Those of you who have a parent with Alzheimer's, as I do, know how easy it is to get impatient with short-term memory loss. Two years ago, I found myself falling into the trap of trying to reason with my mom over something she'd asked -- and I'd answered -- over and over. "Mom, you've already asked me that about five times in the last five minutes," I finally said.

Of course, it was exactly the wrong thing to say and do. My mom, who rarely gets angry, was furious with me -- and obviously hurt. "Well, all right," she said turning away, fuming. "I'll just stop talking."

I decided that day that I had to do better -- and thanks to the insights and advice of people like David Solie, the author of How to Say It to Seniors and one of our advisors, I have. David points out in senior editor Connie Matthiessen’s How to Talk to Your Aging Parents that when we take time to really listen to our parents, we learn a lot about the things that most matter to them (and that they’re struggling to make sense of). Yesterday was one of the high points of putting his advice to the test.

I spent the day with my parents, on a drive to Point Reyes National Seashore, just north of San Francisco. With just a few prompts from me, we spent hours talking about everything from the day my mother, just 9 years old, learned that her family had lost their house during the Great Depression to how she learned to make sauerkraut (all new to me). "We made a big vat of it every fall," she told me over lunch, digging into a hot dog loaded with sauerkraut.

When I half-jokingly asked my dad if he wanted to drive at one point (at age 86, he still loves to drive), he told me about the day he took his driver's test for the first time. After waiting in line for more than an hour, he finally got his chance but stalled the car in the first 10 seconds. "Oh, man" my dad told me, "your grandfather's blood pressure was sky high that day."

When we pulled up in front of our house after a long day of driving and sight-seeing and talking, my mom turned to me and said. "That was just a perfect day. Unforgettable."

Of course, I knew she would forget it. But I won't.