this evening I was invited to Peo & Peter, because their son Janos had birthday.
I didn't even had a present, because the invitation came too late in the afternoon - no time to buy or even think about a birthday present & anyway it's tedious to by last minutes presents - I prefer to chose presents with care (better with care, than just in time) . It's anyway difficult to find a present for a 13 years old boy with trendy interests - & surely I won't buy him a short lived very expensive video game - the book he got from me on christmas 2 years ago is still unread - he's one of the myriards of non-reading kids which somehow outnumber the some 100 still existing book-reading kids.
Later as we sat together dining & talking, while Janos sometimes disturbed our talking with piano playing melodies like Pink Panther etc. but sometimes too loud & quick & unsensible (he gets piano lessons since some years meanwhile..)
now we come closer to what I wanted to tell today:
Peo told me a story I knew already since long but this time with a very ironic detail I didn't know before.
Some years ago this flat they now live in lived Peter's old, but not so old mother alone. - She lived very retreated because she had had an apoplexy partly paralyzing her face. - She was still clear in mind, but didn't wanted people to see her in this state - so her son Peter was visiting her every day, supported her with purchasing what she needed in daily life -
I think it was about 4 years ago - when P. & P. were for some days in holiday on the Canary Isles, when his mother got a second stroke.
When he came back in her flat - she lied unconscious, cold, hardly alive anymore on the floor of her sleeping room - they brought her at once to the hospital - she never ever recovered - she had fallen in the worst of states in human live you could imagine - she couldn't move any muscle of her body anymore, not a finger, no tongue, no limb, couldn't speak, chew food or doing anything to control her body - so she was put in a hospital for nursing cases (about 4.000 Euros per month) & existed there in these state for still 2 years on, before she suffocated probably by a nurse error. - I've been once with Peo & Peter, while they visited her - Peo fondled her hands & washed her face & could see in this starving body that her eyes were still alive. - We knew she could see us hear, but couldn't give the least sign anymore to join us. - What a hellish torture for years! -
I once read that Charles Baudelaire died in the same way, in a paralized body nursed by nuns, but with conscious & understanding eyes.
Peter als had told me in that time, that his mothers wish & opinion on such a case, would be, not be artificial kept alive - she had belieft in euthanasia of own free will, but of course she couldn't express her own free will anymore & if so - the standards of our society would have forbidden her instant wish to get released from eternal seeming torture ..
& here we come to Peo's little story: - she told that an old Lady living under them from times to times had complained about Janos's piano studying - he never played in the evening after 8 p.m or at midday peace time - but once while again she felt molested & complained to Peo on phone - Peter later when he heard that called her angrily back - he told her he could sue her (or should have done) - for not helping his mother, when she had that stroke.
& so I heard the ironic tragic of when Peters mother lied their helpless. - She had cried for help for hours - not able to move anymore & the noise sensible neighbour had heard her. - Her reaction wasn't to call ambulance or police or something. - She wrote a note that she had heard these cries from the flat above & put this note in the mailbox of Peter's mother. - (She really must have been disquieted & disturbed - maybe she thought if the victim would find that note it would get aware that it should look for help) -
Meanwhile this old lady is dead too - maybe she met in that sphere there Peter's mother. - Mother asking: "Why didn't you inform the ambulance when you heard me crying for help so loud? - you could have saved my life for years - you could have spared me these years of helpless torture!" - Neighbour: "Please understand - I just didn't wanted to get involved - & anyway your grandson later on was really nerving me with his hour long piano play - that was torture too!"
