The Pre-Roll

David took me to my niece's concert last night. Chelsea McBride's Socialist Night School; that's her. It was an exciting evening of interesting, eclectic music. Chelsea has always been that way, using music to express what she see's, presenting compositions which take different pathways, non-traditional jazz routes. Probably the most exciting part was watching Chelsea perform, and knowing her Mom was in the audience. Alas my brother, Matthew, is up north skippering a ship up and down the Mackenzie River. We are an unusual family, with unusual talents.

The sad part about last night was having to leave halfway through the show. Home Care waits for nobody; I had to be home by 9:45 PM at the latest. All right, my HCA did wait an extra 15 minutes. Between the timing of the intermission in Chelsea's performance and the drive home, we made it here at 9:30 PM, the normal timing for putting me to bed.

Sleeping was easy last night; I was exhausted after all the activity, along with a pre-bedtime glass of Scotch. At least it was easy until about 5:00 AM. That's when I woke up and realized my HCA had not positioned me to turn easily. In fact I could not roll on my side at all, the common state of affairs these days. Now, in order to make that movement, I have to be "pre-rolled" to ensure my hips are slanted enough that I don't actually roll as much as I complete the prior positioning. So, on a proper night, I am not really flat on my back, but positioned more in a 1/4 turn. From there, I can complete.

So, at about 6:00 AM, after trying any number of maneuvres on my own, I called the night nurse. Fortunately she was not all that busy, so she had time to come and help me reposition. It is my hope that all of this goes away once I have a live-in caregiver. I don't mean that I will wake her up at 5:00 AM. My hope is that, like my other evening HCA, she will learn the pre-roll as part of the routine, an important part, not to be forgotten.