Skype With Mom

It's been three weeks since I was able to visit Mom. I am grateful that the facility where Mom lives shut it down early and restricted visitors, but I do miss that weekly visit. I miss the quiet lunches where I watch Mom slowly push her food around the plate so that it looks like she ate. I miss the one sided conversations where I talk very loudly so Mom can hear me.

"So, how is Mark? Why doesn't he visit me?"

"Mark isn't feeling well. He has trouble going up and down the stairs."

"What?"

"MARK ISN'T FEELING WELL."

"What?"

"I SAID, MARK ISN'T FEELING WELL. HE CAN'T VISIT."

"Mark fell?"

And this is in the dining room filled with about twenty other old folks who don't even look up when you shout into Mom's ear. As a replacement for face to face visits, the good people at The Crossings have come up with a program that lets us see Mom. Skype. You call ahead and schedule a time for the Skype session and at the assigned time an employee brings an iPad up to Mom's apartment. Last Thursday was my turn. At the assigned time I tapped on the Skype icon and I was connected to the aide who was helping Mom. For the first ten minutes we couldn't get past my face staring back at me.

"Press the little camera icon."

From the other end I heard confusion.

"Okay.... can you see him Lila?"

More confusion, and then finally a picture appeared of my mom's apartment with a little fluff of white hair at the bottom.

"Move the pad down a bit. Mom's not in the picture."

The pad got moved, but moved up so that I was looking beyond the fluff.

"No, down. Angle the iPad down so I can see Mom."

"Okay, I thought I had. Is this better?"

"Sure, sure it is. That will work."

And for the next ten minutes I talked to the top half of Mom's head. I would talk, Mom would say, 'What?', and the aide would yell what I just said into Mom's ear. It worked perfectly. Sure was great to see her. She seemed very upbeat and happy and she looked good. At least she looked good from the eyes up.