Confusion and Simpleton collide

It won't take much to figure out who the simpleton is with this story.

The day started off kilter with Poppa. We were sitting on the back porch, drinking coffee and smoking... the usual. But Pop was worried, it was getting late (for him) I think it was around 7am or so. He felt like he was suppose to be somewhere, he was suppose to do a job. Didn't know where, or what.. and he was really worried about it.

Finally I said, "Poppa.. you retired, you don't have to do anything unless you just want to."

At first I felt like maybe I'd hurt his feelings, cause I knew he didn't remember... or understand why he'd be retired. He was a worker, thats what he did. Why would he retire?

After a couple of minutes, he seemed to calm down and forget about it all. I don't remember anything out of the norm happening the rest of the day. Every day had its ups and downs and we all just went with the flow, best we could.

That night he refused to take his meds. Which sometimes Critter would have to talk him into. But this was the first time I had seen him flat refuse. He was sitting on the side of his bed, arms crossed. Not violent (other than trying to smack the meds out of Critters hand), not even agitated really. Just more like he'd made his mind up that he wasn't taking them and that was that. Even said he'd take them tomorrow, but not tonight. Critter called the hospice nurse to get some ideas, or to find out what to expect if he just wouldn't take them. At some point I ended up on the phone with the nurse and she was feeding me lines to tell him... Like, if you won't take your medicine, they'll put you back in the hospital and they will MAKE you take your medicine.

We had pretty much tried everything and nothing was working. I finally said "Pop, why won't you take your medicine?" And just as plain as plain can be, he looked at me and said "I'm retired, and I don't have to do anything I don't want to." *sigh*

The nurse heard what he said and asked me who had told him that. Me, me.. ya that was me. Yes ma'am, that was me. Bright and early this morning I told him that.

She got a good laugh out of it and said next time I might put certain limitations on things I told him.

Critter and I got him in bed and settled for the night, then he took his meds.