman got to ride in the ADA area for both needed bus segments. For one segment RantWoman was alone, for the other there was one other person who needed the lift but kindly folded a seat across the aisle from himself for RantWoman. In other words, RantWoman arrived about as free of bus germs as possible.

RantWoman has various strategies for maintaining social distance or barriers between herself and other passengers. RantWoman also specifically planned a needed trip to Trader Joe’s for cat food for after the visit to RantMom. For RantWoman’s schedule it definitely would have worked better to get cat food before the visit to RantMom but RantWoman was very conscious of not wanting to track virus in, for instance off shopping bags. RantWoman’s shopping bags would have held up fine to the disinfectant spray regime but RantWoman had already decided not to chance it.

The Path

Back to our arrival. Flowers were blooming exuberantly. The RantSisters had not reckoned with the chain saw and the wood chipper; someone in a fluorescent yellow vest was pruning a tree on the path between the RantSisters’ bus stops, on the way to the front entrance of the community. Who needs to hear anything when middle-aged women with hearing loss have their faces covered by masks anyway?  All of the RantWoman wound up expressing appreciation for the peculiar opportunity to think of RantBrother and his tree-trimming prowess, but the noise still made negotiating the front entrance and sanitizing anything to be exchanged more challenging than anyone was happy about.

Negotiating the front entrance? RantWoman had not read all the emails, about a path to the outdoor meeting that had a lot of issues about tree roots and uneven ground. Little Sister and RantMom had conferred. Special arrangements were made to allow Little Sister to get screened into the building and travel down a hallway to the garden. However, RantWoman and Ambassador Thwack and a guide got to trip trap trip trap through the employee parking garage, down a bumpy path, around the building, down some more bumpy path and finally around the corner into one corner of the garden. RantWoman’s preferred mode of sighted guide is follow, not hand on shoulder or elbow. RantWoman found herself sometimes sticking close to the wall, sometimes nearly falling on her face because Thwack does not always detect every bump there might be to trip over. RantWoman gets the point about limiting exposure to spaces inside the building, and, um, if this entry path is going to be a longterm thing, a smoother path and a gate might be really good ideas.

Now OUT--and home without cat food.

Frankly, RantWoman is glad to have done the walk once. The RantWomen were all THRILLED, THRILLED about time together, especially because EXTRA time happened. RantWoman is also grateful when it was time to leave that everyone spoke up: RantWoman said, well, it was good to have done the path once, but..  RantMom expressed concern about RantWoman getting out safely. Little Sister said something about liability issue. Yeah, people with the resources to live there would probably have relatives able to think that way. Phone calls were made. Permission was granted to RantWoman to get screened in the garden and follow Little sister out by the same route Little Sister came in by, just “don’t touch anything on the way out.”

Screening? Temperature check: 98.8. RantWoman had been sitting slightly in the sun with hat and mask on so no problem. Long list of screening questions including something about building with someone who has tested positive. Ding Ding Ding. RantWoman’s building has a sign about an unnamed resident in an unnamed location. RantWoman travels only in the hallway from the elevators to her apartment and rarely visits any other part of the building except the lobby, the laundry room and the hallway out to the back door.. RantWoman wears a mask every time she leaves her apartment. RantWoman is also going to get a plastic face shield to help about communication with all her neighbors who need to be able to lipread. In other words, RantWoman does the best she can to be safe and does not linger for half an hour with anyone. But RantWoman notes the building issues data point. Probably if RantWoman had called ahead there could have been conversation about disinfecting RantWoman’s purse and bag or about RantWoman changing a layer of clothing upon arrival. Or….

Anyway, RantWoman was granted permission to exit through the hallway. There was one moment where RantWoman and someone passing the opposite direction did the both parties look away from each other and tread carefully while passing that RantWoman has observed several places.

Next, time for cat food. RantWoman and Little Sister got the same bus to the same stop and RantWoman headed off to the U-District Trader Joe’s. Dial-a-Tirade available about the closing of the Capital Hill TJ’s. RantWoman decided she had no time to wait in line so cat food will have to happen another day. Then it was time for another neighborhood issue described elsewhere. RantWoman gave up about in-store cat food, even though in-store shopping tends to wind up catching more items than cat food. RantWoman will order online. And food will wind up being sandwich from Riteaid on the bus-transfer pathway before a 6 pm Zoom call. High excitement lifestyle but everyone’s hearts are still singing from the family visit.