GIVING UP

Peg just rang in tears. Saying she can't stop crying, at all, because she can't stop thinking of Daddy "being embalmed" (which he wasn't) and in a "big black box" (which he isn't) and I'm not there and she just talked to the collie puppie woman saying she doesn't "understand what's supposed to be happening" (she does NOT get a puppy, we get the PROCEEDS from a puppy) even though we've discussed this nine million times, she is also crying because "this" is how her life has turned out after "working her tail off all these years" (she retired by choice at 55) and poor me poor me etc etc. and "no one feels sorry" for her.

So. It's Thanksgiving. I was doing fondue but can't find fucking Sterno anywhere in this stupid country except online for delivery in 3 days which does me no good so now I guess we have no dinner and I am now on antibiotics but still don't feel human and my ear and teeth and sinuses are still throbbing and I have been doing my ever-loving BEST to make life a little nicer for my mother and am up to here with getting her PR and relaunching her shows in the UK and getting her scripts published and loading more website content which I think I'll be doing util the day I die which ain't too far away let me tell you and launching DK's book and 2 more CDs of his published and trying to finish that novel or three and get the Peg House built in the garden here that she doesn't want to live in and have the Becket house ahead of me to empty and sell and….

Moan moan moan. It will all get done. But for today and maybe this week and maybe next too, who knows, I am giving up even moaning.

HAPPY 98TH BIRTHDAY

Peg's, not mine. Although I feel 98. No, make that 108.

The plan is, so I hear, to hit Tina's the Hairdresser's at 9:00, then off to Home Depot for bird feeders, then Price Chopper for you name it, then to Salmon Run in Lee where The Staff are taking Peg out to lunch. Then home, to accept a Facetime call from Kings in England singing a jolly Happy Birthday around the piano, during which I hope not to cough too much. After which either Bonnie or Terri or Bob will lead Peg onto her Facebook page, where she can see the many birthday wishes from friends and fans, and then view major fan James Lilek's birthday video he made for her for his newspaper in Minneapolis.

As 98th birthdays go, it will be fine. 

Jennifer (sort of adopted sister) arrived last Saturday for the night bringing birthday cake and a sweater that's too tight in the sleeves but Peg loves it so will wear it. 

On Thanksgiving, in two days time, four gay guys arrive with the full Monty dinner. 

I am sorry not to be there, but only sort of. Mostly because I still feel crap and will be starting antibiotics tomorrow and the thought of a plane journey and going deaf with the cabin pressure and then trying to be fun in Becket doesn't do it for me. Still. She's Mama. She rang this morning and I burst into tears.

The big news from this end is that today we got official planning permission to build the Peg house at the bottom of the garden.

The big news for the Becket end is that according to Bonnie, Peg has gone off the idea of moving to England. In fact not just gone off, doesn't want to come, ever. Period. 

I guess her plan is to stay there then until she runs out of money for oh, you know, staff, electric bills, food, printer ink and so on and just one day curl up under the duvet and die, by herself, with no one there to even ring and tell me the news. 

And I tell you, at the rate the money's flowing out, we're talking April.

I am not sleeping well these days. 

And if my son leaves any more sneakers in the front hall, he's out of here.

BLOODY BLUE BOOK - ITIS

She's back on the case. Blue Book alert, danger danger, Dive! Dive! This you may or may not recall, is a project my mother invented roughly three years ago, the idea being to make up 8 x 10 (blue, as it happens) plastic scrapbooks/photo albums based on her life and career to send to about nine million lucky recipients. The project for which she tore apart her carefully compiled and preserved old radio and TV scrapbooks and thereby fucking them up totally. The project where she spent fortunes on photo paper, cartridge ink, photo sleeves, printers, you name it, singlehandedly keeping the Dalton, MA. Staples store in business. The project which covered every surface the house with piles upon piles of photocopies of Peculiar Items To Include In A Scrapbook About One's Life, such as a grainy photo of a fisher (like a mink) and the wedding photo of some guy in Japan who uses Peg's scripts to teach English, and Kate Smith doing the Charleston as a young fat 16 year old. The project which drove everyone crazy because Peg was acting like "getting these Blue Books out to everyone who wants one!" was more important than, say, getting her website up, my father to the dentist, or even dinner, but mostly drove everyone crazy because IT NEVER GOT FINISHED. Because Peg cannot organize and because Peg procrastinates. The Blue Book Project which went on hold when Peg was rushed to the ER last April and nearly died, the Blue Book Project which, as a gesture to "Peg's last wishes", friends Annie and Wendy and I kindly rolled up our sleeves and knocked ourselves out to FINISH, in two days, AND get a dozen of these precious books mailed off to the 12 most deserving recipients (two of whom have since died and am now trying to decide if its tacky to ask for these books back, because, you know, seems like a waste when we could simply change the dedication and post on to Numbers 13 nd 14, say--bummer, wasting pics of fishers when you don't have to).

In any event, Peg did not die, and though she seemed pleased at the time when we presented her in her hospital bed with a Completed Blue Book--we'd even done clever printed captions--my suspicion, which has now been proved correct, is that it pissed her off that WE had done HER project.

Anyhow, she's back at it, driving Terri and Bonnie and Outside Bob to distraction. And now me, having just seen online the $396 Staples order that went in yesterday. We cannot afford Blue Book-itis any more. $400 is what only just came in for her French fire screen at auction. $400 is a week's salary for Staff (well, one of them) and Peg's blowing it all on printer ink and manilla folders. Kill. Kill.

I really don't know the answer to this. I want her to have a project--wait. Do I? Maybe not. No, I don't. I take that back. I think what I want is for her to sit quietly and read and nap and get her hair done and do the nice interviews I set up for her and maybe answer the nine thousand letters she owes people if she's feeling up to it. And stop making life difficult for everyone. 

On top of which, Bonnie reports that Peg, who has made a big song and dance about wanting to be "in charge of her own pills goddamit!", hasn't been taking them. Bonnie says she hasn't taken them in fact, for over a week now. This is 15 pills a day she's missing. High blood pressure, cholesterol, gout, bladder cramps, diabetes, psoriasis--you name it. 

Am torn between making a fuss about all this or saying well, what can you do. Nothing. Certainly from 3,000 miles away. Except invent a Blue Book pill to be taken 3 times a day which any one of four people, I guarantee you, would gladly help ram down her throat.

TO BECKET OR NOT TO BECKET

I'm over here getting no sleep and keeping DK awake coughing and sneezing and spluttering and in fact wishing at this very moment that my nose would stop dripping onto the keyboard and my eyes would stop watering long enough to at least type a sentence, and meanwhile fretting about when to book my flight to Boston and will my sinuses be all right flying by next week because God knows I don't want my ears to pop and make me deaf for a week like they did last year--and now Peg is suddenly acting surprised to hear I'm coming over, although we've been discussing this for month. And, as of the last phone call, is absolutely insistent that she's "OK" and that I am not to fly over there "and give everyone your cold". So that's where we are. Plus the two people I need to meet with are going to be away now I hear, the whole time I'll be there, almost to the day. 

So I don't know what to do. Still. Terri (Staff) can be there for her birthday, she assures me, and for Thanksgiving, so Peg won't be alone. Still. Or did I just say that. 

Meanwhile, Outside Bob has successfully managed to install a $6.35 camera from eBay onto the PC there and hook Peg up to Skype. And it works. We checked it yesterday. Ever the set decorator, I had Bob leaping up ladders rearranging the signed wall photos from celebrities behind where Peg sat so the good ones showed more i.e. Basil Rathbone, Helen Hayes, Margaret Hamilton. "Boy, she's still a pain in the ass and she's not even here!" Bob grumbled good naturedly (maybe).

Anyhow I can now give the green light to two Peg SKYPE interviews, one from an online magazine here in the UK for their column "Awesome Old Lady of the Month" (my favourite sample question being "What is your night time beauty routine?", can't wait to hear the answer to that one, hope the word "catheter" doesn't feature) and the other from some radio station. Have just sent digital copies of five of Peg's scripts and a DVD of her performing to the Motion Picture Retirement something in LA, the idea being that old retired film people will perform for camera Peg's comedy shows. Instead of I suppose basket weaving and flower arranging. A publishing company wants to publish her scripts, am trying to hammer out a deal as we speak. Lileks from the Minneapolis Star Tribune is bringing out his piece on her later this month, "as a birthday present for her" he said. And am in the process of getting her shows on the radio here in England.

Plus chased up both the auctioneers who disappeared with quite a bit of her stuff last summer and found out we have about $3000, possibly more, coming in from some silver, a fire screen, and a Tower of London flintlock musket. So money is in place until January, by which time I will need to have drummed up more. From God knows where. The other auctioneer is not answering my emails and has clearly retired to Barbados on proceeds from the Becket house. 

Mike the Boundary Guy, my new best friend, is going to advise me on the sale of the Becket property when its time, and figure our pricing and parceling out land plots to sell separately or keep as bargaining points. 

So not all is looking bleak, by any means. It just seems that way when you don't feel well. And the thought of a still-full 8 bedroom house on 28 acres all needing your attention--looms.
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MEDICAL UPDATE:

Peg has had her first visit to her speech therapist, who has told her to stop clearing her throat and to cough instead. Peg's thrilled. Coughing a lot (join the club) but thrilled.

A COLLIE BY ANY OTHER NAME

Great excitement amongst collie lovers. Spurn-Me-Not Piper Angel Honeybear (aka Stainer of Rugs and Bleacher of Parquet Flooring) has just given birth to eight little Spurn-Me-Not Piper Angel Honeybear juniors. Having just been on the breeder's website [http://wellsmerecollies.com/spurn]
trying to figure out how to see them on the webcam (it's been a slow night here in Walberswick), I was interested to learn that we may have been addressing  the dog by the wrong name. She appears to be named "Van-M Spurn-Me-Not". No wonder she paid no attention when we called her, she was waiting to hear "VAN-M? Oh, VAN-M? What the fuck are you doing squatting on the white carpet in the Tulip Room?"

I also see that not only has the breeder put 3 "N's in Peg and Odd's last name, she has put a photo of Peg on the website, Peg asleep, cuddling Van-M, possibly the one and only time Van-M got onto Peg's bed in the year and a half she was in residence, in fact was probably deposited there by Outside Bob at Peg's request and escaped as the shutter clicked. 


Peg is already making plans to visit the puppies, an hour and a half away, with Dawn, whom she fired last year for labeling and dating the Tupperware containers in the fridge and who set the Great Borrowed Collie Plan in motion to begin with, thinking it was a great idea, which it was--to recap, briefly: Peg gets VAN-M for $2000 until Van-M comes into heat, then gets bred, then has pups, and Peg gets proceeds of one pup ($1000) and this was to happens twice. Or was until my mother, despite signing the contract, said she knew nothing of any such arrangement, "Honeybear" was NOT leaving the house to be bred or for any reason, ever ever ever, and Dawn was a terrible person "and--and--and in fact put her hand over the part of the agreement that stated all that!" so Peg "couldn't see it!" And so it went. Until I pried the dog loose, the dog that couldn't wait to leave anyway, and now, well! Presto! Eight Little Van-Ms. N, O, P Q, R, S, T and U. 

And guess who is now insisting on a puppy--no, make that two puppies. Despite me saying we need the $1000--which we do--not crap all over the floor for Peg to roll her walker through. 

So I feel pretty much like an ogre. One who incidentally has the flu and whose tooth (LL5, in dentist talk) fell out last night while I was eating ice cream. And which today a very nice lady dentist in Southwold glued back in for me for £33. Which is equal to about one ear of a collie, in dog talk.

PROGRESS

We have finally received Planning Permission from the Parish Council for the "Little Peg House" we are hoping to build at the bottom of the garden but still waiting for the fingers crossed "big YES" from the District. After which I can line up builders and a start date and make girlie decisions like what kind of boiler and heating system I want (no idea besides the kind that gives you heat and hot water when you want it), how the drains should be configured (um, in a pretty figure eight?) and what sort of flooring. All I know here is that I don't want tile, stone or cement, it's too hard on the back and feet. 

On top of which Peg won't like it. All she ever wants is carpet. Carpet carpet carpet rugs rugs runners and more runners. She and my father spent fortunes on a parquet floor in the dining room and kitchen, covered it with rugs and more rugs, especially when it started buckling, eventually had it torn up and replaced with engineered pine boards which Peg also covered with rugs and filled in any gaps with stick-on runners you cut off a roll, including a little 4 inch wide strip over the door jamb into the laundry room (also carpeted) because "the dogs don't like wood floors". All of which makes you wonder why, if no one there's liking wood floors, they had any installed to begin with. But now you can at least see them again because, as you may or not recall, I had to pitch the four rugs and various runners she had in there when they became saturated with collie urine.

So I guess what I should do is stop worrying about floors for the Peg House, put down what I want (wood), then wall-to-wall over it all for Peg and rip it up when she has moved on to heaven (which I hope to fuck better be carpeted).
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The Motion Picture Retirement Fund runs a home in LA, and they want Peg scripts to perform and film. So today, while I am feeling distinctly fluey--certainly enough to give Keep Fit and a ladies lunch a miss but not enough sadly to lose my appetite--I am listening to Peg's comedy shows and choosing  appropriate-for-elderly-actors-to-perform ones. Am also sending DVDs of her Old Time Radio convention performances so these retired film types can see how these shows should be played, for timing and delivery. I then find the script to the episode, scan it if not already scanned, or ask Terri to go into the files in Becket and scan it. That was the easy part. The hard part has been explaining Dropbox to Terri and the fact that I have 3 Dropbox accounts and only, it seems, the right passwords for two. And both of these are full so I need access to the third. Four hours and 1,200 emails and phoned calls and security questions later, I am happy to report we are getting closer. Closer that is to posting in the bleeding mail and forgetting Dropbox.

_________________
DK, meanwhile, when not busy opening dodgy emails thinking they were from a neighbor, which consequently entailed my spending a few hours on the phone getting DK's security question changed via a dim AOL Customer Services rep named Amy who had to have the DK's "favorite film" spelled for her about eleven hundred times using "Brava" and "echo" and all those others I can never remember--has completed the orchestral score of Black Beauty, and all the parts, with a view to renting it out, as we keep getting requests from orchestras. Today he is off getting it copied onto A3 paper. As opposed to sending the original out, as he did, once, and never getting it returned. Or he wouldn't have had to re-score the sucker. He is also about to launch into a heavy PR campaign to publicize the launch of a newly-mastered cast album of a musical of his from 30 years ago, Worzel Gummidge. Stage Door Records, the company behind all this, has organized more radio and TV interviews for him in three days than his agent has done in the past three years. We're thinking of asking StageDoor to handle the PR now for DK's memoirs, launching early 2015. 

I am also hoping that he returns from Halesworth with more aspirin for me. 

ME to PEG: I'm toying with the idea, Mama, of coming over for Thanksgiving. What do you think?

PEG: Are you worried you're not going to see me before I die?

ME: Well--no.  I know you won't die before Christmas, you have Steve Hiss [a fan] coming, and Laurie [another one].

PEG: I really only called to tell you how pretty you looked last night on the phone. I don't know why you want to get your face done--!

ME: [RESIGNED BUT KINDA PLEASED] Oh--Mama. Am sure it was a trick of the light. But thank you.

PEG:  MY eyes are driving me wild! They water so much I can't see a damned thing anymore, it's like looking out through Niagara Falls.
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PROCRASTINATION

…is something that Peg is especially good at, of course, but not I. Yet here I am dithering, big time, about whether to hop a plane in a week or two so my mother will not be alone on her birthday or Thanksgiving. Alone, that is, meaning without me. The Staff and Local Gays will see to it that she is wined and dined and showered with gifts. What's stopping me is  the thought of having to do that god-awful journey again, twice. So it's totally selfish. And the dithering is whether or not I can live with myself or not for being selfish. 

[PHONE. PEG CALLING ON FACETIME, ALL BY HERSELF.]

Funny. It's almost as of all I have to is type her name and the phone rings. Today I got to see her new black and white polka dot suspenders that Bonnie bought her. Apparently when she was at lunch last week at Bob and Trevor's, she stood up to leave and her pants fell down. Dominick (who she just called Domino) kindly yanked them back up and suggested suspenders. She's lost more weight, is the thing and all her waistbands are too big. 

OTHER BIG BECKET NEWS:

- Peg has had to retrieve her glasses four times in three days  from the toilet. When she looks down to "inspect", after, as you do, her glasses, all of which need tightening she says, shoot off. 

- Spurn Me Not Angel Honeybear is due to give birth to at least 5 collie pups today or tomorrow. The breeder is keeping Peg informed. Peg wants two of the puppies. (She is not having them).

[PHONE. PEG CALLING AGAIN ON FACETIME. "JUST PRACTICING"]

- Teri has finished scanning 4 scripts I have to send out to the Motion Pictures Retirement Home who want to film residents performing her comedy shows. Am also sending a DVD of Peg and Bob Hastings performing them, so they know what to aim for.

- Health-wise, all Peg's vitals are swell but her legs "still like jelly". 

- She told me my hair looked nice. Never fails. It's 3 days unwashed and am long overdue for cut and colour, scheduled for tomorrow. She said that years ago when she was little, her mother came to collect her from school one day with a new hair style (shingled) and Peg didn't recognize her and howled. She was further confused by her mother having just had her name chiselled onto her father's headstone (cheaper to do all at once apparently)  i.e. "Here lie Hugh Franklin Lynch and Clara Frances Lynch" and decided her real mother had died and this stranger with the shingled hair had taken her place. 
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It's lashing down outside and the dog needs a walk but I need  a nap. So will continue to mull over my possible selfishness, lying down.