While things may not be ideal, or even as good as they were a short while ago, it seems we are getting back to some kind of even keel.

Dad has started to attend his exercise classes again. Greg visited recently and took him to see mum. Twenty minutes was enough, and then he was ready to go back to his own section. Just like mum now, he is being led around by other people, and seems to have lost his own initiative, which was tenuously alive until only a few weeks ago.

So, for now, they live within a few metres of each other; mum completely unaware that dad is there, or even that he is her husband, dad perhaps knowing that somewhere he has a wife, but not sure where. All they have, between them, would barely fill a trunk, but it is more than they need or want.

The last time I saw dad it took him a long long time to recognise me, and I do not think it will be long before he forgets my name. I am visiting infrequently now, so I am not doing my chances of being remembered any good at all. The thing is that I don't feel it is any use. People say that it is, but it doesn't feel that way. It depresses me, and mum and dad forget my visit a few minutes after I've left. Yes, but they enjoy it while you are there, people say. Perhaps. The possibility of a vague short term pleasure seems such a small and nebulous pay-off. Every day I seem to have other things I feel I ought to be doing instead. So every day another day slips by. Writing this makes me think: well, it's about time you drove over and made another visit. It feels like a duty, it's not something that comes from within.