Close to Nowhere

My front porch remains covered with bits and pieces of the hall bathroom. My bedroom is finally clean, although I may never get used to my new bed. I still feel like I'm falling off. And I still don't want to talk about my sewing room.

My eye is much better though. Monday, April 26, when I woke up, one of my eyeballs was broken.

Sunday, granddaughter Remy and her husband Mitch, one of my two favorite grandsons-in-law, were here helping me move furniture around to make room for my new project. More about that in a bit.

I'd bought a new bed ­ — going from a California king to a twin requires a lot of adjustment! I'd cleaned out drawers, making four new empty ones, which I promptly refilled with photograph albums. Many are mine and I also have my mother's and my mother-inlaw's photo albums.

I needed the dresser and the chest of drawers moved around and that's where Mitch came in. He's a muscular, strong young man and while Remy did kind of hold one end, Mitch did 90 percent of the lifting and shoving.

While carrying and moving piles of stuff, I hung my glasses on something and bent them. Brilliant me, knowing better, I kept them on anyway.

So when I woke up Monday, my poor eyeball had taken revenge on me by rolling up in my head and laughing. If I looked out of both eyes, it was like watching split screen television. When I took my little dog Rowdy outside, if I opened both eyes I could see two of him. My equilibrium was way off kilter as well and that made me really nauseous. All in all, I had a really fun Monday. Tuesday was better and by Wednesday I could see out of both eyes again.

With my one good eye, I had managed to finish rearranging my bedroom, so I went to work on my sewing room. Horrors!

In the meantime, the reason for my frantic rearranging and getting rid of stuff began arriving.

Some day I'll tell you about my goings-on with FedEx delivery service. Or at least one small part. But not today.

I'm getting all the supplies necessary to start with athome dialysis! I was so excited to begin the process, and even though I know both my grandsons-in-law are exhausted and son Kris is sick and tired of me and my fits, we're all still excited about it.

Wednesday is my last day at the dialysis training clinic in Oxford. Thursday my dialysis machine arrived. Friday, my training nurse Rebecca (who worked at the Fresenius clinic in Holly Springs for several years) will be coming to the house to watch me for my first at-home treatment. If all goes well, and I'm sure it will, Saturday I will do it totally by myself. Well, not totally. Kris is going to be an invaluable assistant.

And my brother, who is working here around a full-time, demanding job in Memphis, Tenn. is finishing up my bathroom. I hope by the time you're reading this that my bathroom bits and pieces are all back inside the bathroom in their proper place.

I don't know what I'd do without these guys. I don't have a lot of family left, but what I have is spectacular!

Linda Jones of Laws Hill is a former staff writer for The South Reporter. She is retired but continues her weekly column.