Re: bolt

On Feb 24, 10:44 am, Carla <ca...@xxxxxxx> wrote:
Rick wrote:
On Feb 23, 10:26 pm, miranda <thehowep...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

oh no. now I can't stop worrying. Did sailor or did he not conquer the
bolt?    <R>

Sadly, I have seen several old men, in the rural community I live in,
obsess on their death beds about some mechanical problem that had
bugged them in their final days. I hope my mind is steered more
towards a pleasant childhood memory or a part of a former lover's
anatomy.

"Rosebud"  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HyJAytr1ebc

In 1989, essayist Gore Vidal cited contemporary rumors that "Rosebud"
was a nickname Hearst used for his mistress Marion Davies; a reference
to her clitoris, a claim repeated as fact in the 1996 documentary The
Battle Over Citizen Kane and again in the 1999 dramatic film RKO 281.
A resultant joke noted, with heavy innuendo, that Hearst and/or Kane
died "with 'Rosebud' on his lips."

Marion Davies  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_6Zs-UOQQfA

I dunno, I think it's very sad that anyone's last thoughts should be be
focused on something in their distant past. The whole point of the
"Rosebud" image was to underscore the fact that to Kane, all he had
collected, all that he had accomplished in his life did not bear as much
meaning as those moment of joy sledding down a hill fifty years previously.

Thinking about nuts and bolts at the moment of death is very "here and
now." Nothing wrong with that, in and of itself. But I hope that during
their last days and hours those old codgers have also been able to
contemplate with satisfaction and contentment the fabric of their lives,
with its many colors, images and themes. If it is important for them to
distract themselves with nuts and bolts in order to be strong and silent
at the moment of death, as they have borne the trials of life as they
traveled through it, it simply speaks of their value system, to which
they remain true to the last. There is something poignant, but noble, in
that, I think.

At least fifteen years ago I worked in home care for the richest man
in my home town. Ex- president of a major nationally known corporation
based and named after my home town. I worked 48 hours through the
weekend giving the women who was the live in care taker her weekends
off. He was every negative stereotype you can think of that would fit
a business executive who had clawed his way to the top. He treated
every person who came to the house, including his daughter and me,
like ***. The first day I worked for him I brought him his lunch, a
salad plate, and I didn't give him a salad fork. He literally screamed
at me, waving the fork at me, "Not this fork, I want the other fork."
At first I thought, old man, dying, in pain, etc. But after talking to
other people, many of whom had business interactions with him over the
years, I discovered not one person who had a good word to say about
him. Everyone had the same things to say about him, mean, nasty, a
***.

I worked there until he died and in the last few months as he went
down hill he went through this sort of progression. First he would
call me down several times a day to count the money in his wallet. He
would remark with sadness, "I can't remember how much money I have in
my wallet." Well there are lots of things one can forget as they begin
their decline. I thought it was interesting that the one that bothered
him was forgetting how much money he had in his wallet.

This went on for a few weeks than stopped. Then as I was sitting in my
room I heard this wail, like a Jacob Marley wail. I jumped up and ran
to his room and saw him sitting calmly in his chair. He looked up at
me quisically and I asked him what was wrong. "Nothing" he said. I
asked why he was wailing and he said he wasn't. I said, "Yes you
were." He replied, "No, i didn't, was I? I don't know why."

I talked to the week day worker and she said the same thing was
happening to her. Several times a day he would let loose with this
blood curdling wail and if you asked him about it he would deny ever
doing it. Again this lasted for a few weeks. After checking on him the
first few times we just kinda ignored it.

So he finally stops wailing. Then he started counting. One, with a
long pause, two, pause, three. And again at first we checked on him to
ask why he was counting. And again he would deny doing it or having
any knowledge of doing it. It would go on for an hour or more, stop
for a time, and start up again. Sometimes he'd get stuck on a number,
eighty three, pause, eighty three, pause, eighty three, pause.

After a few weeks of this it too stopped and soon after he was no
longer able to get out of bed even with help. In a short time he
stopped communicating and than eating. He slept most of the time and
one night I could no longer hear him breathing. I went into his room
and he was dead.

My theory, take it or not, is this. Here was a man whose whole life
was about money. It was all he cared about. So as he began to loose
his faculties that was what concerned him the most. Then in his final
days his soul tried to speak to him of a life wasted, hence the soul
shattering cries of anguish. In a last effort to blot out any self
analysis of his life he occupied his mind with counting, one to ninty
nine, over and over again.

And in a final achetypal moment, this was a man who was know his whole
life as having a foul nasty tongue, a black tongue. In the last week
of his life his tongue turned black in his mouth. I'm not an expert on
death and I don't know how common this is. But I did this work for a
few others and none of them died with a black tongue. And he had as
good or better care than all the others in helping to keep his mouth
hydrated when he was unable to eat or drink.

This is only a fragment of the story. Interesting experience,
especially when I compare it to the stories of other people's death
sagas that I was a part of.
.