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Going to visit an aunt in a nursing home in Birmingham

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PkrBum
2seaoat
6 posters

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2seaoat



I was about six when my grandfather was dying of lung cancer. He worked as an engineer and his train run was between Birmingham and Atlanta. He was a heavy smoker, and for anybody who ever visited Birmingham in the fifties you could smell the coke and iron mills belching out smoke from twenty miles away. They lived right by the green water tower on interstate 65 in north Birmingham. The house my mother was born in was demolished for interstate 65 and during my grandfather's illness my brother and I lived in my aunt's house with my cousins for two weeks as my mother helped care for her father.

My uncle passed two years ago and he married my aunt at 17 and she was 18. High school sweethearts. She never worked and raised her three girls and was active in the church. She is about ninety now and lives in this great nursing home in Hoover which is top of the line, and the daughters visit their mother regularly. This will probably be the last time I see my cousins and aunt. My oldest cousin worked for Bell South and became upper management in her forty year career where she started as an operator. It was her husband who died of endocrine cancer. It was horrible. they took a camera you swallow, and it never came out.....his tumors had closed his small intestines, and he had a horrible last three months. So horrible that when I try to talk to her about what is coming as I share the same cancer, she simply cries and I have to change the subject.

The family home is gone. My mother's grade school has been demolished, and the congregation at the baptist church reflected the changing neighborhood as once the interstate destroyed the core of the Acipco neighborhood, most of the people moved south of Birmingham to a place called lay lake. My Aunt's house was sold, and now all my connections with Birmingham are all but gone except three cousins and my aunt. Everybody is dead. She will not be buried in the family plot because my uncle did not like being toe to toe and was buried in another place. So I will say my goodbyes to a special place which was full of history and excitement as a kid.

PkrBum

PkrBum

Sounds like a good plan. Birmingham had always been one of my least favorite cities. Maybe it's all of the red brick buildings. I don't know exactly... I just always got a depressing vibe from it.

Telstar

Telstar

I imagine Alabama to be quite the shithole but perhaps not as deep a hole as Mississippi is. To my knowledge, Mississippi is the only state East of the Rockies where an underground nuclear bomb was blasted. Twice, in 1964 and 1966. I reckon they figured what the hell, a good nuke explosion might just blast Mississippi out of the stone age if not into the stone age. Twisted Evil

RealLindaL



So when are you going, Sea? Heading to Florida thereafter?

Joanimaroni

Joanimaroni

RealLindaL wrote:So when are you going, Sea?  Heading to Florida thereafter?

Our bitter cold has subsided.

bigdog



I don't really think the state of Alabama is a shithole, in fact, there are some very beautiful areas up in Northern Alabama. The road between Gadsden and Huntsville is very pretty, and there are areas where the mountains meet the rivers that are remarkably beautiful.
Of course, I wouldn't live there for anything. The people in that state ruin everything about it with their pride in being ignorant and their racial prejudice. It's a shame people can ruin such beautiful scenery with their pick up trucks and Confederate flags.

Telstar

Telstar

bigdog wrote:I don't really think the state of Alabama is a shithole, in fact, there are some very beautiful areas up in Northern Alabama. The road between Gadsden and Huntsville is very pretty, and there are areas where the mountains meet the rivers that are remarkably beautiful.
Of course, I wouldn't live there for anything. The people in that state ruin everything about it with their pride in being ignorant and their racial prejudice. It's a shame people can ruin such beautiful scenery with their pick up trucks and Confederate flags.
-----------------------------




Agreed, it's usually the people that turn a state into a shithole. bounce

Joanimaroni

Joanimaroni

Seaoat.... are you headed this way?

2seaoat



Great visit in Birmingham, but my health has significantly declined from the trip, but we will be staying in Navarre for a couple weeks unless this decline continues and we need to head back. I hope I can start posting tonight after sleeping a bit to recharge my batteries.

2seaoat



The nursing home encourages dog visits. Our dog loved it. Old people just lit up when we brought her into the facility, and my Aunt was like a little girl as my dog licked her hands. The dog does not like to travel, but she has been great as she loves to socialize with people, and went around and greeted my cousins and their spouses. She is four years old now and I am so happy I was able to convince my wife of a puppy for my bucket list. She and her sister were at a kill pound in KY, and now both are living exciting lives and are so loving. I do not know what the deal is, but I was always a bit of a hard guy with dogs as I forbade the kids from feeding a dog from the table, and no feeding them snacks and human food.......my wife says no to the dog, but I break all the rules and feed her people food.

Joanimaroni

Joanimaroni

2seaoat wrote:The nursing home encourages dog visits.  Our dog loved it.  Old people just lit up when we brought her into the facility, and my Aunt was like a little girl as my dog licked her hands.  The dog does not like to travel, but she has been great as she loves to socialize with people, and went around and greeted my cousins and their spouses.  She is four years old now and I am so happy I was able to convince my wife of a puppy for my bucket list.  She and her sister were at a kill pound in KY, and now both are living exciting lives and are so loving.  I do not know what the deal is, but I was always a bit of a hard guy with dogs as I forbade the kids from feeding a dog from the table, and no feeding them snacks and human food.......my wife says no to the dog, but I break all the rules and feed her people food.


Glad you had a great visit. Relax and get your strength.

RealLindaL



Good to know you're back in the area, and hope you can enjoy the warmish weather Thursday as long as the rain holds out. Sorry you're just in time for an imminent cold front, but if you can hang in for about a week it should ease once more. And at least you won't find ice and snow to impede your movements...but then you knew that.

2seaoat



I am spending all my time in bed, so I do not know what the weather is like. I will meet with somebody Friday which will require that I leave the house. My wife's brother and his wife will visit us Friday. We look forward to the visit and I need to clear some land, but I think that has become a pipe dream.

I have noticed a lot of new home construction in Navarre north of 98. It has been years since new construction has happened in Navarre, and that is encouraging that home prices are going up and the area is once again attractive to investment. I still have no idea how such a messed up drainage system was ever approved by Santa Rosa County. I think Navarre wants to incorporate the town and not have to deal with the County.

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