Its been less than a week of 2026 but so far nothing has gone as planned… Ain’t that the way?

I’m still in Athens. Pinned down under the obligation of caring for my mother, who, when I arrived before Christmas with the idea that I’d spend the holidays with her and return home, was up and about and doing well. She’ll be 94 later this month, so she has aches and pains, can’t get around much without a walking stick and an arm to hold on to, but we’d gone to the supermarket together, and the visited a friend, she’d get out and sit in the little park opposite our house and enjoy sunlight on a warmish day.

Then she went to make the bed and either fractured a rib or tore some ligaments or who knows what. She’s old. She has osteoporosis. This is nothing new. The last time this happened the doctor warned her that it can happen at any time – from a cough or a sneeze or turning over in bed.

At least this time its nowhere near as bad as it was last spring. She thinks it is. Telling everyone who will listen that she’s never had pain like this in her life. I have to remind her that its not as bad. And she’s healing way faster. But pain killers won’t help her. She doesn’t want opiates (and neither do I, they almost killed her last summer). And calling in doctors to tell her the same thing over and over won’t help either.

Its age. Its osteoporosis. Its something she has to live with. She’s alive and she still has so much zest and interest in everything.

She is the most stubborn woman I know. In both a good and bad way.

The good: the physio she saw on Paros would come in and do some exercises with her, leave her with a program to do to keep her strength up and she does them. Every single morning.

The bad (as I saw it): when I was a kid she refused to let anything get her down. We’d go on holiday – the place we booked had no hot water? I’d whine about ‘this stupid place’ and carry on. She’d put on a pot and heat up water so we could stand in a tub of warm water to wash. Ooh, her positive outlook made me so angry! LOL

“Life is what you make it” Garrison Keillor said his mother would always say in his Lake Wobegon series.

And that’s right. Life IS what you make it.

Every day you wake up and make a choice. You can be miserable, hateful, angry, or happy, go with the flow and other hippy things.

Yes, I want to be home on Paros, creating stuff, working on my own home, swimming in the cold sea even, just being myself in my home. I want to be working on the Art From Trash Exhibition which has been my dream since I moved to Greece. But here I am, back at the kitchen table in the house in Athens, pretty much stuck here caring for mom. I knew this was part of what I signed up for when I moved to Greece but she was so well for so long I kinda lived in denial.

My life isn’t my own. I can’t make plans and that’s so frustrating. But there’s nothing I can do about it. I have to find ways to make it work, live with what life throws at me.

Its not easy. And yes, I feel trapped by the situation. I can choose to be bitter or angry or I can choose to get on with it and adapt.

Back when I worked with people with intellectual disabilities I (too often) worked with the high support needs folks. I hated it. Absolutely hated it. I would dread going to work on those days. Then one day I sat in my car and told myself that I could go in there and resent the entire day, or I could go in there and have a positive attitude. I chose the positive attitude. From that day on I’d go in there and offer to help with the horrible jobs, take someone to the toilet or all the other unpleasant things I disliked taking my sense of humour with me. The days went faster, I had more fun with my co-workers, and I felt so much better at the end of the day.

So, choose to be positive.

Life is what you make it.

z

PS. And don’t hit people when they tell you, like I used to feel like doing to mom… She’d say ‘smile, you’re so pretty when you smile’… I just wanted to thump her.