Aside from getting up and walking around (with help), aside from sleeping, eating and (uh, well, you know), aside from carrying on usually incoherent conversations because she refuses to admit she can’t hear, aside from slipping into dementia at the least hint of stress, there is not much my mother can do but watch television.
Except anything with violence or anything the least bit sexual sends her off into one of her “episodes,” which involve wailing about “where can I go,” and/or “don’t leave me,” and/or just holding her head and crying and asking for her mother.
And so, luckily, we found the Hallmark Channel, where stories about little kids and dogs and old people abound. Little House on the Prairie is one of her favorites.
The Hallmark Channel also seems to be the place where second stringers and old timers wind up when the major networks have moved them out. I even saw Rory Calhoun (whose handsome face adorned my teenage walls) in one of the Hallmark movies made in the 90s.
All day and well into the evening, I can usually find something on the Hallmark Channel that my mother will sit and watch. And if it happens to be time for “Murder She Wrote,” we just switch to ABC Family. That’s usually good for a kid or two.
And, while I’m reluctant to admit it, I’m kind of hooked on Kyle XY.
If all else fails, we always have TVLand, where Andy Griffith and the Beaver never fail to hold her attention. (But not Lucy, who mom thinks is too crazy.)
Although we also sometimes watch the musicals on Turner Classic Movies, the awful truth is I’m getting to enjoy the Hallmark Channel too. Something about watching movies and programs depicting life as it never is/was but rather as the child in us wishes it would be.