It was not an easy thing to tell her daughter. She had tried for days to come up with the right way of saying it.  Should she start out with a joke? No, maybe it was best just to be blunt “Jane, I love you, but I do not want to live with you”  Her daughter had offered to open up her home to her. She did not want to live with her daughter, but the alternative left her feeling sick -- a nursing home.  She remembered when her own mother could not live on her own.  She had three kids at home at the time and a husband, Hal a trucker, who was away five days out of seven. 

It was the late 1950’s and that was what was done back then. You just did not put your mother into a nursing home. You looked after her for as long as you could.  Still it was the right thing for her and Hal to do.  She was the only girl in her family and there was little choice. It was just assumed that she and her family would be the caretakers of her Mother.  Her brothers did not offer their homes. 

Her Mother had looked to her and had accepted the offer she and Hal had made. after being on her own for so many years and a lengthy illness it was an opportunity for her Mother to be part of a home again. Thinking back on it now, she knew that she had mixed emotions about that time herself.  Her whole family did.  

She felt obligated to take care of her mother -- a woman who had cared for her when she couldn’t take care of herself.  Her Mother became the child and she became the parent. Her Mother needed her. She loved her dearly and couldn’t see her in the care of strangers. She was still trying to work part-time, take care of a home, children, husband. It had been a heavy workload.  

No one had privacy. On top of each other -- because there was now an extra person in their home became a strain. Trying to stay on friendly terms with siblings, parents and spouse was not a feat her family handled well. Bickering over little things drove everyone crazy. It had steadily became worse. Gone was the peace she had felt after the kids went to bed. Replaced with exhaustion and tension and waiting to hear her Mother call her name. The work never ended -- their home was forever changed.  

The entire family became withdrawn. The kids stayed at friends houses more often then she liked. She and Hal felt a strain on their relationship right from the beginning of her Mother’s arrival, until her death six years later.   Hal felt she always put her Mother first and she felt that Hal didn’t understand how her Mother’s move had put her in an difficult position. They just became roommates to each other. Civil and just existing in the same space.  

It was a big adjustment for their kids too. They hated those years. Having to baby-sit their Grandmother and taking on the extra duties that came with a bedridden 75 year-old woman was something a typical teenagers did not looked forward to.

To this day her kids still complain about those years with Grandma Hagen. It wasn’t all bad, but unfortunately it was the negative that her family all remembered. She didn’t want that to happen to her own daughter.  She knew Jane meant well asking her to come live her, her husband and children. She had meant well when had made the same offer to her own Mother. 

It hadn't worked out as Hal and she had imagined when they first made the suggestion to her Mother.  All the same she cherished the time spent with her Mother and wouldn’t have traded it for anything.  But it had left it’s mark on her family. 

Before she could tell her daughter “No”, she knew she had to come up with a solution.  That’s when the panic would always set  in. What alternative did she have?  Her finances were limited. She only had her pension and her husbands pension to live on.  Hal’s life insurance had buried him and allowed her to buy new living room furniture. The one luxury she had afforded herself after his death.  That had been it, except for a small bank account with just over $1,000.00.  Continuing to live on her own would mean she would be living below the poverty line.  

She’d found that out when she’d been visited by a nice man from one of those insurance companies. After the expenses of Hal’s funeral she thought she had better increase her own policy. The Insurance Agent, had been pretty blunt with his assessment of her situation. He said she couldn’t afford more life insurance plain and simple. She couldn’t make additional monthly payments after he had looked at her living expenses and money coming in.   

Wasn’t that a joke - living expenses.  She’d worked over 20 years (mostly full-time after her Mother had died) and with Hal’s salary they had managed to put food on the table and keep the kids clothed.  They didn’t have any luxuries, like a second car, VCR or holidays. Her kids had to work their way through college and university.  They hadn’t been able to offer any financial assistance. The had just made ends meet. 

It was frustrating to think that all their lives she and Hall and worked hard, paid the bills, stayed out of debt. Where had that gotten them?  Now their kids were working long hours, sometimes two jobs and living paycheck to paycheck. 

What was this world coming to? It was suppose to be easier for her kids. That was why she and Hal had worked so hard. So their children could have a better life! 

After Hal had died she’s lived in the same small apartment Hal and she had moved to ten years before. They had always rented.  First a small three bedroom apartment above a beauty shop after they got married.  God, she could still close her eyes and imagine the smell of the perm solution that used to come up through the floor registers.  Then they had moved to a house when the kids were teens. An honest to God house. With a yard and their own driveway.  They were still renting, but it felt like theirs.  After all the kids had left home they moved to yet another apartment. It seemed silly to be paying rent for a three bedroom house for just the two of them. 

By that time they moved to their second apartment (the one she was living in now) Hal wasn’t able to do yard work. He had emphysema and a heart condition.  It was just nice to sit out on their patio and watch all the squirrels play and fight it out for the nuts and maple keys.   

Now her building had been sold, changes and improvements had been made.  But with those changes came an increase in rent.  Too much of an increase for a senior on a fixed income. 

She’d lived through the Depression and as a kid and seen her parents struggle.

Now she felt that she was living through another Depression. This one looked like it had no end in sight.  What was ahead for her own children and grandchildren?   

All this worrying and reviewing of her past was not solving her problem.  How could she live independently? Her whole life it had always come down to money.  Every decision or change was effected by the lack of it. How would she be able to afford to live on her own?  She’d think about it on her way to the Senior’s Centre. This was one constant in her life -- the Seniors Centre.