Читать книгу Has Anyone Here Seen Larry? - Deirdre Purcell - Страница 7

I’m the last of my own family. And my darling husband, Josie, died many years ago. I sometimes forget his anniversary until Martha reminds me.

The really awful thing is that I have to look at my snap albums sometimes so I can remember his face.

To be fair, life in this house is probably as hard on the girls as it is on me. Especially on Martha. She’s the eldest of the six children Josie and I had. As I’m sure she has told you by now, at length, she does everything. All the cooking, cleaning, washing, shopping and driving. She is always busy, always organising, always rushing here and there. Despite not working ‘outside the home’, as they say these days, she never has time to bless herself.

Sometimes I think she trained somewhere in some secret boot camp. She certainly runs this house as though she is an army officer. Her kitchen floor is so clean it squeaks and the carpet in the hall always smells of Shake ’N’ Vac. (She likes the vanilla kind.)

I am not saying that she is a bad person. Or that she is mean to me. At least not on purpose! Because there is so little I can do for myself. My arms are as stiff as old windscreen wipers so I do value all she does for me, I do really. There are even times when I feel sorry for her.

But what can I do about it?

She is so bossy and pushy, she is hard to love. I have to admit that right up front. Yes, she is my own flesh and blood, but that’s the way it is.

Naturally, I try to keep my lips zipped. God knows, but who could blame me if now and then I come out with what I really feel? I might be 87 but I’m still a real person.

And although she would never admit it, she does make things harder on herself than she has to. I think she enjoys being a martyr.

For instance, I wish she would not insist on driving me to visit my friend, Marian. All the rest of them are gone now and she and I are the last of the gang. She’s a sad case, thin as a whip, and so weak she doesn’t get out of bed any more. Although I find it hard to see her like this, if I didn’t keep up the visits I feel I might as well give up the ghost myself.

Isn’t it funny with friends? You always feel you have to explain yourself to your family, but never to your friends.

I could get a taxi to go to the nursing home. It is not that far, only a couple of miles, so it would not be all that expensive. After all, I do have a little bit of money from my pension. But Martha won’t hear of wasting money on those rascal drivers. They would see me coming, she says. Old ladies are fair game to them, she says.

To tell you the truth, she ruins the visit for me. By the time we get there my nerves are already in shreds because she has a hissy fit if traffic lights don’t turn quickly enough. And then, while my pal and I are talking together, she stays in the room. She pretends not to listen but jangles her car keys to let me know that time is short.

And don’t get me started on her cooking. Sometimes I feel my throat will burst if I have to eat one more plateful of mashed up vegetables ‘because they’re good for you’. The teeth aren’t great, of course – but really! Surely in this day and age there should be some solution so we don’t have to eat like babies? I do try to get the stuff down but Martha gets in a snit if I make a face. I can’t show even for one second that I am less than thrilled when she plonks this gooey, grey-looking mess in front of me each dinner-time. If I so much as sigh, she snatches the food away and throws it in the bin. She shoves a banana under my nose. ‘There – eat that!’ she says, as though I’m a monkey.