Dancing in the Light by Shirley Maclaine

somewhere in Scotland. I knew the look of that place so well. I couldn’t understand it. I thought I had been there with your daddy. But he didn’t feel it was familiar at all. So I don’t know why, but I knew I had been there. It was the smell and the feel of the place. And when I was there, I was happy, very happy, but I can’t figure out when.”
    A nurse came in to check Mother’s heart monitor. She looked over at me casually and said, “Good morning,” and then said, “Oh, my God. I didn’t realize you were here.”
    I laughed.
    “Yes, this is my daughter, Shirley,” said Mother.
    “Oh, my God,” said the nurse, “I’m a nervous wreck…. Well, we really love your mother. She takes as much care of us as we do of her.”
    “Yes,” I said, “I can imagine.”
    Mother looked up at her.
    “Is my clot dissolving?” she asked with an almost girlish smile.
    “It’s not one clot, Mrs. Beaty. It’s several clots and, yes, they are dissolving.”
    “Can you see them dissolving?”
    “Well, we take the CAT scans and that’s how we tell.”
    “See?” said Mother. “The doctors don’t tell you anything.”
    “Oh,” said the nurse, “the doctors will tell you everything if you ask.”
    “Isn’t that nice,” said Mother. “You see, that’s why I love doctors.”
    “Well,” said the nurse, feeling that she should leave, “I’ll let you two visit.”
    She left, and Mother asked if I could get her and Dad tickets to my show when they came to New York. I laughed and said sure, wondering what else I could do or say to get these two to relax and enjoy one another more.
    We sat and smiled at each other.
    “You know, Mother,” I began, “so many people are going through intense problems right now. Haven’t you noticed it?”
    Mother sat up in bed. “Yes, Shirl,” she said, “that’s true, isn’t it? Everyone I know seems to be going through difficulties.”
    “Well,” I went on, “we all draw to us what we need to experience, in order to grow, however that might be. So whatever we’re going through is a learning process.”
    “That’s right,” said Mother. “Same as your father.He knows that whenever he takes a drink, he has to be responsible for it.”
    I thought about how to continue the point I was attempting to make.
    “So,” I continued, “whenever someone chooses to do whatever they’re doing, there’s really nothing much anyone else can do but allow them with love and understanding to do it.”
    “Yes,” said Mother, “the only way to really help someone else is to be with them every minute of the day. Like your father with his drinking, I know where he is every minute. Sometimes he gets mad at me and I lose my temper, but that’s the only way I can help him.”
    “Well, Mother, maybe his drinking really isn’t that bad. I mean, he doesn’t exactly get drunk. It’s more that you think he shouldn’t drink at all because of what you feel it does to him.”
    “But it does, Shirl. He’s not happy when he drinks.”
    “But he says he is. And at this age, why not let him do it? It can’t be too terrible for him.”
    She shook her head stubbornly.
    “Nope,” she said, “it’s not good for him. Why, I find bottles all over the house—under the bed, in the closets.”
    “Well, no wonder, Mother. You won’t let him drink out in the open.”
    “Nope.”
    “Okay.” I let the matter rest for the time being. It was so amusingly clear to me that the issue wasn’t so much about my dad’s drinking as it was about control and interaction. If Dad didn’t drink, I wondered what there would be for them to talk about.
    “Are you eating all right, Mother?” I asked.
    “Oh,” she said, “I’m on a very strict diet. No sugar, no sodium. No salt, you know. Oh, yes, I have to be careful. Lunch will come in a while, then you will see.”
    “So,” I said, “did you have a nice visit with Sachi?”
    “Oh, Shirl, she is really something. She told me all about her acting