Crazy Is as Crazy Does

You know those moments in your mid- to late-twenties when you have a startling realization that time is flying by and there’s not a damn thing you can do to stop it?

I’ve been having a series of these OMGWTF moments over the past few months.

Namely because my grandmother is losing her GD mind.

She’s always been quirky, ever since I was a little kid. As a result, my sister and I were conditioned from an early age hold everything she said at arm’s length. My parents used to tell us to “take everything Grandmom says with a grain of salt,” and “let everything Grandmom says go in one ear and out the other,” which was good advice, otherwise I would have grown up believing that men are the devil and all they want to do is get in your pants, so every time they’re nice to you, you should punch them in the balls and run away screaming.

Surprisingly, that was excellent advice on how I SHOULD have dealt with my Ex. If only I had known…

Vaguely traumatizing advice notwithstanding, Grandmom was then and still is today one of my favorite octogenarians. If you’re not easily offended, she’s hilarious. She’ll tell you exactly how it is at all times. She’ll tell you that your ass looks great, getting old sucks balls, and the “PRs” are ruining this country (don’t get your panties in a twist, I’m just repeating what she says). She knows that what she says isn’t politically correct, or even accurate half the time, but she says what’s on her mind and makes no apologies for it. Beyond that, she has always had these amazing moments of clarity where her wisdom and life experience really shine through. In one heart-to-heart talk we had, she accurately diagnosed the emotional source of my longstanding feud with my father, and explained to me in perfectly clear terms why I probably married the Ex, despite how bad he was for me.

My grandmother: What Freud would have been if he was a short, Italian racist.

Unfortunately, these moments of clarity are getting few and far between. Moreover, she’s developing dementia, paranoia, and the inability to regulate her emotions properly. As a result, my grandmother and grandfather recently moved from the assisted-living community they were staying at and bought a house—at the ages of 85 and 87—because she was convinced that the nurses were trying to kill her, or at least drug her to steal her Medicare money.

Oh yeah, she’s definitely on the one-stop train to Crazy-Town.

It could be Alzheimers, although lord knows she’d never submit to a psychological exam. The way I figure it, diagnosis or not, she’s just friggin’ OLD, and as a result, her brain isn’t working the way it used to. It’s sad, but honestly, what can I expect? Sure, there are people out there in their nineties who are still completely independent and as sharp as a tack…but not many. My grandmother has had 85 years of relative cognizance, and I am grateful for every coherent conversation we have had.

However, I’m happy to report that, even in her declining mental health, her personality is shining through. Take the other day, for example:

My mother told me that earlier this week she was driving my grandmother home from the hospital (she had been admitted for a panic attack), and they stopped at WalMart to pick up her newest list of prescriptions. When my mom came out of the store, my grandmother, who had been waiting in the car, was giggling almost uncontrollably.

“Do you see that?” she asked, and pointed to another car in the parking lot.
“No,” my mother said. “See what?”
“That dog. He’s taking a shit on top of that car over there.”

Of course, there was no dog on the car, let alone one who was taking a shit, but try telling that to my grandmother. I guess the thing is that, while I’m sad for my grandmother that she’s losing her marbles, at the same time, she’ll always be Grandmom. She may be hallucinating, but at least she’s hallucinating in a manner that’s consistent with her personality. She’s not seeing elephants walking by, and she doesn’t think she’s the queen of England (yet), but she sure as hell managed to conjure up a totally inappropriate image of a dog taking a shit on a car.

If that doesn’t say “Grandmom,” I don’t know what does.