Brief Update

My mother is out of ICU and can move her feet, so everyone is breathing a sigh of relief. 
I was asked to call my mother's only sibling - my Uncle Rob - and give him an update last night.  I hadn't talked to him in years... maybe a decade.  It was a cordial conversation, and he offered to help me fly back to CA if I needed to.  I told him thanks, but I was going to wait and see how things went.

My father said he'd update me today, but when it got to be past noon and I hadn't heard from him, I called.  He gave me the news, and then said he was going to start building ramps for the house!  (I hadn't said a word to him about the stairs at this point.)  I kind of made a strangled laugh and said that I think it would be easier to just sell the house.  Surprisingly, my father said - seriously - that he'd thought about that, and is going to see how her recovery goes.  He said he thought he'd need to build at least 4 ramps and was glad he had lots of wood.
Good grief.  That place is going to look like the Winchester Mystery House before he's done... I hope he doesn't have a heart attack trying to do all that by himself, but he was busily building a new fence along their West border when I left California, by himself, digging holes in the rocky and packed Auburn soil.  He wouldn't let anyone help him with that, either.

Thanks to everyone who has taken a moment to think good things about my mother and the rest of us.  We'll see how it goes.  She should be in the hospital in Sacramento until sometime late next week.