It had been a while, so I'd forgotten how much blood, sweat and broken fingernails actually go into moving a person and his effects. Of course, it didn't help that said person did his level best to frustrate all our efforts, and was as recalcitrant and uncooperative as he could be. Sitting in his recliner complaining and quarrelsome, Dad watched us (myself and the two friends I'd managed to rope in to help) busting our gut moving his heavy furniture around and out the door. In the end, we had to get him out of his chair -- and while the flat was quickly being divested of all the things that made it habitable, Dad threw a tantrum and refused to leave. It was only when I resorted to taking the cat under my arm and walking out with her without a backward glance, that he agreed to reluctantly follow us out.

I am mean. But he tries my patience sometimes, really he does.

Of course, he wasn't any help when we got to install him in his new room at the nursing home either. Luckily, one of the carers came to take him away and under his wing for a while, so I could get on with the business of sorting out and putting away his clothes, glassware, cutlery and cups & plates and the like; as well as making his bed and hanging up his pictures and clearing away the rubbish. When Dad was brought back a couple of hours later, he was in a much better mood due to the fact that they'd given him not one, but two pieces of cake to celebrate his arrival; he was actually responsive when his personal carer came to introduce herself. I think they'll get on well together - her name is Dhip and she's Vietnamese, and my Dad's always had a weakness for Asian women...She asked me what my father's main character traits were and I started ticking them off one by one: hard-headed, stubborn as a mule, temperamental -- and then she asked if I couldn't think of any good points to mention. My mouth dropped: those ARE his good points! He's also kind, gregarious, and possessed of a wicked sense of humour.

As I was leaving, I bumped into my nephew Mick who's recently started catering college and is loving every minute of it. He'd made gevulde speculaas, a seasonal treat, at school and was on his way to share it with his granddad.

I expect I'll be clearing out the flat this weekend and see if there's still some stuff worth salvaging or flogging; but from this moment on I hope I will not have to be dealing with my Dad's little dramas every two seconds. I feel a lot better now that I know there's trained personnel to take proper care of him around the clock. It's a lot safer for him, and quite a bit of a relief for me.