The Meadow 103 would be geriatric. Someone with a few a gray hairs and a smidge of gravitas. Instead she was young enough to be his daughter. Maybe forty or forty-five. Practically a teenager. Dr. Gonzalez sat at her desk armed not with a stack of papers--a stack of papers you could wrestle and write on and thumb through--no, this woman sat her desk and scrolled her laptop as if she were clothes shopping or checking her mail. The whole process seemed so sterile, so nonchalant, so easy. But that’s what it’s come to, thinks Marvin. His wife’s diagnosis just a bunch of words swimming on a flat blue screen. “Her best prospect,” said Gonzalez, “is putting her in a facility. You know. Like a Memory Care Unit. Once again the waitress tops their coffee. “So Mom’s senile?” says Lisa. “Is it definite? Are you sure?” Lisa’s their oldest one, the one who aimed for the A plus, who takes her job and her marriage seriously. The other two. Who could keep up? His son Brian is saving the world somewhere in Africa. His daughter Lauren crashes her way through broken relationships and dead-end jobs. “They showed me the MRI’s, the tests, you name it,” says Marvin. Then he dabs an eye with his sleeve. “Your mother has spaghetti brain. There’re no pills, no cure, no therapy. Once you board the train, you can’t get off.” “We have social workers who can steer you,” said Gonzalez.” It’s better this way. For her. For you.” “You’ve got insurance. Right?” says Lisa. “So we hire an aide. And aide whose only job is to watch her 24/7.” “They’ve done studies,” said Gonzalez. “They have statistics. The life expectancy of someone with Alzheimer’s is five to ten years from the date of diagnosis. The life expectancy of their caregiver? Not so much.” Weren’t they supposed to teach doctor’s compassion? Where the hell did bedside manners go? Lisa twirls the spoon in the coffee, the cream spiraling, the spoon clinking. A Milky Way in the palm of her hand. “But
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