Today's Buddha quote about living in the present resonates with me. Since reading a� book, Madonnas of Leningrad, about a cultured �woman with Alzheimer's, I recognized�a benefit of Alzheimer's- no worries. It seems the ultimate emotional detachment, just watching events unfold. No worries about personal safety, no worries about eating, drinking, or healthy living.
The book opened my eyes in several ways. I was (and still am) mourning my mom's loss of memory. I am alternately in denial and sad about it.
But I tell myself that she now is eternally in the present. She has some long term memory left, but also makes up stories or imaginatively fills in the blanks.Whether it's what happened yesterday or when she was a little girl, it's all her imagination. The stories are creative and quite good. I am happy for her when she�recreates�her history to be positive. But I also miss the mom that could fill in the�family history�blanks for me....who is in that picture? how many horses did we have?�� She is now what medical people call an "unreliable historian"
Though �she lives in the present, I wish it could be with more wisdom.
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