Missed a dispatch? They’re all here.

My brother JJ and I had colluded before I arrived in Phoenix, and Dad was on board.

We wanted to help our parents downshift into a simpler life. One that didn’t depend on Dad maintaining the air conditioner via YouTube tutorials, or Mom dusting curio cabinets filled with memories no one else knew what to do with. The first step was neighborhood shopping.

Now my brother is an enthusiast. He can get you excited about choosing floor mats for a car you don’t even drive—that’s his gift. He brings people into his orbit by making them part of the process. When he says, “Hey, how ‘bout going with me to pick up my bike? Just got a new suspension,” even Mom has a hard time refusing him.

JJ and his daughter Bebe rolled in one afternoon, full of that shopping energy. “Hey, let’s take an afternoon drive. See some other neighborhoods.”

Mom sniffed a rat. “You all go ahead. I’ve got laundry to do.”

Dad said, “Oh come on. JJ’s just looking ahead, in case he and Christi want to downsize. We might find something we like too.”

Mom pursed her lips and let her eyes go dead.

I could never have pulled this next trick off. “You’ll be lonely if you stay behind,” JJ said with a grin, opening the front door. Then the stroke of genius: “Besides, we need your opinion.”

It was a gentle fiction, but a strategic one. It framed Mom not as the object of concern, but as a woman whose opinion still shaped the future. He’s so good at this stuff.

She took the bait, but cautiously. “Well, I don’t mind helping you look, but don’t talk to me about moving. I’ve had a back and two knee surgeries since we moved here,” she reminded us. “We just got this place the way we like it.”

JJ and Dad exchanged glances of relief and solidarity and Dad said, “Okay then, get your purse. I’ve already got a couple bottles of water.”

Different Kinds of Making

First stop: the original Sun City, built in 1960. People my age appreciate the Mid-Century Modern aesthetic, calling it “retro,” but Mom could barely keep her nose from tipping upward. This was not fun and edgy, it was downscale.

“You all go. I’ll wait.” Unspoken: nothing to see here.

My niece Bebe had been crocheting a summer top for herself, and said she’d keep Grammy company while she finished the current row.

Mamaw taught me to crochet when I was five or six, and, like Bebe, I took to it—duck to water. I’ve always loved fiber arts. There truly is something about the rhythm of the hands that steadies the mind. It’s one of the few ways I can stay in the room even when part of me wants to slip away.

Mom never really took to crochet or knitting, though she tried. I remember finding that unfinished yellow acrylic sweater when we cleaned out the Ohio house—still on the needles, abandoned mid-sleeve.

She preferred a different kind of making. She always doodled. On hold with a company? Doodle on the back of an envelope. Watching a show that didn’t carry her attention? Doodle caricatures of the actors.

Her true joy is painting. She’s got a couple neighbor girls who come by for lessons, and she treats it like a finishing school.

If one of them says huh or yeah, she stops them cold.

“Excuse me? It’s not huh, we say please repeat that,” and “We don’t say yeah. Ladies say yes.”

There’s artistry in the brushwork, sure—but the real lesson is posture, diction, poise. She’s not just passing along a craft. She’s shaping character.

But that afternoon in the van, Mom had no brush in hand, no lesson to teach, no part to play. Bebe had her yarn. I had my inner monologue. Mom had only the quiet hum of an agenda she hadn’t chosen. She wasn’t angry. She wasn’t sulking. But she wasn’t herself either—and when she’s quiet like that, I worry. Stillness doesn’t suit her. She needs something to push against, something to shape or improve.

More Than Square Footage

Next, we visited a newer development, Sun City Grand—polished, well-appointed, with every amenity imaginable. Lots of choices, condos, duplexes, single-family homes, but, unlike the original Sun City development, this one lacked a continuity-of-care model I favor, the kind that could accommodate both independence and future needs.

Dad said, “Wow, I could see us living here.” Mom may not have heard that, but if she did, she ignored it.

We toured an open house that I thought was perfect—plenty of light, beautiful kitchen, smart layout. I would have signed an offer on the spot.

“I can’t live in 1,700 square feet,” Mom sniffed, crossing her arms. “I need at least what we have now.”

I lowered my voice and said optimistically, "You know, Mom, if you move here you won't need your own art studio. You can paint at the community center and save a lot of money on the mortgage."

She didn’t even pause. “I need my creative space to myself.”

Checkmate.

JJ managed the day just right. He didn’t push—just promised we’d go out again tomorrow and look at a neighborhood where they’d all attended political fundraisers and community events and knew a few residents. It wasn’t my first choice—no continuity of care, and at least fifteen years older than The Grand—but both Mom and Dad perked up at the established homes and landscaping—amazing how tall some cactus grow!

I pulled up Zillow and started reading off listings in the area, limiting the filter to homes over 2,000 square feet. I live in a 1,600-square-foot condo—plenty for us—but for Mom, square footage wasn’t about comfort. The move wasn’t about physical labor. It was about letting go of something she’d pursued most of her life and lovingly personalized.

More than once, she said, “I can’t even think about starting over…”

We kept circling the subject of the move. JJ and I weren’t pushing, exactly—but we were trying to hold up a mirror. Mom clung to her domestic routines like they were life preservers, and in some ways, they probably were.

And then it occurred to me—what if she wasn’t resisting just because of pride, or fear, or her usual need for control? What if she was simply… worn out? What if all those years of keeping the show running—of keeping us scrubbed, the furniture polished, and selling enough insurance to earn a trip to Australia—had used her up in ways she didn’t know how to name?

What if this wasn’t resistance at all—but the quiet cost of carrying so much, for so long?

The Rhumba Moment

That night, the Rhumba stopped working. (It’s actually a Shark, but we all call them Rhumbas now—like Kleenex or Thermos.) The whole point of buying it was to save her time and effort, to automate a daily burden.

Apparently, the filters needed cleaning so she dug into that like a gopher. Then the battery wouldn’t hold a charge. One frustration stacked atop another. Her face was pinched in that way I now recognize: the quiet panic of not being able to keep up.

I heard the clicks and sighs, the replayed YouTube video. I’ve never had one of those vacuums, but owed it to her to see if there was anything I could do. I lifted the unit gently, and without really thinking, must have properly positioned it near the charging dock. The magnet caught. The light blinked on. It started charging.

Mom looked relieved and humiliated at the same time. I hadn’t earned the ease, but I got it. It was just dumb luck that my hand moved the right way. And yet I’d solved something she couldn’t. That’s the quiet cruelty of aging in a so-called convenience economy: tools arrive too late to use with ease—and help, too late to ask for without shame.

The Shark wasn't the only device acting up that week. The next day, in the van between retirement communities, Mom was tapping at her phone and sucking her teeth the way she does when something’s off.

“I’ve got to renew this phone storage plan,” she muttered.

A Scam Wrapped in Memory

Dad caught the edge in her voice from the front seat. “Lemme see, Gloria,” he said gently and held his hand out, palm up.

He doesn’t like to admit it, but he’s tired of being tech support, and he's not even that good at it—only by degree. He’s tired of settings and subscriptions and troubleshooting on tiny screens with fingers that don’t work the way they used to. Tired of the way so-called “smart” devices make people feel dumb. I’m just a few years behind them.

My boys are the digital natives who shake their heads at my gaffes.

Mom handed the phone over. I watched him squint and scroll, watched her try not to hover while pretending she didn’t need his help. I imagined the quiet panic roiling inside her—the same kind I’d seen the night before with the vacuum. A panic not about the task, but about becoming the person who needs help. She always tried to be the problem solver, anticipating them, warding them off whenever possible.

These things—phones, vacuums, smart speakers, thermostats—they’re supposed to make life easier. But for my parents, they often do the opposite. Each one asks for an update, a new password, a subscription plan, a firmware refresh. Each one, in its own way, reminds them they’re not built for this pace.

The phone message wasn’t just tech fatigue—it was a scam. One of those predatory pop-ups disguised by a livery of legitimacy, warned that her storage was full, her memories in peril. Renew now, it said. Just $7.99 to keep your photos safe.

Dad talked her down gently that time, walking her through what was real and what wasn’t. But the next day, I watched it happen again when I took her out to do a couple of errands. The same panic bloomed. The same held breath as she squinted at the alert, her thumb hovering over the screen.

“But if I don’t, they’ll be gone,” she whispered. “Everything will be gone.”

For Mom, it wasn’t about storage plans. It was about the thousands of photos and videos that tether her to the life she built. The faces of grandchildren, of dogs now buried, of rooms she decorated, parties she hosted and family members long gone. Every one of them had been saved for a reason. Each was proof that she’d made something beautiful of her life.

I wanted to scream. I wanted to find the people who build these traps for aging minds and take a square-handled ice pick to their servers. I’m not a violent person, but there’s something in me that rages when memory is weaponized against the people who treasure it most.

What these scams exploit isn’t ignorance. It’s love.

And there’s no antivirus for that.

I didn’t fix much that week. Not really. JJ was the steady hand, the one who’d been in the trenches all along. He knew when to nudge, when to let it go, and how to keep things light even when they weren’t.

But I showed up. I listened. I stayed in the room when it got uncomfortable. And when I wanted to change the subject—or the outcome—I usually didn’t.

I am still learning how to stay present without trying to fix what can’t be fixed, or outrun what hurts to see.

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