Still Got It - drawings by Mum

Mum’s cartoon of the day she was moved from the hospital in Harborough to the Knoll by a taxi driver who seemed to be outstandingly inept. Having asked to be paid in cash, he stopped by the cashpoint and promptly ran out of petrol. Being only half a mile from the Knoll, he then wheeled Mum in a wheelchair up the road, in the rain. Not what she was hoping for. But at least it inspired this drawing, so there’s that.

Mum, as you’ll know if you’ve been following this blog, has recently been admitted to a care home. She’s in the Knoll in Kibworth, which used to be my mate Nick’s house, as her condition continues to be stable but, as she might describe it, boring. She really has precious little energy, wanting to sleep most of the time, and is having increasing difficulty with her manual dexterity - a pox on whoever designed phones that you have to tap and swipe in order to answer them, and to all those designers with their nimble fingers who think pinching and swiping with two fingers without accidentally pressing the wrong bit of the screen remains easy forever!

So it’s a delight to see her still drawing. Not anything near as much as she’s always done, and inevitably not up the quality of her usual work. But I’d happily rank her work alongside late Picassos and a good few others I’ve seen (this summer’s show or Orson Welles drawings at Summerhall springs to mind).

This is a sketch of Paul, who is, I believe, the handyman here at the Knoll. I may be belittling his job, he could well be the boss for all I know, I’ve not met him yet. He’s been putting pictures up on the wall for Mum, mostly photos of the family, and her watercolour of “General Jacks” (the Old House in Kibworth Harcourt, which we’ve always known by that name.)

Here’s Jude, Paul, and Mum's zimmer frame. She’s not in a hurry to go downstairs and eat with the others, preferring her quiet wee room. I say quiet, Jude (with the tiniest help from me) has sorted out Mum’s TV, and iPlayer on her Hudl (Earth’s most useless tablet) and iPhone, as well as sorting out a booster for her Wifi. Sadly it’s also Earth’s slowest wifi, so the only way we can load Mum up with TV is to take the devices home and bring them back loaded. But it seems to be doing the trick.

I’ve just been visiting her, over Friday night and through Saturday, my first visit since the first week of August when I came down to help Jude suss out care homes. Jude has been a far better daughter than me, staying with Mum for a few days every week. I’m going to try and get up as often as I can, but the nature of work means it won’t be as long as anyone would like.