It'll be a week tomorrow since I've been home.  Nancy (aka Schnance) watched over me until Friday when my caregiver arrived.  If you've been following my story, you know that the most unusual things can happen.

When Mignon boarded her plane to return to Santa Monica, little did she know that fate and a 4-hour wait on the tarmac would lead her to her meeting Bill,  who was returning home to Phoenix after having spent a month with his father in hospice.  He happened to be sitting in the same row as Mignon, in the middle seat directly to her right.  As it neared sunset, the airplane cabin grew dimmer.  Mignon was reading. Bill reached over to turn on her overhead light and thus began a conversation that took them all the way to the end of the tarmac ordeal and onto Arizona. Among other things, he told her about a live-in caregiver named Tina who had stayed with his father for the last thirty days of his life. "Tina is part of our family now," he told Mignon. He gave her the contact information for the caregiving agency in Pennsylvania that he'd called.  In fewer than twenty-four hours, Mignon was on the phone from California with that agency's owner, Kari, who impressed Mignon with her caring, understanding, and generosity.  Her sincerity came across to me too when I spoke with her myself last week. She told me she had a caretaker available whenever I was ready.  Within a few short days, Kari was driving from Lancaster County in Pennsylvania to the Jersey shore, bringing with her my caretaker. That caretaker's name? Tina.  The very same Ghanian woman who'd helped Bill, Bill's father, and Bill's four sisters. The serendipity of all of this did not go unnoticed by myself, my family, and Mignon.  Meet Tina...

...a Ghanian beauty seeing the Atlantic Ocean for the first time.  Wahoo!

Tina has been such a big help.  I wouldn't have been able to manage in "heaven" alone.  The issues and worries are still there but I'm home.  Now, instead of staring at a poster from a hospital bed, I'm spending time sitting outside on my  deck and looking forward to visits.  In fact, rumor has it that Dr. Nancy, my friend since 2nd grade, will be in this neck of the woods soon.  The doctor appointments,, diet and fluid restrictions, weakness and all the rest seems more bearable.  So grateful.