The View From 95---December

2026ViewDec
The View From 95---December
December of course was the month of Christmas, a month of supposed good cheer and holiday spirit and for those like me who were without their loved one a hard time to get through. However, we’ll get to that in due time.
The month started with one of my rare outings, lunch at the Timbers with three other guys from my grief support group, which I had dropped out of but W---, who organized these lunches, insisted that I keep going to. I don’t remember what we talked about, probably about our most recent ailments and I do remember that one of us had trigger finger, meaning he couldn’t bend his finger or fingers. This is one of those things that happen to older guys. As for what I ate, I was still wary of hamburgers with my missing teeth so had chicken gumbo soup.
This is a lead-in to the unfortunate event of the month; I wasn’t wary enough in what I ate for lunch one day and it happened again, a broken tooth. This time it was the small one to the right of my two front teeth. Luckily, my son M--- was off work the next day and I was able to get an appointment with my dentist so he drove me there, the dentist looked at the tooth, said there wasn’t enough left to restore it so the best thing was to have it removed to prevent any complications. I’d been down this road before so once again I had to get an appointment with the oral surgeon and once again apparently a lot of other people had to have their teeth pulled as the earliest date I could get was January 9th.
There was more bad news this month, something much worse thn even my broken tooth. I saw a posting on Facebook by J--- L---, the lady that put out Storystar, the online site I posted my stories on, saying that she’d been diagnosed with bone cancer. Then a later post that the cancer had spread to her entire skeleton. I was very upset by this as I’d been exchanging e-mails with J--- for many years, knew she lived in Florence, Oregon, and considered her a friend, not to mention a supporter of my writing, along with writers from all over who posted their stuff on Storystar. Also, the suddenness of her cancer diagnosis reminded me of how sudden Beverly’s had been and how terrible. J--- was later to post on Facebook and also on Storystar that, in her words, she was dying of cancer and that she was giving over operation of Storystar to another lady. I could only hope that the doctors were giving J--- something to ease her pain. At the end, Beverly was given morphine.
Going to a more pleasant subject, I was still watching old movies on television. This month it was Here Comes Mr. Jordan, Harper and Witness for the Prosecution. I’d seen Here Comes Mr. Jordan years ago and knew it was about a boxer who’s mistakenly killed before his time and that Mr. Jordan was an angel sent to rectify this mistake. I’d forgotten that Mr. Jordan was played by a youngish Claude Raines. His assistant angel was Edward Everett Horton, who I remembered as playing English butlers in many movies. The boxer’s manager was Jimmy Gleason and the stars were Robert Montgomery and Evelyn Keyes, two more names from the past. Harper was played by Paul Newman. Witness for the Prosecution, a courtroom drama based on a play by Agatha Christie, starred Tyrone Power, there was a name from the past, and Marlene Dietrich. The real star was Charles Laughton as an irascible lawyer as only Laughton could play him.
In the sports world, the Sacramento Kings, after a so-so start, descended into absolute futility. Fortunately, the San Francisco 49ers, despite an onslaught of injuries, managed to stay in playoff contention. In the outside world, while the government stayed shut down, the latest Trump activity was sinking boats from Venezuala carrying drugs (allegedly, of course). This upset the Dems, who deemed this not legal so now were on the side of drug dealers as well as illegal immigrants. Trump of course was as obnoxious as always and the press briefings with cabinet members all sucking up to him were unbearable.
Finally, Christmas. As with Thanksgiving, everyone came to my house. My son M--- got individual meals of honey ham with sides, plus pumpkin pie, so there was no cooking needed. Christmas gifts were exchanged. There was a game on TV; I forget what. The weather wasn’t as bad as forecast so nobody got drenched by rain coming or going.
Then my birthday, number 96 on December 30th.. As in past years I’d told everyone to consider the Christmas visit to also include my birthday but my son M--- came over with Chinese food for lunch. The Chinese food was good and had enough rice to feed the Chinese army.
On the subject of food, my sister had sent a box of chocolates for my birthday. My brother-in-law T--- got me a box of See’s. Earlier, my Irish son had as in past years sent a big box of Irish goodies. And my Ukrainian cleaning ladies had given me a box of Ukrainian goodies. I anticipated gaining at least ten or twenty pounds to start off the new year.
Earlier, my son in Ireland had sent me something else. He’d had his brother-in-law, a craftsman, make him a bracelet with the dates of Beverly’s birthday and passing inscribed on it in her remembrance. I’d told him I”d be interested in having a similar bracelet and in the mail about a week before Christmas it came. So now I have a copper bracelet on my right wrist. It’s inscribed, not with dates, but with the number of years Beverly and I had together.
There was something else from Ireland. On the morning of my birthday my son in Ireland called, we did a Telegram session so I could see everyone and he announced his present, he and my grandson and granddaughter would be visiting me this coming Easter (regrettably, my lovely daughter-in-law can’t go on long airplane flights). So I think this is as good a note as any to end December and the year.