We both know there's something happening here

I stand behind her, my fingers moving through her hair, lathering the shampoo, moving across her head, trying to massage all confusion and pain from her mind. Looking at the color of her gray hair curling around my fingers, I am struck by time and, for a moment, lulled by the simple scene before me, that of lather bubbling across the contrast between her hair and my skin.

She shudders and screams, Stop this, let me GO!

I move my hand to her shoulder, step around her chair so that I look into her eyes, It's alright Mom, I'm here, it's alright.

She is not one to be fooled; she knows better, I know better. It's not alright. Where we are is not alright. She deserves more; something needs to be rigged to accommodate this exercise so that she can keep her dignity. I voiced it to no return; it's up to me. I put it at the top of my long list.

Still, the present is now and I ask her to tilt her head back. Cautiously she does so as I pour a cup of warm water over her hair, watch the suds weaken and rinse down in streams of change flowing across her hair and my hands.

This is gentle and fragile. This is love and caution. This is tender and pure, this cleansing of her body and her hair, this very basic need of hers, to be clean.

This is also hell. For her, for me.

I bring the washcloth across her back, gently raise her arm and slide the cloth from her shoulder to her hand, her fingers, wrist, and upwards again.

She yells, Stop it! I don't want to be here. Get me OUT of here.

Where do you want to go, Mom?

She cries, I don't know, anywhere but here.

Timbuktu?

She laughs, Yes, Timbuktu.

It's a joke between us, one she started a few months ago, one I do not understand but know it's something and comprehend enough to know I've bought a minute of peace for her. At most.

I'm in the bathtub, her hands washing my body, my hair, her voice telling me to lean back. I'm afraid to do so but hearing her voice soothes me and I trust her hands to support me. She tells me to close my eyes -- Honey, it's okay, close your eyes -- and I do so and feel warm water falling over my head, my face, my shoulders. I am safe, loved, baptized in her love, in our faith and trust. This is all there is; this is everything. And I stay leaning back into her arms until she gently pushes me forward again and wraps her arms and heart and a towel around my shoulders. I open my eyes, look up to her face, find the comfort waiting for me there in her eyes.

I want her to feel that. I want her to feel the same that she gave to me, the love given and the promise made, and the trust hung between the two. The strong arms from mother and daughter, and now daughter to mother.

Her nurse and I struggle to get her from the shower chair to the wheelchair. She screams for us to leave her alone. She is cold and wet. She is afraid and shivering. I circle her with the towel, patting her body until every last drop of water is gone from her skin. I lean across her with my life and warmth, and whisper in her ear that I love her and I'm here and she's okay.

She hangs her head, whimpers, Timbuktu.

After we get her into her cotton gown, and in her soft cotton sheets, she relaxes in shifts I can measure. She feels her familiar, she feels safe again. I feel safe again. I climb onto the bed and place my body beside hers, my cheek against her own, and curl my breathing into the pace of hers. I shut my eyes and imagine I can finger paint the curve of my breath shadowing hers. We swirl through all the colors together, moving in curves and circles and each other. I dance my fingers along her arm, across her shoulder, through her hair. She is warm and loved. She is tired and does not resist sleep. I watch her, protect her, rise above just enough to feel her own warmth and love. I too am safe. Mother and daughter; daughter and mother.

Her breathing shifts into slumber. I kiss her cheek, whisper into her ear, I love you Mom, Timbuktu.

Tonight, my life is filled with the voices of the women in my life, strong, poetic and beautiful. My Mom's voice, her nurse's voice, and a handful of well-chosen CDs. All of them grabbing my heart. At home, I listen to a Stevie Nicks CD (thank you C&J!). Track 11 is another version of that song, the one that has accompanied me through one love two times, through the life and death of my father and now my answering the call of my mother's needs. All the while, through each love and age, the song that both crucifies and soothes the giving, losing, growing. And the loving. Always the loving.

Oh mirror in the sky, what is love?
Can the child within my heart rise above?
And can I sail through the changing ocean tides?
Can I handle the seasons of my life?
I don't know.

I've been afraid of changing
'cause I've built my life around you
But time makes you bolder
children get older
and I'm getting older too.
Yes, I'm getting older too.

The lyrics timeless and familiar. Somewhere there is a circle and I sit upon the base, swinging, kicking my legs back and forth, my hands on the sides, back and forth, forth and back, my bare feet in the air, stretching forward, drawing back, higher and higher, more familiar and trusting and free with each arc. This night is that. Back and forth, higher and higher, returning lower, climbing higher again, returning lower, climbing higher, and higher still.

It's no more, no less, this circle. Round and round the wholeness of it. This is gentle and fragile. This is love and caution. This is tender and pure. It is what it is.