Foggy Friday

There’s something about this time of year, when a little rain mixed with unseasonably warm weather produces fog. I’ll admit I’m not a big fan of fog. For one thing, it’s a little spooky to be driving along and hit a heavy patch of fog. For some reason this always seems a little bit like driving into the Twilight Zone. Makes me halfway expect to hear strange music and to see Rod Serling, dressed in a suit and tie, standing alongside the road ready to hint at what’s really going on in the depths of the thickest fog.

Fog scares me, especially since the night I was driving along a gravel road after a visit with Jim at the nursing home and hit fog so thick I couldn’t see anything. I stopped and with trembling fingers dialed my son’s phone. I was afraid someone would come along and ram into me.

“If you can’t see anything then surely no one else is driving either,” he said.

While I sat there waiting for the fog to lift, I couldn’t help but think how Alzheimer’s is like a fog blanketing cognitive skills. Sometimes, fog just drifts in and out, but other times, it halts us in our tracks.

After a few long moments, the world became visible and I could see the road. I drove to my son’s house. When I worked up the nerve to head on home, he still thought it was risky for me to drive, so he led the way. His taillights were like beams shiny from a lighthouse directing me to safety.

You can be that beacon for your loved one when the fog is the thickest.

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