Mom and Dad

　　Mom and Dad, Brian pointed out, had options. They could move back to West Virginia or Phoenix. Mom could work. And she was not destitute. She had her collection of antique Indian jewelry, which she kept in a self-storage locker. There was the two-carat diamond ring that Brian and I had found under the rotten lumber back in Welch; she wore it even when sleeping on the street,cheap jeremy scott adidas wings. She still owned property in Phoenix. And she had the land in Texas, the source of her oil-lease royalties.
　　Brian was right. Mom did have options,replica rolex watches. I met her at a coffee shop to discuss them. First off, I suggested that she might think of finding an arrangement like mine: a room in someone's nice apartment in exchange for taking care of children or the elderly.
　　"I've spent my life taking care of other people," Mom said. "Now it's time to take care of me.""But you're not taking care of you.""Do we have to have this conversation?" Mom asked. "I've seen some good movies lately. Can't we talk about the movies?"I suggested to Mom that she sell her Indian jewelry. She wouldn't consider it. She loved that jewelry. Besides, they were heirlooms and had sentimental value,cheap adidas shoes for sale.
　　I mentioned the land in Texas.
　　"That land's been in the family for generations," Mom said, "and it's staying in the family. You never sell land like that."I asked about the property in Phoenix.
　　"I'm saving that for a rainy day.""Mom, it's pouring.""This is just a drizzle," she said. "Monsoons could be ahead!" She sipped her tea. "Things usually work out in the end.""What if they don't?""That just means you haven't come to the end yet."She looked across the table and smiled at me with the smile you give people when you know you have the answers to all their questions. And so we talked about movies.
　　MOM AND DAD SURVIVED the winter, but every time I saw them, they looked a little worse for wear: dirtier, more bruised, their hair more matted.
　　"Don't you fret a bit," Dad said. "Have you ever known your old man to get himself in a situation he couldn't handle?"I kept telling myself Dad was right, that they knew how to look after themselves and each other, but in the spring, Mom called me to say Dad had come down with tuberculosis.
　　Dad almost never got sick. He was always getting banged up and then recovering almost immediately, as if nothing could truly hurt him. A part of me still believed all those childhood stories he'd told us about how invincible he was. Dad had asked that no one visit him, but Mom said she thought he'd be pretty pleased if I dropped by the hospital.
　　I waited at the nurse's station while an orderly went to tell him he had a visitor. I thought Dad might be under an oxygen tent or lying in a bed coughing up blood into a white handkerchief, but after a minute, he came hurrying down the hall. He was paler and more gaunt than usual, but despite all his years of hard living, he had aged very little. He still had all his hair, and it was still coal black, and his dark eyes twinkled above the paper surgical mask he was wearing.
　　He wouldn't let me hug him. "Whoa, Nelly, stay back," he said. "You're sure a sight for sore eyes, honey, but I don't want you catching this sonofabitch of a bug."Dad escorted me back to the TB ward and introduced me to all of his friends. "Believe it or not,foamposite for cheap, ol' Rex Walls did produce something worth bragging about, and here she is," he told them. Then he started coughing.