Like a lot of people, I live my life with eyes wide open. Except of course when I notice I’m entertaining my friend, Denial. Perhaps you know her? She’s nearly everywhere once you start paying attention. She means well. In fact, she might even be considered a life-saver in certain circumstances.

A year ago I inadvertently became full time caregiver to my 85 year old father, the King of Denial.

I use the word inadvertently because he was living in warm, sunny California, and we live in cold and windy Chicago, and although he needed to find a place to live, I never dreamed that he would choose to make a move like this at this point in his life. I invited him to come for a visit, thinking if he did he could see for himself how lovely it is here in the Midwest. He said no. The next thing I know, he is on a plane headed this way with one hastily-filled suitcase of his belongings.

I had fourteen hours to ready the guest room, stock the pantry with his favorites, and make a quick trip to Walmart for warm socks. It was November, after all, and I knew he wouldn’t be ready for what loomed ahead, weather-wise.

He arrived shivering on that 40 degree, rainy day in 2010. That was the beginning of my education on The Art of Living in with Denial.