"It's better to spend money like there's no tomorrow than to spend tonight like there's no money."
~ P.J. O'Rourke
Mothers and dogs. Well, at least, my Mom and my dog.
My brother and I finally had a serious conversation about how we can help Mom to make the decisions she needs to make about: 1) whether to keep running her real estate business; 2) where she should live; and 3) how she will handle her financial needs. Following the advice of several of you, we are going to leave the decisions to her. We will be there merely to help facilitate the decisions -- and to put more cash on the table.
All of this will happen when she returns from Mexico. She swings back and forth from loving Mexico to fearing Mexico. I doubt she would ever feel comfortable living there full time.
I thought I was going to have a bad news report concerning the dog. When I came home from work tonight, Jiggs had trouble supporting himself on his rear left leg. I was positive that the nerve in that leg had been entrapped in his damaged vertebrae. It was almost as if he could not tell if his foot was touching the ground.
We started on a walk, but he fell several times. So I took him back to the house where he started licking his leg. Then I noticed the problem on the carpet: a sweetgum seed pod. Apparently, it was stuck in his paw, but he managed to pull it loose.
And there is the lesson. I have pulled seed pods out of his paws many times over the past 12 years. His actions were always the same as they were tonight. But I have allowed my worries about his declining health to blind me to a reality I need to learn again and again: stop worrying that the worst will happen; life is far more mundane than that. That is true for both Mom and Jiggs. The relationship matters. All the other issues will resolve themselves -- with a helping hand to remove the burrs.
