AUSTIN, Texas, Apr. 16, 2005 — I feel like Im' in a time warp with my dad. We have to take care of him until the surgery Tuesday. I can't imagine that the surgery is going to improve things. I can't let myself get too optimistic about it. But I have to hope, too.

I told him to call me at 7:30 this morning. He does. He says he is still in bed. He is glad he doesn't have any appointments. Me, too.

I tell him I'll get into my workout clothes and come make him some breakfast and get his paper for him to read. Then I'll go work out.

He is up in his easy chair when I get there. He's had coffee and a banana. He makes the coffee in a little French press I gave him, using his electric kettle to heat the water. This he seems to be able to handle. I give him his paper, scramble up some eggs and give him some ham, eggs and a piece of toast with some preserves a friend made for him. He doesn't quite finish it but he eats most of it.

I clean up the kitchen, get the clean dishes out of the dishwasher, find his strawberries and get them on a shelf in the frig he can reach easily. He wants a glass of water and a glass of cranberry juice by his easy chair. I read a section of the newspaper, sitting with him, and ask if he needs anything else. This is when I wish that his house wasn't fifteen minutes from ours. So I could pop in more.

I go to the club. I do a little over fifty minutes on the bicycle, reading some old newspapers. I do a few sets of weights. I thought if I went to see about Dad first I wouldn't feel rushed at the club but I do. I go home.

FFP is going to make these special hamburgers he likes and asks me to mince some garlic and chop some onion for the meat. I do. He makes the burgers and we eat them with sharp cheddar, spinach, red pepper chipotle sauce and tomatoes on them. And a sesame seed bun. They are so good I have two. But, but the patties are smallish. I drink a Diet Coke with it.

I figure I'll get showered up and go back and see about my dad again before we go out this evening, maybe make him something else to eat. But when I call 'good daughter' and his preacher are there and she's brought him some food and they are talking.

I read The New York Times and watch some videos and stuff off the DVR. I call him back. He assures me I don't need to come over. So I don't.

We have to get to the event early because we are on the host committee. We haven't actually done any work, just donated a little extra money. FFP has rented nehru-type jackets at Lucy in Disguise. His is bright orange. Mine is a little small so I fish out a dressy gold top that belonged to my mother (one of about four things I saved out of her clothes) and wear the jacket unbuttoned over that. The theme of the party is Bombay Dreams.

It is a pretty good drive to the party. It's on this side of Mansfield Dam, but barely. Still we get there earlier than most everyone except the caterers, homeowners and the hosts who have really done things.

They are attaching these little jewel things to women's foreheads. FFP gets one for an earring. (He a little later starts talking about getting pierced for an earring. Whoa...retirement is getting to him. Did I mention that he's got a little art studio going in the corner of the storage room?)

People show up, a band plays (world music but they don't really do Indian). There is a leopard (stuffed), a view of the river, below Mansfield so is it Lake Austin? It's not very wide so it feels more appropriate to call it a river. There are Indian-inspired snacks and then an Indian meal. Special drinks (I have one of the lime vodka things with a touch of minced cilantro then switch to wine). There is a psychic doing readings. He says I used to be quick to anger but now I'm more diplomatic. (Most people believe that about themselvs, that's safe.) Then he says he is getting a 'Jewish connection.'

"You might have been at the Holocaust in another life," he says. "Do you have Jewish friends?"

Hmmm. I wonder if this is a stab in the dark or really something he is 'reading.' I wonder if somehow he picked up the vibes of all the Holocaust and Humanity Project stuff. Or my call this afternoon from my Jewish friend offering to take food to my dad. I wonder if my longtime interest in the Holocaust is more than just an historical interest in a time just before I was born.

We have belly dancers and us dancing. One of the belly dancers dances with a sword on her head. We talk to a dentist and his wife (he helps with one of the St. David's foundation projects for denistry and this is a St. David's benefit). We know we know them. Turns out we all went to the club that closed in 2000, I think it was. The club we belonged to before we joined our current one.

During the party I get a message on my cell phone from a cousin. My aunt in Maine broke her kneecap and has to have surgery. She was taking her husband to the doctor. He is scheduled to have his pacemaker replaced (it was recalled) in about a week. This aunt has no kids so all of her nieces and nephews worry over her. But she is fourteen years younger than my dad. And only eighteen years older than I am.

We go home, watch a little TV, go to bed. The party was a success. The people who bought tickets kept thanking us as hosts but we didn't do that much. FFP and I went around giving big tips to the band, belly dancers, and psychic who have worked cheaply or for free.