No News Is Good News

Apologies for not posting for over a week, but I have been very nearly trampling myself coming and going trying to get done all the things I need to get done.

An estate sale firm has been chosen and the contract signed. They will have the sale at mom’s but they will also come over and get the things I’m selling and take them to her house, and bring the things she’s keeping to my house. That way, the movers will only have to come to one place. Preparation for the estate sale starts the 16th, by which time I have to make sure I’ve removed everything we’re keeping from the house. In the meantime, I have to get my own things separated between keep and sell, too, but I won’t have a crew coming in to do it for me and I’m the one running all over town trying to get stuff done. I’ve used two full tanks of gas in four weeks — and that’s at 30 mpg!

We are going to go into Carillon, one way or the other, but getting both of us in under the same deal now depends upon getting this one piece of paper and a very large check (!). Getting that one piece of paper apparently entails my getting a special Merill Lynch power of attorney (everybody else — the realtor, Carillon, the bank — likes the one I already have, I don’t know why ML doesn’t — go figure!) — which if they are going to insist on me getting, I will need to have anyway for the future. I find out tomorrow what other hoops I will have to jump through to get that. Since it would be very hard on my mom to wheel her into a van, be jostling her about while schlepping her across town in 90+ F (32+ C) heat to a notary public, one of the Carillon notaries offered to come to The Garrison. Now if we can just get the power of attorney paper, the ML guy, the Carillon notary and me to rendezvous at The Garrison and “execute the instrument,” hunky doryness will ensue.

As I say, the power of attorney I already have was good enough for the realtor. I signed the contract and Mom’s house went on the market at noon today. It has a sign in the yard as of this morning, pictures on line, and it already has a showing scheduled. We’re asking high knowing that we probably won’t get it (that kitchen!), but it gives us room to come down some if we get a serious offer.

Mom’s neighbor wants to buy her car (a RED 2009 Mazda 3 sedan with less than 38,000 miles on it). I looked it up in the Blue Book to see what it was valued at, and that’s what we’re asking. I just texted him that mom wants to sell it to him. We’ll see how that plays out.

I had a good doctor visit. My labs were all normal! I still have to get another CT scan, (Doc wants neck, chest, and abdomen. I’ve had the neck one) but so far, so good.

The Carillon guy we have been working with (and who has been so helpful!) gave mom a copy of their residents’ directory. I swear mom already knows at least half of them. (Give her a couple of weeks and I’d bet she’ll know the other half!) She will do so much better in an environment where she can socialize more easily and comfortably.

(And where she will have ready access to a beauty saloon!)

Mom so very much wants to finally get settled into Carillon. This has been a difficult transition for mom from being totally independent and having what she wants when she wants it because she can do it for herself, to having to depend on others for help (and having to share her caregivers!). The abruptness of it all has made it even harder. She turns 97 this September. We have been so blessed that this degenerative scoliosis and slipped disk business is the first major health concern she has ever had. She has been working hard in rehab to try to gain back ground she lost being in the hospital. Hopefully, we can get her moved to Carillon soon and get her into a more settled and structured environment. (And I can catch up on my sleep and my knitting!)