Time and Weather

Until the Two Lucys became roommates, this Lucy had no idea how important time and weather could be. I understand the concept of time and most rooms in the house have a clock I can check if I’m supposed to be somewhere at a certain time. I check the weather most mornings on my phone to see if I should wear rain boots. That is about it for me, as regards weather or time.

For Lucy#1, on the other hand, time and weather are urgent matters.

Lucy#1 keeps a pocket calendar next to her place at the table. She records appointments in this calendar, when she or I have appointments. She also records the outside temperature in the calendar – several times each day. She has at least three temperature entries per day on her calendar. Many days she turns the television on every couple hours just to see the temperature, and she watches every news program to learn both the current weather situation and the forecast for later. The weather seems to be her main focus at the moment. She doesn’t ask me how I enjoyed my day at work; she asks what the weather was like at my office. She appears to give very little thought to what a long-distance caller has to say about anything except the weather. Family members call her, and if she mentions the call to me at all, it is to tell me that it’s been in the 60s here or they have been getting a lot of rain there. Every day when I come home from work, she tells me the current temperature, what the temperature has been at various times during the day, and what weather is forecast for tomorrow. She rushes to watch the news at 5:30, 6:00, and 10:00 so she can see the weather. As soon as the weather segment is over, she turns the channel or turns the TV off.

Lucy#1 also has what I, infinitely lackadaisical, would say is almost a time fetish. If I announce any plan, Lucy#1 wants to know the exact time of the appointment. Once recently, I didn’t have an exact time to give Lucy#1: A friend and I planned to meet for coffee Saturday afternoon. However, Christine had things to do on Saturday, so we agreed she would contact me when she was free and we’d figure out a time then. We made this plan early in the week, and I told Lucy#1 right away so she would understand I would not be home part of Saturday afternoon and so we could do her shopping and errands either one day after work on Saturday morning. She was not happy that I didn’t have a specific time for the coffee date. She asked me every day that week if Christine and I had set a time, and when I would say we were going to figure it out on Saturday, she would say, “Well, why don’t you tell her you need to know what time you’re meeting?” I could not make her believe that I was not worried about the meeting time. On Saturday morning, she was quite upset that I still didn’t have a specific time. When Christine called to finalize the plan and we decided on a time, Lucy#1 finally relaxed. She obviously did not care that I was leaving the house; she cared that I did not have an exact time of departure.

I know these fixations are brought on by dementia. Next time I see one, I will buy an outdoor thermometer and hang it where it can be seen from the living room windows to see if that helps her. Every time I leave the house, I tell her when I expect to return, and I call if I’m running late. These are easy things for me to do; they make Lucy#1 happy.

These things also make me keenly aware of how often I work late and how long (in general) it takes when I stop at the grocery store or the bank on my way home. I have a better grasp of time and its passage than ever before – maybe that’s the silver lining in the Two Lucys’s sometimes foggy world.