How It All Began

It was July and my father was living in a home for the elderly, in the Alzheimer's ward, a patient but still not yet really a patient, not nearly advanced enough in his disease to need that type of care. Via the encouragement of my husband (he goes by a nick name, Wink), my sister, Debbie and I decided it best to check him out of the home and move him here to Austin, Texas back into a family unit again. For nearly 2 years now he has been happily living with my husband, son and myself via a giant coup, that I am very proud to say, my sister and I pulled off that summer of 2008.

I don't remember exactly when or where the decision was made to make this snatch. But once it was, my sister and I both knew it was going to require some real cunning on our parts. We knew it would have to be done totally apart from our father's knowledge because there would be no cooperation on his part. After all he had lived all his life in the Santa Clara Valley in Northern California and had never stepped one foot in Texas. Frightening questions surfaced, like would he dig his heels in at the last minute at the airport gate and refuse to get on the plane? How were we going to get his belongings packed without him realizing that something was up? We had purchased a plane ticket for him and there could be no mistakes, no turning back. There had to be a plan and it had to be a good one.

The day of our departure my sister and I arrived at the home mid morning fully prepared to pull off our great sting! The first step was to engage the staff in distracting Pop while the two of us packed his bag. Knowing we only had minutes to accomplish this task before he became suspicious, we dashed upstairs. With pounding hearts and sweaty palms we stripped his closet and bathroom of his earthly possessions and stuffed them into a suit case. Taking the elevator downstairs we quietly left the residence and loaded the bag into the back of my sister's car.

Taking a few deep breaths to calm ourselves, we returned to the lobby where Pop was waiting. Escorting him down the hall to the nurses station we received final instructions on his meds and then the three of us casually walked the front door knowing that our dad had no idea he would never be returning there again. On the verge of hysterical laughter, or was it fainting, Deb and I usher Pop into the car under the auspices of making a trip across town to my sister's house for a visit. We had our short "visit" and then encouraged my dad to go with us to the airport so he could see me off, back to Austin. We were getting no push back from him at any point in our adventure. "This was too easy," we thought to ourselves.

At the airport, we checked him through all of the boarding security, all the way up to the gate, the whole time listening to him lament my departure. Each successful step in the whole process built our confidence and we began to relax. We realized that we were almost ready to pull this thing off.

Soon we heard the announcement over the loud speaker that it was time for the passengers to Austin, TX to board. This was my sister's and my cue and turning to to our dad we cried, “Surprise! The three of us are making a trip to Austin!” He looked at us dumbfounded and with a little tug at his arm we were on the plane.

Once on the plane there was no exiting and the coup was complete. My sister and I breathed a huge sigh of relief and inwardly relished our unbelievable success at pulling off such a grand plan of espionage.

Several weeks later, back in our home in Austin, Pop said to me, “There isn't a round trip ticket for me is there?” We chuckled and said, “No. How do you like the idea of living with your family now?” All things considered he agreed that the room of his own, the comfortable bed, nice roof over his head and three decent meals a day was not so bad. Thus the adventure began.