A disappointment

1 Since my return, I have examined my 2008 and 2009 diaries: the only entry about a visit to Chester was made in January 2008. As I sense that I did not visit last year, it may well be that the gap between my recent and the preceding visits has been nearly three years.

2 Given the gap, I am an unreliable reporter of any changes in Jim's capacities. So I register what I observed this time. He is using the door as a support when he transfers between the wheelchair and the driving seat. I wonder how close he is to the limit of his strength in his arms. I sensed that I was watching an elderly man who is struggling to make the transfers.

3 However, the elderly man continues to dominate. He shouts at his wife. He is preemptory with his elderly brother. (At one time he asked me if I knew about the takeover by one firm of a potash firm in Saskatchewan; my failure to respond to the question - as I sought to understand what he was talking about - was compounded by my failure to know that the province was an important producer of the commodity.) Nothing is beyond him. He has an opinion, vigourously expressed, on everything. Daunting, really. No scope for discussion. And so we annoyed each other.

4 During the two evenings, watching television was the preferred activity. Jim, I gathered, watches until after midnight. He rises about 1000 or later.

5 So I left as a disappointed elderly brother of an elderly man. I arrived in hope; I left without hope of a reconciliation between two men of different dispositions.

6 I am about to delete my gmail group entitled . Instead, I will send individual e-mails to Mary and, probably less frequently, to Jim. Instead, I may adopt the habit, at least for the time being, of sending a letter to Sheila and to Jim, jointly. We'll see. (But the gmail group will be deleted.