Ann B. Keller pays tribute to her
husband's parents, George and Patricia Keller, by writing the forward to, So,
What Is Love?
Ann’s mother-in-law, Patricia,
wrote this memoir when she was in her eighties, caring for her husband George while he
declined with Alzheimer’s disease for twelve years before his death. Patricia
died four years later.
Patricia's writing is mushy,
sugary, tender, eloquent, and vividly detailed. She briefly takes us back to
her post World War II courtship with George, then through the years they raised
a family, continuing through their retirement when they renovated an old
Victorian home in Wellington, Ohio. The bulk of the text describes George's
battle with Alzheimer’s, and how Patricia struggled to care for him.
At times the reader will wince with
pain as George, at two hundred pounds, no longer recognizes Patty, a mere one
hundred pounds. Thinking she’s an intruder into their home, he attacks her, and
she has to call the police to subdue her own husband. You’ll gasp and be
repulsed when George tries to wash his face in a public urinal. You’ll chuckle
while shaking your head and moaning with sadness when Patty struggles to change George's
soiled diaper in a men's restroom, while other men listening think there’s
hanky-panky going on in the locked stall.
This book gives an honest picture
of the difficult life and immense love of a spouse-caretaker. I read the memoir in two days. Once I started, it was impossible to put down.
As I read, I thought, what's so
gripping about this book? I concluded, perhaps I was captivated because
someone who lived in Wellington, Ohio was the author. I could visualize the house,
the town, and the people. But in the months to follow, I’ve read over a dozen
other memoirs written by loved ones of people afflicted by Alzheimer’s, and So,
What Is Love? continues to stand out. I’m in awe of the clarity with which Patricia Keller, an elderly woman,
poured her heart out on the page. Her flowery language leaves no doubt she
deeply loved her husband, but she does not hold
back on gruesome details of his disease and behavior. This much
honesty had to be excruciating to reveal, making the book
riveting.
If one can appreciate the sugary
language as representative of the era, Patricia’s truthful clarity makes this book
impossible to forget.
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