On Sunday, Mom had some ice-cold watermelon--one of the few things that won't plug her up. She devoured it in about 30 seconds. Ginger ale finally has competition.

We are in a bit of a holding pattern here. Mom has told us repeatedly that she is ready to go--that she wants to go. And her vitals and mental clarity have led us more than once to think she would go very soon. But come each morning-time she has lasted the night, her tough body plugging away; her spirit weaker but still there. Yesterday she kept Dad and Lorie busy from 3 am until 5 am recording her thoughts on dying...a philosopher to the end.

The hospice nurses are of course circumspect--the I-have-no-crystal-ball metaphor is frequently used and continually unsatisfying. Their estimates range from a week to weeks, though in the next sentence they caution that her condition could change rapidly.

I can't speak for the others, but I feel very much in a time bubble, where the days pass quickly or slowly with much activity or none at all. There are so many parts of her history and her approach to la vida that I know I will wish I'd asked her about. But there is scarce perspective from her bedside in the living room, leaving me few triggers for those questions. And it would be impossible and exhausting and selfish on my part to try in any case. Instead I am attempting to content myself with the little gems of herself that she shares every now and then.

"Carry on my sweets," she says.

-nate