A History Of The Present Illness (2013) - Plot & Excerpts
By the morning of Rosh Hashanah, the pieces had fallen into place: his election to the Residents’ Council, an open room in the Jaffa building, and a signed contract for his trio, We Three Hebes, to play at the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass festival in Golden Gate Park. Now only two obstacles remained between Harold Chaikin and a happy ending—the small challenge of telling his wife and the larger one of securing his room change. He felt badly about Ruth, but he refused to feel guilty. They had lived at the New Israel Care Home for seven months already, and she hadn’t once made an effort to adjust. Instead, she let it be known—to him, to the staff, even to other residents—that debilities notwithstanding, only fools willingly gave up the real world for an institution. She would leave in a heartbeat, he knew, would prefer to live almost anywhere else, but they hadn’t had children, and most of their friends were in similar straits or worse, so he’d reasoned they’d be better off here than alone at home with only each other and paid help for company.
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