Press enter or click to view image in full size My mom and me at her assisted living facility in Pompano Beach, Florida. Photo by my aunt Edith Chalkin. “You have Alzheimer’s disease.” The doctor at my mother’s assisted-living facility delivered the diagnosis with such blunt detachment that for a moment I thought I must have misheard him. After noticing an unfinished prescription for Namenda in her purse, he told her she could resume taking it despite the side effects or “speed up the downward spiral.” Then he handed her a Do Not Resuscitate form. My 87-year-old mother and I looked at each other for a long moment before signing it together. I left that appointment haunted by a single fear: that someday she would no longer know who I was. That day eventually came, but not for several years. During that time, we still had long conversations — none more memorable than one afternoon beside the pool at her assisted-living facility in Pompano Beach, Florida.…