Musings of a Club Sandwich

While being compared to an upscale excuse for eating too much lunch is rather disconcerting, Carol Abaya’s term “sandwich generation” aptly describes those who are caring for aging parents as well as for their own children. Her term was adopted by the Merriam-Webster Dictionary in 2006, and is now part of our culture’s lexicon. On her website, she parses the term further, defining the “Club Sandwich” as those in their 50s or 60s sandwiched between aging parents, adult children and grandchildren, or those in their 30s and 40s, with young children, aging parents and grandparents.

My father turned 83 this year. I was not with him for his birthday in July, but I went for a walk him in August. The Pennsylvania air was steamy and still, smelling of wilting plants and the fresh manure used by the Amish farmer down the road, Dad wore heavy blue jeans as well as a sweatshirt that he refused to remove. His feet dragged from one step to the next, his cane serving as more of a hindrance than a help since he could not balance himself properly with it. Every few shuffles, he stopped to wheeze and totter, leaning backwards more and more until he looked like a limbo dancer headed toward a pole. After laboring up the driveway of my sister’s home and around the cul-de-sac, we creaked back to our starting point where he finally lost his balance, falling into my arms.

My mother accompanied us. In contrast to my father’s fragility, her gait was slow, but sure. She stood less than five-feet tall, and her left arm hung useless at her side (the result of degenerative arthritis), but the steel in her stance was a reminder of her once formidable character. Her concern was that we would not get back in time for her to “go home.” She was sure that her Mom and Dad were expecting her—she would be late.

“They will be worried, you know. And I need to get packed before we leave.”

I tried to reassure, but her parents continued to worry her.

My brother and I try to support my sister, their primary caretaker, as much as we can by traveling to her home to stay with Mom and Dad. Our efforts are, in the grand scheme, only gestures since we are not there enough to deal with the chronic concerns of the disease, but our visits encourage our sister and assuage our guilt, at least for a few weeks.

My husband and I are in the habit of walking after dinner which is usually rather late since we wait for soccer and cross-country practices, after school activities, and work responsibilities. Last night’s walk was cool and dark. We strode through quiet streets that glowed pink under the streetlights while sleepy houses with windows half-closed watched our progress. The conversation was comfortable both in the words and the silence between. It blended gently with the rumble of the neighborhood, and our steps provided a cadence for our speech. We talked about our children, two of whom will graduate this spring, one from college and the other from high school. We talked of money and of the mundane. Who would pick up whom? When? How would we get the grocery shopping done before the weekend? We smiled about our son’s hysterical comment at dinnertime, and worried about our daughter’s Lyme disease diagnosis. We passed an elderly Asian woman, watering her garden in the almost-dark, and our conversation veered back to that small Pennsylvania apartment containing an elderly couple who is gradually evaporating.

Our President spoke to young people yesterday, about staying in school and doing one’s best. His speech was a pep rally for education, and on the front page of the paper this morning were the faces of eager kids listening intently. I want someone to call an assemblage for club sandwiches—to encourage us as we are squeezed softly, yet inexorably, by those sweet faces on either side of us. Perhaps as we begin morphing from filling to bread, we can teach our children how to better deal with being in the middle.

Dad and Mom

To Blog or not to blog—a Blogospective

In the first graduate course I took in educational technology, I began my own blog and linked a podcast to it that I had developed on the subject of podcasting. After the first posting, and waiting in vain for someone to comment on my pitiful start, I abandoned it to the great cemetery of cyberspace.

Since then, I have been fairly reluctant to participate in the “fire hose” of “talk ,” as Bob Walsh describes the blogosphere in his blogging handbook, Clear Blogging (4). I did not understand a blog’s value as a discussion tool, and underestimated its value as a network between people who would otherwise be invisible to each other (though I have also been known to read a blog or two when someone brings it to my attention as noteworthy, and I faithfully follow the blog of a young friend of mine, Becca Taylor, who is a pediatric nurse on a Mercy Ship). However, the “fire hose” for me seemed more like Niagara Falls. Being rather anally organized, I could not see how the gargantuan amount of information available, the glut of opinion and chatter could be organized into any usable and useful form.

Thus, when I read Walsh’s comment about profiting from the blogosphere on my own terms, I had a minor epiphany: “It’s not that it’s evil, devouring, or malevolent—quite the contrary. The problem is the blogosphere is a growing, engaging, whirlwind of information and opinion, and it is much too easy to find yourself sucked in, spun around, and overwhelmed” (16), or, in my case, in a barrel headed toward the edge of the falls. Using “Google blog search,” I began to look tentatively for blogs written by people with whom I would actually comment and interact.

I found Liz Davis’s blog The Power of Educational Technology. Liz is the Ed Tech Director at the Belmont Hill School, which, like my school, is in the New England Independent School Association. She writes a blog directed specifically for teachers, and shares her experience and expertise in the area of incorporating technology within the classroom. One of her top posts included 10 tips for teaching technology to teachers. She states: “It isn't really about the tool it is about how you use it: It isn't the word processing software, it's the skills and usefulness of word processing. It isn't the presentation software, it's how to create a meaningful and effective presentation.” Her blog is professional and invites networking. She also has some great resources, including a section entitled “Two for Tuesday” where she lists two favorite tools and how to use them.

Another area of particular interest is Alzheimer’s since both of my parents are suffering from that disease. Susan Berg’s Dementia Views You Can Use is replete with helpful suggestions and links to resources. Berg is a dementia expert, and her blog is full of links to solid resources such as activities and information about being a caregiver. Neither Davis nor Berg represents the large media writers deemed “the experts.” Rather, they are both simply women with expertise in their professions, and a willingness to share their knowledge with their readers.

I now understand the blogosphere as “hundreds of thousands of online communities differentiated by interest” (16), which is a far more manageable way of organizing its enormity of information. Thus, instead of rolling off of Niagara Falls, I can sit safely on its river banks, enjoying getting my feet wet with no fear of mortal danger. I can even offer my own experience as a teacher and mother, through my own blog and comment on others as a way of mentoring and joining communities bound by interest, profession, or personal life points.