There is no magic here

This, more than anything, seems to explain my systematic health and emotional decline.  There is no one here who is interested in living or creating an active second chapter of life..  Everyone else and I have been stacked up in here to die while others profit from it. I do not want to die, but I do not want to live like this either. I am stuck. 

 

I don't know how to get out!

 I live in the biggest box I've ever been in my life. It is the absolute worst thing I could have imagined and I am dying just being here. And I do not know how to get out!

 

How is Brookdale the Largest Senior Living Facility? Stockholders, investing in seniors poor lifestyle.

The first picture is what they want you to think the Brookdale Lake Orienta courtyard looks like, and the second is a compilation of photos taken yesterday, 7/16/2025. I pay a lot of money to live here and they are consuming all of it. There is nothing left to enjoy life anymore. I live with constant leaky roofs, unresponsive maintenance, medications that are screwed up regularly and food that is more like an elementary school cafeteria.

I could go on, but as they say, one picture is worth a thousand words. I only have 10 pictures, but that's only the courtyard! There are so many more!  

Dump Site

I often use this as a dumping ground.

Look out, here comes a big dump.

Not all prisons are full of impenetrable bars. My prison is a 1 bedroom apartment, on the 3rd floor of an assisted living facility, my crime...I am sick (a sick heart and at one point over-prescribed pain killers for a fractured spine that was never diagnosed). I did not do anything wrong, but I did do quite a few things other people thought was wrong and they were afraid I might accidentally harm myself. Without my consent or asking what I wanted to do, I was placed here in an assisted living facility that is more like a padded 1-bedroom jail. I miss my life, I miss my home and I miss Skip. I miss my friends and family, but they all have lives of their own.  I cannot ask them to rearrange their wonderful busy lives for me when I can not reciprocate.  Everything I had and have that brought me love and life has been replaced by this place...and I have come to hate it and the life I have in it.  I have no choice about what to do with my life and I do not know how much longer I can do this. Well, I guess until my money runs out or I an dead. I hope 1 runs out before the other. I would rather spend the money I have now to play, create and be with family and friends. This is not the life I want.

I feel like a 15-year-old adolescent who has been restricted.  The difference is that this is not a bedroom or a prison but an apartment. I have tried to be a part of this community to make everyone happy. But it isn't working Bingo, childish crafts, puzzles and Rumi cube do not make me happy. This is not the life I ever wanted. I am not living, I am just here.

 

 

Greatest Accomplishment

I think Ralph must have been to my “adult living” complex before he decided to live in the woods. Both he and Henry T. Thoreau ran to the woods to escape from the people they had to see and deal with every day.

I get it, guys.

I would have run with you into the woods if I had any clue about how traumatic it would be to live in an overpriced "assisted living” apartment that pays more attention to the stockholders than the residents and building maintenance. I guarantee the stockholders are not dodging garbage cans in the middle of the hallway to catch the roof leaks( yes, that is plural, 3 of them).

I could go on and on, but I will leave this one. There are so many more stories, observations, and complaints to share, but I will end today's grousing now and figure out how to achieve Ralph's greatest accomplishment. 

 

Well....DUH...

 

Well…DUH

I can now clearly recognize the medicated ones because I am one of them. I quite frankly do not think I need all of these pills, but maybe a few of them.  I could delve into the brain science behind it, but that would likely bore everyone. Besides, my family feels like they can safely go out of town knowing I am well-medicated.  

We are the ones that have to survive in this assisted living facility looney tunes.  It is a full-time job keeping anyone happy here with all of the egregious things that go on. So if we are all somewhat sedated the staff and owners of this huge stock exchange corporation get away with a multitude of violations but  they still collect the astronomical rents! After all, there are stockholders to pay!  

There is chronic terrible food. I had a chicken enchilada last week, with no chicken in it, they listed rainbow sherbet as sorbet, and yesterday’s 4^th cookout made me so nauseous I threw up like I never have before. The roof leaks are chronic and everywhere.  Most of the medicine technicians, a fancy word for pill pushers for whom I pay dearly to have, are grossly underpaid. Most of them do not understand English and have no idea what pills they are giving us.  Administration has even devised an almost foolproof way to simply the distribution but they still screw it up. 

I will give some of them credit!  The fact that they can work in this looney toon farm is a true tribute to their caring about us. There are some that I have come to know and they do care but the administration does not back them up.

Yep, for the most part I am well-behaved and medicated.

Djembe Drum Day

It’s Djembe day!  The sound, when tuned, is amazing, but there is something moving about how it is made.  This one is hand-sculpted out of a single tree trunk.  The outside grain is sanded smooth, well mostly, while the inside is just chipped away to produce the sound. 

Lately, it has been popular to make them here in the states out of molds, fiber glass or plastics mixed with sawdust.  I am certain that they may sound as good, but I think there is something spiritual about being hand-made in Africa with no painting or decoration, just the natural wood grain. I spent the better part of an hour just unlacing the old head while the goat skin head is soaking in the bottom of my shower.  I thought that was a great place to soak it and keep it flat. Then I cleaned and oiled the outside. The heading and lacing will begin as soon as I give my hands a moment to rest and have the arthritis medicine to kick in. 

I really was not thinking about my hands when I began this project. 

…..but I cannot wait to hear it when it is finished!

Provided I Don"t Fall Down

 Signed up for my first-ever Tai Chi class.  The ad said it was good for balance and flexibility. I will even get a certificate if I finish, provided I do not fall down and break something first. Today we had 30 minutes of tai chi description, 15 min. of filling out 7 pages of paperwork to participate in a free class!  I had no idea this was sponsored and funded by the State and Federal Government until they pulled out the paperwork. I really was ignorant about how litigious the government was until I was served with the first 4  pages of liability releases, then there were 2 more pages that seemed to be some kind of verification that real people who could read and sign their names had actually shown up for the class. The last one was a doctor’s release with a list of symptoms that needed a doctor to sign off on. Several of mine were listed, but I have seen tai chi; it is not like I am signing up for an aerobics class.   

I had to smother my laughter as the instructor, a nice elder gentleman with a thick German accent was explaining a very Chinese concept. German and Chinese, just does not seem right. With the last 15 minutes, I learned how to breathe, gesture strength, unity, and respect (but forgot the 4^th) one).

From here on out, I will NOT be on the first row. I will copy what the person in front of me is doing, desperately listen to understand the German-Chinese movement directions while I frantically try to muffle my laugh.