A Separation

This prompt was dated July 11, 2009.

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Dementia is a wedge between us. She no longer remembers names of grandchildren or friends without prompts.
"The one with Lupus," she says when talking about her youngest grandchild. Sometimes I'm "this one" and my sister is "that one".
I suppose it is a separation between herself as well. A disconnect between her now and her then. A constant game of charades or twenty questions.
But she still covers well most of the time. While watching slides of her past life, she'd say "You know who that is don't you?"
I'd say, "Yes, it's so and so."
"That's right."
But somehow we both doubt she knows that's right.
She is separate from her past and her future. Dazed and confused in her tiny one-roomed present, grounded only by an eleven year old mostly blind dog.
I don't really know her anymore, this woman who holds snakes where once she was terrified. Who tries new foods when "I don't like it" was her mantra.
She is five or seven or ten and a bit naughty.
She will slight you for the smallest offense, usually involving the dog. Then the Irish DNA kicks in and she does not forget.
She is separate too from her filters - the ones that warn about saying something hurtful or unkind. My sister ["that one"] becomes "the pretty one" and I get asked if I'd like to look at pictures of myself before I started eating so much.