You May Ask Yourself, My God What Have I Done
Most of us who have scraped and finnagled our way into our brownstones know the feeling of awe that sets in that first time you’re alone in your house and you think, “Holy Shit!” Colin Harrison describes that moment 20-odd years ago in his essay this week in New York Magazine: We moved into our…
Most of us who have scraped and finnagled our way into our brownstones know the feeling of awe that sets in that first time you’re alone in your house and you think, “Holy Shit!” Colin Harrison describes that moment 20-odd years ago in his essay this week in New York Magazine:
We moved into our Brooklyn house, a big creaking brownstone in Park Slope. Four floors. Seven bedrooms, three baths. Seven mantels. Walnut detail throughout, never painted. Sure, it needed a little work: They all do. We were deliriously excited. This was our house now? In the hours just after the closing, my wife and I lay on the dusty parquet floor of the empty living room gazing up at the impossibly high ceilings. How would we fill this big house? How would we populate it? What life would we live that otherwise would never occur?
The Deal We Made [NY Magazine]
This board reminds me of the elections and the use of the word “values,” except here it is about the use of the word compassion. And here, I tend to think that everybody swings to the left.
I agree with the last poster that the lack of of compassion for this couple is far more disturbing than the lack of compassion that this board believes the couple had for nana.
There is no story without the end of the story. If the story was “we bought a house with grammy’s money (but we had to promise to have a baby)”, that would have been odd, but whatever. It’s the “and then we dumped her 18 months later in the closest place we could find (after looking for 10 minutes)” ending that gives it the Only In New York Magazine kicker.
CH
Yes, the ending of the story is questionable. Perhaps they did not make the best decision. But there are other people on this board who think that the entire story is about greed and selfishness and I personally find that much more disturing than anything the couple in the story did.
What is it with C. and K. Harrison? Everything they write makes them look like terrible people. I can understand being a terrible person, but why publish it?
I have no problem with their moving her to Brooklyn or accepting her Faustian baby bargain. That all worked out for the best.
However, I have a serious problem with dumping her in a shitty nursing home once she began to falter. Would you put your grandmother in a place where they tie old people to their wheelchairs?
What about getting a home health care aide to take care of her or searching a little harder to find a decent nursing home. Nothing is all that far away in Brooklyn.
These people applied all kinds of ingenuity to buying their brownstone with grandma’s money. However when it came to finding her a decent place to die–not so much.
Maybe nana thought the winters in Brooklyn would suck and maybe she didn’t. She had a car that she couldn’t seem to keep on the road! Leaving her in LA was an accident waiting to happen.
For some reason you want to believe that these two people are terrible and I think they are honest and more compassionate than most.
I also think that New York is one best places in the world to retire. Everything is in walking distance, there are people all around you, there are a million things to do if you are so inclined.
Nana didn’t want to move. Nana liked her housekeeper and the ladies at the beauty shop. Nana even seemed to have a car! Maybe Nana thought a NYC winter would suck when you’re pushing 90. Maybe she didn’t think getting wheeled out onto the roof of a terrible seniors home (but only in the summer!) was all that great…
These two flew out there to convince her otherwise and then couldn’t handle it. They should have sold the house and given her the money back so she could live someplace nice.
I don’t see the brutal calculating selfishness. Provided that you believe they wanted to keep Nana close by and that the nursing home they chose was the only one with a bed. But it seems to me that your problem with their story has to do with much more than the nursing home they chose. You believe that their choice to sell Nana’s house and bring her to Brooklyn was entirely motivated by the desire to own a brownstone at any expense. I believe that they carefully weighed the options and made a great decision for all generations of the family. I believe that nana was far happier living in Brooklyn, getting to witness the birth of her grandchild then she ever would have been staying in LA, where she was isolated by her ability to get around by car.
People should get higher horses if they think this is ok.
Honesty doesn’t make up for brutal, calculating selfishness. Yeah Nana seemed like a real pain in the ass, but she didn’t have to go out like that.