Day 5 of lock down

I wonder how you get the picture to the side, or maybe it should be in the middle… anyways, here I start my blog with one of my random thoughts. Oh well, that’s okay too. I don’t know if I said it somewhere, but I decided that in this time I will blog again, play Dawn of Titans and do my jewelry. Well, I’m successful thus far.

Sad thing just happened. I’m looking after baby chicks that is been hatched in an incubator. One little Orpington just died. He had lovely white lines around his eyes. His dad… a formidable huge Orpington with a real bad temper died a month or so ago. I’m so not taking this very well. A wonderful thing about this chicken thing is that a few times I had the little chicken born right in my hand. That is an awesome experience.

I enjoyed my first game on Dawn of Titans. There are a lot of new players I don’t know and way to little players. Wonder where my kids went off wondering…. (mind you grown-ups between 30 and 50 years old)

My jewelry education on Youtube is quite extensive. There is this woman Darlene, I just adore her and she is so practical and awesome creative and good ideas…. and so I can go on.

Had a very nice Zoom Dementia Mentors Zoom meeting today. We had such a laugh, Peter had to chase a bumblebee out of his glasshouse where he was chatting from. Everyone is learning or doing zoom and whatever meetings now, while we have been doing it for like ever… Our Virtual Cafe’s is awesome. We are family, friends and meet everyday. So awesome. I just love the lot of them. Everyone has some form of dementia in different stages, although most of us are early onset. Some days we all have on hats, or tie dye shirts (don’t know how to spell that, not that it matter anymore for me, as long as I can communicate.

My husband is driving me around the bend. He is comfort eating and smoking his pipe, but I put my mask on when he smokes. I will most probably not go out anyway.

Have to go. Toodles

Saro (Elmarie)

My friend Omar aka Hades108

Hi there, long time since I wrote a blog, but life has been hectic. Today I want to tell about my friend Omar or Hades108. It is a story of kindness and friendship. Someone showing kindness and understanding for someone with Dementia.

I have been playing an online game for the last four years, that really provides me with a lot of fun and a lot of good friends. The game is Dawn of Titans. Now Dawn of Titans is played mostly by older people that really are children at heart. I am not going to explain the game now, but might later on write about some adventures. It is not a aim and shoot game, but strategy between alliance members

One day I found Omar in league chat asking for an active alliance. I send him a message that he is welcome to join a fun active family. To my delight he joined, as I was trying to recruit for my alliance. He was level 14 and I thought he needed training and pointers to play the game. So I started with training. Then this rascal informed me that he is a beta player. Now a beta player is someone that started playing when the game first came out. He forgot his password and could not find his account. Dang, I felt like a fool, but then I realized he hasn’t been playing for three years and as the game keeps on evolving… so he was sort of a newbie lol. Not anymore thought.

Apart for communicating in game, the players communicate or hangout in Line App. My in game name is guess what…… Yup, you’re right, Saro.

Omar lives in Jordan and I in South Africa. In March this year I had another stroke. I got a message from him, saying I better get well or he walks across Africa and I don’t want to find him at my door. Sweet munchkin, it warmed my heart so much even though I was sort of really out of it. I could not communicate or think and my left side were paralyzed at the time. I found the message when I started to recover.

He always said the nicest and kindest things to me in game and in line. The next communication we had, was when that lunatic in Australia/New Zealand (can’t remember of cause) killed all that Islamic people in the Mosque. Now I am a christian and he is of the Islamic faith, but a mosque, church or temple is a place where people feel safe. So I send him a private message saying I’m sorry for his brothers and sisters in the faith got killed.

He replied that it is okay, because they believe they go to heaven if they die in a mosque, but his heart is broken for their families. So we started talking and really became friends. Now Omar is 22 I think and I’m an old lady of 56. Omar has the most wonderful manners… his mamma raised him well. When I told him I have dementia, he said that he is talking to Saro, not Saro with dementia, but a person called Saro that is kind and good. That is the most awesome thing anyone with dementia can hear or experience. Some people think when we start forgetting or get into the later stages, it is just a shell remaining. Not true, a person is a person. Somewhere in there is still a person with a story. We had a video chat the other day and he showed me the sun going down from his house’s rooftop. It was breathtaking. Doing that was so special and he just is this nice young man.,.,. He is not perfect, I’m not perfect, but small things in life is so important. During Ramadan he texted me everyday at the same time to say hello. He told me they believe to do good things during Ramadan for other people, and I guess I was one of his gifts. Thing is, it was not just a Ramadan thing, he always am my friend and I am always his friend. I am honored to know such a kind young man.

I was thinking about what to write other than dementia. Then I decided to start writing short stories from my past and family. I think it will work?

Anyway, much love and kindness

Saro

Kindness and DOT

Dear friend, I’ve been meaning to write about DOT kindness for a few days now, but life just got busy and I couldn’t write. So let me tell you about kindness, as the idea feels like it is fading in my mind.

A lot of kindness has been given to me by friends since I were diagnosed and before. I play an online game Dawn of Titans. I never liked to play games… really solitaire?… boring! But Dawn of Titans is a community and I have been playing for three years now. We have an app where we socialize and brag with our Titans etc. called Line. This is not a blog on the latest Titan or stats, but about my friends.

I hope they don’t mind me mentioning some of them, because we all goes by an alias. Mine is Saro of cause 🙂 Anger is our Captain, he will deny this of cause, but he is. When I told him one of the first things he said was that he will send me a message saying:” Hi Saro, my name is Anger. We are family and we love you.” I’m not going to mention everyone, otherwise I will have to write a book on Dawn of Titans or DOT as we call it.

Another one was my dearest Hades108. I think I mentioned him before. I only gave him and Anger a link to my blog. This young man told me:”Saro, I don’t talk to you as a person who is sick or a person that has dementia. I talk to you as my friend Saro, that is like a mom to me.

I shared my dementia thingy with the rest of the leaders of our alliance (the 6 of us have been playing together for about 3 years, don’t know the exact time) and they always have my back. Boy o boy, I can mess up in Line app. Miss understanding stuff, not understanding stuff, being impulsive, type nonsensical messages and post stuff in the wrong chats. Geeeezzzz and DOT can be very intense with spies and stuff hahahaha. Sometimes I have to send Anger a message and ask what they are talking about or just simply drop it. Confusion really is a bummer.

But they will always have my back or fix things. I’ve been thinking of leaving DOT, but I spend so much time in the game. Have made so many lovely friends. Never met them face to face, but they are real to me. The guys (girls not many) sometimes shares their heartaches and stuff. I so love hanging out with everyone….

Playing DOT, is one of the things that makes me happy. When my Titan Grimvald goes whoos whoos with its lightning axes and the archers swish swish with their arrows and my storm maidens trrrr trrr shooting lightning bolts with their axes all at the same time, it thrills me so. It stimulates my brain, as I need strategies. Which are faltering, but I’m still good to go for a very long time.

This is kindness shown to me by people that lives all over the world, that has never met me face to face. A big thank you to all of you, even if you might never get to read this blog.

Now I have to leave, thank you for reading.

Lots of love and kindness

Saro (Elmarie)