No Saints around Here: A Caregiver’s Days

Red Flag in the Mailbox

35 RED FLAG IN THE MAILBOX February 26 Several signs alert me when I’m nearing the edge. Most are predictable—noticing an especially sharp tone when I talk to James, feeling my head throb at the end of the day, wanting so desperately in the morning to stay in bed that I have to invent a heartening reason to get up: “If I push off the covers and set my feet on the floor right now, I could have a quiet half-hour with the newspaper while James is still sleeping.” I can tell I’ve entered a danger zone when, like today, I open the mailbox and find four small, squished packages among the usual bills, circulars, and appointment reminders. I know what these packages are. Last week, after I’d tucked James into bed at 7:30 p.m., and I was snugly in my bathrobe, teeth brushed, chores done or postponed, but not quite ready to sleep, I was too tired to read. I usually read under almost any circumstances , at any time, but that night I couldn’t bring myself to focus sustained attention on the printed word. I didn’t want to watch a DVD or recorded TV program. I couldn’t stand to hear any more voices. Up I went to my computer. Mindlessly, I checked my e-mail. Nothing new. But wait! Right there on my bookmark bar was a magic tab: eBay. I clicked. red flag in the mailbox 36 I knew I did not need anything. (This is not one of those days when I actually had to find a source for a medical supply or a replacement bedspread or a nonslip rug pad.) My closet is jammed. I live close to several consignment shops so I can scavenge there for anything I want, and until this moment I didn’t think I wanted anything. Now, however, I am seized with a feeling of wanting something . What can I imagine wanting? Maybe I’ll just make a few more clicks—like “silk shirt”—and see what’s offered. Then I’m plunged into a pictorial feast: red shirts, purple shirts, animalprint shirts, indescribable print shirts. I don’t really plan to buy anything. So I shouldn’t be doing this. But I spot a gorgeous blue-and-purple plaid shirt, just perfect over a T-shirt with my jeans. The auction is ending in six hours! No one has bid yet! Of course I’ll be in bed when this listing closes, but that doesn’t matter. I’m sure I won’t win anyway, especially if I put in a low bid—just pennies above the initial price—but what fun if I did win! Only eight dollars (and let’s not count shipping). I type; I click. I am the high bidder! And look! Just below that listing is another, and I can so easily see myself in that rosy-pink color, also excellent with jeans. That auction closes minutes after the one I just bid on. Suppose I don’t win the first shirt? Should I stake a claim on the second? Before long I am scrolling, enlarging pictures, mentally trying on shirts and discarding them—or not—and thinking, “What the hell!” as I make another offer, another click. For half an hour I troll around the site, totally engaged, as if I were so much younger and once again on a shopping spree with a close friend at the after-Christmas sales. We used to “go shopping .” I can’t believe I ever did that, but I did. We’d set out for the largest local mall, browse in and out of stores, look for bargains, try stuff on, give each other advice. At the end of an afternoon, we’d load up our treasures and congratulate each other on our hunting skills. red flag in the mailbox 37 I happily shopped with my mother too. She firmly believed that if anything was reduced to 50 percent off, it was our moral duty to buy it. And 70 percent off the retail price? Or even more? Grab it! I still periodically have to purge my closet of dirt cheap items that never even had the utility of a good garden bed of dirt. I’ve learned a lot since then. I worry now about money in a way I didn’t when I...