Number Four

It was late. Close to midnight. I turned off my headlights and pulled into a patch of grass in his neighbor's yard. When I turned off the engine, my body was vibrating from anxiety. I had to pee. I turned around to check on my sleeping five-year-old son wrapped in a blanket in the backseat. What the hell was I doing?

I locked my car and walked the short distance to the end of his drive. If what he said was true, there would be no lights on in the house. He had cancelled our date because he wasn't feeling well and was "hitting the sack early," he said. That had been four hours ago, but my intuition told me something was wrong.

I met Love Number Four a year after my divorce from Jason's dad. My Beetle Bug was ailing, and I was told that he was the best Volkswagen doctor in Greenwood. Handsome, rough around the edges, self-assured, a man's man and not the least bit interested in me. Bingo. We have a winner, folks.

After several more visits to the car doctor's office, Number Four took notice and asked if I'd like to go for a ride in his airplane sometime. Youbetcha. One date led to another and before long we were exclusive.

EXCLUSIVE

Excluding or not admitting other things.

                                                  --Goggle Search

The house was dark. No lights on anywhere. What an idiot I was for doubting him. I had caught him in lies before, but he apologized and said he would never do it again, and here I was at midnight standing in his driveway in my pajamas questioning his loyalty and honesty and feeling so stup...

WAIT A MINUTE! IS THAT A LIGHT IN THE KITCHEN?

Number Four was a mystery. Unfortunately for me, I was attracted to men who kept me guessing. Was I that special one, or not? Four's declaration of love was affirming, but his actions were disturbing. Gone for days at a time with no explanation, last minute cancellations, taking the phone off the hook whenever I was at his house, and the plethora of women he referred to as "just friends." 

It was the kitchen light. Maybe he'd gotten up from his sick bed for a glass of water, thus the need for the light, and here I was questioning his integrity. I felt bad about that, but I was already there, so why not just take a peek for reassurance sake. Once I saw this poor sick man all by himself, I could beat down the doubt demons, calm my anxiety, drive home, and get a good night's sleep.

With every step up the drive, my anxiety grew more unbearable. Boy, did I ever have to pee. The window with the light was getting closer. How long does it take to drink a glass of water and go back to bed? Closer, closer. Ten feet away, eight, six, four...

I see him. Oh, the poor guy. He had to sit down at the kitchen table to rest before making it back to his bedroom. But wait! He's not in his jammies. He all dressed up. And he's animated, smiling, and talking. 

She was very young. Much younger than me. Pretty, too. Much prettier than... . I know what you're thinking. You thought I was going to say "prettier than me" didn't you? Am I right? I thought so. She was much prettier than the last young lady I had caught him with, but then again she was "just a friend," he said.

I walked back to the car, opened both doors on the passenger's side and peed on the neighbor's lawn. I drove home, put Jason back in bed, and then called his number. It rang busy. I called every fifteen minutes until he answered at three something in the morning. He was feeling a little bit better, he said, but he was going to have to cancel our date for the next night because of his contagious state.

I know what you're thinking. What if the neighbor had seen me peeing in his yard? Am I right? I thought so.

Magpies and Tapioca

I sat on the couch drinking cherry Kool-Aid and eating a ham salad sandwich. Tommy was sitting on the floor in front of me and we were watching cartoons. "Don't spill that Kool-Aid on the carpet, Carol Louise. It won't come out!" I squeezed the glass tighter between my knees and said in a voice that was drowned out by the hysteria playing out on the television, "I won't. I'll be careful." 

The birds looked identical: black magpies with gray bellies, almond-shaped beaks with big toothy smiles, and happy eyes that belied their mischievous intent. The only way to tell them apart was by their accents: one British and the other, Brooklyn, but they were equally cynical, rude, and antagonistic. Their unsuspecting victims, who were portrayed as dimwits and dopes, were simply naive, innocent, and unaware of the suffering about to befall them. Watching the birds be disrespectful and mean to others made me uncomfortable, so I asked Tommy if we could watch a different cartoon: Bugs Bunny, Donald Duck or Mickey Mouse "No!" he said, turning around and pinching the fatty part of my thigh and twisting it until I cried out in pain. He was the supreme ruler of the TV, and besides, he liked the violence the birds brought into our lives everyday from three to six o'clock.

"Don't spill that Kool-Aid on the carpet, Carol Louise. It won't come out!"

"I won't. I'll be careful." I pressed my knees tighter into the glass between my legs.

She came out of the kitchen with two bowls of Tapioca. "Oh, I don't like that cartoon. Those birds are so mean," she said, as she sat our dessert down on the coffee table between Tommy and me. Our babysitter stared at the television for several seconds--just long enough to see the birds cause great pain and suffering to a barnyard dog--before leaving the room in disgust. "They shouldn't be allowed to make cartoons with violence," she screamed from the kitchen, followed by, "Don't spill that Kool-Aid on the carpet, Carol Louise. It won't come out!" 

"I won't. I'll be careful." 

Behind her back, the neighborhood kids called her "the-cranky-old-maid-in-the-ugly-red-house." At first, I was happy she said no to my mother's request to watch me for three hours after school. She wasn't particularly fond of children she said, but then when another working mother in our neighborhood asked if she could watch her nine-year-old son, Tommy, the thought of making money, while two kids sat in front of a TV for three hours, wasn't so bad after all.

While the magpies were taking turns hitting a blubbering dog over the head with a mallet, Tommy stood up, and with no warning, whacked me on the head with the spoon from his Tapioca bowl. This malicious and unprovoked attack would start a chain reaction of unfortunate events that produced a big red stain on the carpet...

"Oh, no! Tell me you didn't spill Kool-Aid on the carpet, Carol Louise!"

...and would end with an unsuspecting, innocent, blubbering victim naively unaware of the pain and suffering about to befall her.

Fall's Tease

It was fall's tease. A preview of what was to come. A month away from winter and it was snowing, but once the snowflakes touched the ground, they disappeared. With all the lights out in my farmhouse, I stood at my kitchen window and starred at the floodlight on my neighbor's back porch. One of nature's incredible spectacles was playing in 3D in the space between Margaret's house and mine, but the beauty was lost on me. My confused and cluttered mind had more important things to think about.

I found the farmhouse by luck. I knocked on a stranger's door to ask if she knew of a rental close by. As if the lady who introduced herself as Margarget were expecting me and with much enthusiasm she told me my timing was excellent. The farmhouse next door that her grandfather had built in the 1800's had just that weekend been vacated. It was that easy. One day I'm living in Indianapolis and the next Evansville.

He had told me that if I married this man from Evansville, he would come to the church, stand in the balcony, and yell, "NO!  STOP! YOU ARE MARRYING THE WRONG MAN!" Really? He would actually do that? He would come to my wedding and make a marriage-interruptus scene? I have to admit that that did sound pretty cool--two men in love with me at the same time and one professing his love in such an outrageous way--but then again, maybe not. He had been my first love and he had had nine years to ask for my hand in marriage, but every time I asked, "When are we going to get married," he would answer, "When I get married, I'll be the one doing the asking." So, I don't know how you feel about that, but my thinking was, "If you snooze, you lose."  So one day I met this handsome, slow-talking, southern man from Evansville and gave Love Number One no notice. In an instant, or so it seemed, I was engaged to be married and moving to Evansville to be close to my betrothed.

BACK TO THE SNOW, THE FARMHOUSE, THE CONFUSED AND CLUTTERED MIND

I couldn't sleep. Too much to think about. What if I was making a mistake? What if Love Number One was right about Love Number Two? I didn't know him long enough to commit to forever and ever. Why did I say yes so soon? Maybe I should lengthen the engagement? Spend some time apart? What was the hurry anyway? Long relationships are the best because you get to know everything EVERYTHING about them before you make a commitment to spend the rest of your life with them.

Tap, Tap, Tap. What was that? Was it snowing harder and the flakes were tap, tap, tapping against my bedroom window?

Tap! Tap! Tap!  Nah! Probably not snow.

"You are making a big mistake. Can I come in?" he pleaded as he stood shivering in the cold. During the nine years that we dated he had tapped on my bedroom windows on many occasions (remember what I said about about dating someone a long time so you get to know everything about them?). Even though the last thing I expected to see was Number One's face peering at me through my bedroom window, I wasn't surprised either.

This was my last chance, he said. After making the effort on my behalf to come all the way to southern Indiana in the middle of the night and in a snowstorm, was it not obvious who really loved me. Don't nine years of history mean anything?

Yep? Nine years of history means everything. Have a safe trip home.

An Enchanted Time

She was born in an upstairs bedroom of a two-story farmhouse in Evansville, Indiana, on Thursday morning, June 20, 1895. Her mother was well attended with female members of her family, and the delivery was without complications. As was the custom of the time, her father was relegated to another part of the house. They named the first of their two daughters Margaret, and she would live through five wars, the Great Depression, the moon landing, two presidential assassinations (McKinley and Kennedy), the invention of the information super highway (Internet), and the worldwide computer crash that never occurred on the first day of January, 2000. She was one of a very small percentage of people who could say they lived in three centuries.

In the early morning hours of June 21, 1895, as the young farmer's wife sat in the dim light from a oil lamp and rocked her hours-old baby back to sleep, she could not have been any happier than she was at that very moment. She had been blessed with a large, supportive family who lived minutes away, a God-fearing, hardworking, family-first husband, and now a beautiful, healthy daughter. Margaret's mother could not, in her most fanciful dreams, know what the next one hundred and five years would bring to the world and her precious daughter.

1975

She opened the door of her small bungalow, and when she saw me standing on her porch, she said, "Well, what do I owe this pleasure, fraulein?" Even with a curve to her back, she towered over me. She was wearing her Sunday best, along with a pearl neckless and matching earrings. Her white hair was pulled back into a French roll and kept in line by an army of bobby pins. Before I could explain the reason for my visit, she pulled me inside, and within minutes I was sitting at Margaret's kitchen table, drinking a cup of coffee, anticipating that German coffee cake (kuchan) still baking in the oven, and listening to stories from an enchanted time way back when.

So much had happened in her short eighty years, she told me. "The turn of the century was a wonderful time to grow up." She didn't know where to begin. "Just start at the beginning," I said. I had no job, no social engagements, no pressing appointments. In this unsettling, complicated life of mine, I needed a distraction from the battles being fought in my head. I found it in a time machine in Margaret's kitchen. "Tell me everything," I said, "Take me back to 1895."

Her parents, extended family and friends were from Germany and had settled in Evansville all within a short horse and buggy ride from each other. Major events such as building a house or barn were shared by the men in the community while the women fixed the meals and brought them to the site. Hard work brought rewards and benefits, she told me. No one complained about the how hard life was back then because at the end of the day there was a sense of accomplishment and purpose as well as a spirit of comradery and fellowship that came from helping each other. "Did you know that the house you are renting from me next door was built that way?" she said as she got up from the table, pulled back the kitchen curtains, and pointed to an old farmhouse a stone's throw away. Sitting under an attached lean-to sat my little yellow VW bug. "That was my dear, dear grandparents' home," she said. "I loved them so much." 

So what brought me, at age thirty, to a small German community in the southwest corner of Indiana in the first place? Instead of enjoying a Saturday night out with someone my own age, why was I sitting in an eighty-year-old lady's kitchen looking out a window at her grandparents' home that was now my home?

LOVE

Margaret found her true love a little later than most women at that time. But, she would never settle for less than what she wanted in a lifetime mate. She was patient, willing to wait and in her mid-twenties, Freddie came calling. "Oh, how I loved that man," she said more than once. Even though he was quite a bit shorter than her, she wasn't going let a detail so insignificant taint all of the other qualities that made him so special. Just like her father, her new husband was a God-fearing, hardworking man who always put family first. "It was the best time to be young and in love."

It became an every morning ritual. The combined aroma from coffee brewing and kuchan baking never failed to greet me the moment I opened the door to my neighbor's home. She always met me with a hug and kiss, a place at a fully-dressed table with linen tablecloth, napkins and silver flatware for two. Then she would start the time machine, and we would travel back to the beginning of the twentieth century. Her stories of a golden age forever lost in history captured my imagination, fed my romantic notion of life and love, and convinced me that I had been born fifty years too late. Over time, we became close. I cherished those mornings in the company of an articulate, well-dressed, lady full of proper manners, charm and grace who claimed to have been born at just the perfect time in all of history. "It was a simpler time back then," she said. "We didn't have all of the modern distractions that took us away from what is important in life." Sometimes, when we were leaving one event to attend another (Freddie's new Model T, their wedding, the birth of her son, etc.,)  I could  sense her slip down into a state of melancholy. After a while, and much to my surprise, I also fell into the sadness with her. As if it were my own life we were reminiscing about, I mourned the loss of the good ole days along with her. I longed for the simple life, connection to a large, extended family, sense of community, being a part of something bigger and more important than just myself, the love.

THE LOVE

Oh, yes. The love. That's why I was living next door in the farmhouse that her grandfather and a community of family and friends had built.  It was love, or the hope, promise, and illusion of love, that persuaded me (without one iota of thought) to quit my job in Indy, pack my Beetle Bug with a few belongings and move to, well, his town...so we could live a block away from each other, get to know one another better, get marri...uh...go our separate ways.

1995

Margaret made the news. She was a centenarian. One hundred years old. It had been a very long time since the two of us sat at her kitchen table and travelled back in time. The coffee and kuchan smells were exactly as I had remembered them. She still wore her Sunday best and the pearls were there, too, but the stories were gone. It was her memory. Not so good anymore. Her melancholy was lost to a bit of senility and my melancholy was gone as well. I was fifty now, divorced with one son, and my youthful fantasies, thoughts and expectations about life and love had been reshaped by having lived in the real world. Twenty years had passed since I had come to Evansville looking for love. I didn't find it, but I did discover a sweet little old lady with a time machine living right next door.

2000

My precious friend passed away on August 8, 2000. She was one hundred and five.

Margaret's grandparents' home that I rented in 1975

I Don't Belong Here

Even though Robert and Louise's lust and fate deposited me into this time slot on earth (1945-?), I don't feel that I belong here. I was born fifty years too late. Oh, I adapted because isn't that what we misplaced misfits do? Sorry. I didn't mean to include you as a misfit. Everyone knows how well you fit into this texting, tweeting, hash tagging, facebooking, googling, twerking, bff-ing, lol-ing, :)-ing, fake reality tv, high speed world. But enough about you; let's talk about me, shall we?

I have never fully adapted to this thoroughly modern world; I faked it. I'm sixty-eight years old now and I'm still faking it (don't tell Tom). I'm tired of pretending. I live here but I don't fit in. I speak the language, but this technologically advanced, faster than the speed of light, self-indulgent, materialistic lifestyle is foreign to me. Had I been born in 1895, I would have missed all of this, this, this...what do you even call what is happening here?

2013: DINNER AT A CROWDED SITTING-ROOM-ONLY RESTAURANT

"I don't belong here," I said while listening to a conversation that had absolutely nothing to do with me.  The conversation had been pleasant enough: fine wines, five-star restaurants, Broadway plays, art galleries, mutual funds, European vacations, luxury cars, designer bags, favorite reality tv shows. Then without warning the conversation took an abrupt right turn and life, as the baby boomers at the table knew it, came crashing to the floor. Well, it hadn't actually crashed yet but it was imminent--#THESKYISFALLING. With the vivid imagery of what's to come, everyone at the table could now marinate in all the gory, graphic details of the upcoming apocalyptic horrors until a few sensitive stomachs threatened to upchuck that delicious filet mignon smothered in tantalizing Danish garlic cream reduction sauce. Have you heard what's for dessert?  "Better than sex" chocolate, chocolate divine cake. Decaf anyone?

"I don't belong here," I said again but no one heard me. Too many people talking at the same time with the volume turned up. Too many opinions of the same flavor--was it vanilla?--yet some had peanuts sprinkled on top while others had pecans. So even though they were the same flavor, they were just different enough to make the anxiety palatable to almost everyone.

"I don't belong here." Well, to be fair to those around me, I was mumbling to myself so possibly no one heard me.  As I age the brain filters that used to protect me from inappropriate behavior and comments are starting to lose their effectiveness. They're almost seven decades old now so it's possible they may be a little clogged. Making a proclamation that "I don't belong here" could be one of those comments that should be blocked. Not wanting to embarrass myself, I decided to sit silently, tug on a long nose hair, and mumble to myself, "I don't belong here. I don't belong here. I don't belong here."

After excusing myself for a trip to the lady's room, I returned to Tom's and my table for two. My husband sat speechless as he watched me take my chair from our table and squeeze myself between two boisterous baby boomers at the next table over. As I sat listening to Doom, Gloom, Crash, and Burn, my husband leaned over and tapped me on the shoulder, "Sweetie," he said. "You don't belong here." 

"Oh, no. That's not true. I do belong here. Have you heard what we're having for dessert?"

Standing in the Shadow of an Icon

"The hardcovers are two dollars and the paperbacks a dollar," a gray-haired man about seventy said as I knelt down to dig through a box of books sitting on the ground next to an antique wood-burning stove that he was stuffing with newspaper and attempting to light. The brisk autumn wind snuffed out match after match, but he didn't care. He wasn't going anywhere.

To the left of the stove was a drop-leaf table, and sitting on top were a large cactus, a pile of mismatched dishes, some flatware, and a stack of white napkins. I picked up a napkin. "One dollar each. I warshed them napkins myself," he said between match strikes. "If there's one thing I hate, it's a dirty napkin sittin' on my lap, so I warshed'em." I smiled and told him I appreciated him washing my napkins and handed him four dollars.

I continued to look while he continued to talk. "That was when I was throwing heat for the reds," he said, but I had no idea what that meant, so I smiled and nodded. "That was before Nam," he continued. I smiled again. While he was fiddling with the stove, I walked inside his thrift shop so I could browse without chat. From the parking lot, he saw me staring up at a wall that was covered with framed pictures of sports celebrities. "All them pictures on the wall are signed with authentic signatures,"  he said now standing beside me. The fire was going strong, so he could devote all of his time to his one lone customer. "Yep, I pounded the zone back then," he said as he pointed to some object at a distance, but my focus was back outside on the cactus.

With the thrift shop owner by my side, we returned to the drop-leaf table. I heard him say "my brother and Johnny Bench" then he began to tell me all about the cactus. Huh? Wait a minute! What does his brother and Johnny Bench have to do with this plant? Why does he have so many baseball stars' autographed pictures? And what does "throw heat for the reds" and "pound the zone"mean?

"Where you a baseball player?" I asked as I studied the succulent.

"Yeah. I threw a few for the Cincinnati Reds in my day," he said.

"You were a pitcher for the Cincinnati Reds?"

"Yep!"

He now had my full attention. Cactus? What cactus?  Was I standing in the shadow of an icon, a famous baseball pitcher from the past? I thought about the hundreds, maybe thousands, of baseball cards Jason still has in his barn. I started buying them for him when he was just a toddler, thirty years go, thinking that possibly one card one day would bring a fortune. Is this our lucky day? I mean Jason's lucky day?

"What is your name?" I asked.

"John Strong."

Oh my goodness! What if we have his card? We could be rich. I mean, Jason could be rich. "Okay, I've got it," I said. "John Strong. Pitcher for the Cincinnati Reds.  I'll Google you as soon as I get home."

He stoked the fire in the stove and scratched his head. "Oh, I don't have any of them Googles left," he said.  "I gave them all to my children."

Huh?

So...what I just said about getting rich.  Never mind.

The Old Man and the Leopard Lady

"I'm going home with her tonight," he said as he sipped on his Martini. He was leaning against the bar at a wedding reception for his friends' daughter when he bragged about his plans with the bride's twenty-year-old maid of honor later that evening. With a confident grin on his face, he told the bartender, "Yep! A little evening delight headin' my way." He gulped the last bit of his drink, laid his glass down on the bar, and swaggered after the pretty young girl of his desires.  At fifty-something, but looking sixty-something, he did not have what the world (and the maid of honor) values: youth, beauty and, of course, money. If he had been filthy rich, he might have been excused for having succumbed to old age, and his evening might have turned out differently, but as it was he went home alone, again.

She looked in the bathroom mirror and sighed. Maybe it was the lighting. Surely, she didn't look that fat and old. She knew she didn't look eighteen anymore, but she didn't realize she had that many wrinkles and frown lines and gray hair and when did she get that spare tire around her waist? Everyone told her she looked young for her age, so there was definitely something amiss with the lighting. At forty-nine she was still thirty. At heart. And that's what she told everyone she met on Match.com.

Single, non-smoker, occasional drinker,

spiritual, sensitive but not overly emotional,

love puppies and kittens, anything "hearts,"

fluffy pillows and watching The Bachelor.

Love romantic getaways w/ that special one.

Young. Pretty. Thirty. At Heart.

His profile said he was thirty-eight and he appeared to be perfect. She sent him an out-of-focus ten-year-old picture, and arranged to meet him at Bubba's Bar the day after the lighting in the bathroom had gone amiss. Not to worry, though.  Botox would smooth out the wrinkles, the tanning salon would camouflage the age spots, Miss Clairol would cover up the gray, Spanx would trap the fat, and lots of makeup would disguise the rest. Besides, Bubba's was dark inside and after a few drinks, her great personality would blossom and win over Mr. Perfect.

"I'm NOT going home with her tonight," he said as he sipped on his Martini. He was standing at the bar scrutinizing all of the women and eliminating the ones his age as they walked by. He was looking for someone young because he was young. At heart. Dating younger women was perfectly normal for men in their fifties and beyond, he believed. Men were never too old to appreciate and desire youth and beauty.

Her hammer toes made it difficult to squeeze her feet into the 4" high black leather boots covered with pink heart-shaped rhinestones. It took longer than she expected, and it made her later than she had planned. But her tardiness would be excused once he saw how dazzling and sexy she looked in her form-fitting black leotards and leopard skin fake leather jacket that, when unbuttoned, revealed her enormous and natural-looking implants. It's true. She did look, well, incredible. Everyone stopped what they were doing and gawked as she slow strutted up to Bubba's bar. 

"I wonder who will be going home with her tonight?" he whispered to himself as he sipped on his third Martini. He had been waiting on someone, but now after seeing this beauty, he couldn't remember who. Since forty his eyesight had been failing him, and at a distance, the leopard lady at the other end of the bar looked liked someone he wanted to meet. 

She had been in Bubba's for only five minutes when a sixty-something man approached her and asked if he could buy her a drink. She looked around for her date--he would be the nice looking young man, thirtyish--but there was no one fitting that description in the room, so she accepted the older man's offer.

After he bought her her fourth drink he remembered why he was at the bar. He was meeting someone and she was late. Maybe she had come, had seen him sitting with another woman and left. He hoped that wasn't the case because upon closer examination, it was obvious that Leopard Lady was charming with a great personality and had been a real beauty at one time, but she was not as young as he preferred his women to be, and she was not up to his high standards. He wondered if he should excuse himself and go back to the other end of the bar and wait for his date.

She had been stood up, again. At first it was just moist eyes. Then the tears began to run down her face which she quickly blotted away with a napkin so her mascara wouldn't run and ruin her makeup that took an hour to apply. She knew better than to have that last Daiquiri. Four Big D's always brought up the sadness, even when she was happy, or thought she was. She laid her head down on the bar and began to silently sob. No one appeared to notice and when she sat back up she saw that the pleasant older man who had sat and chatted with her for the longest time was sitting back at the other side of the bar. "Just as well," she whispered under her breath. "Surely he didn't think I would be going home with him tonight?"

At midnight, after an entire evening sitting at Bubba's Bar, he decided his thirty-year-old on-line date wasn't coming. Now sober, he paid his tab and headed for the door. Leopard Lady was also leaving. They walked together but separately to the parking lot but when she stumbled, he hurried to break her fall. "Should you be driving?" he asked with sincere concern.

She got to the door of the bar at the exact same time the old man did. What bad timing, she thought. She didn't want the uncomfortable task of rejecting him--even though it was plain to see he had been quite handsome in his earlier life, she preferred younger men--should he ask to see her again. As they were walking to their cars she twisted her ankle and began to fall. The man quickly grabbed her arm and held on until she was able to regain her balance, but it was true. She probably should not be driving.

"Would you like me to take you home?" the older gentleman asked.

"Are you sure it's not a problem?" Leopard Lady answered.

"Not at all. I have no plans. My date never showed up tonight, so I'd be happy to get you home safe and sound."

"My ride home didn't show up either, so that would be very nice of you."

So off they drove, into the night, the old man and the leopard lady. Through the dark and empty streets they continued where they had left off at the bar. Their conversation was comfortable and the humor and laughs came easy. When she pointed our her house, he pulled his car into her driveway and walked her to the door. They shook hands, bid each other a good night and never again did their paths cross.

The Port Holes to Their Future

(Read yesterday's post Like Two ships first)

They just know. I don't know how they do it. I have put myself in their place, taken myself back decades to when I was young like them and have tried to remember if I did it, too. My long-term memory is fine; it's my short-term that's get me in trouble--"What? I missed an Ebay bid at 3:00 and you reminded me at 2:30? Oh, shoot! I really wanted that chamber pot for my outhouse."

Where was I?  What was I talking about? Was it "pot?" No, that's not it. I don't smoke pot. I ate it in a cookie once, though, and that didn't turn out well. Where was I? Oh, I remember now. I want to know how some young folks can tell that a person is old (and someone to avoid) without actually looking at them? How did that young man on Main Street pass by me and not see me? So I went back in time to when I was young, and with my excellent recall from my youth I can say without a doubt that Yes, it's possible to discern many things through our peripheral vision. Back when I was young when I had peripheral vision, I did it all of the time. But I didn't use the outer edges of my vision to avoid just the elderly. Oh, no. I avoided a lot of people for many reasons, but I don't remember why now. No, really I don't. Okay, I do, but I'm not telling.

So why do some members of the younger generations "pretend" they don't see us older folks? My ninety-five-year-old mother-in-law says old people are invisible and ignored, but I never listen to her. We are not invisible; they know we are here. I believe when we lose our youth, vitality, sex appeal, and what our society deems "cool" we lose the interest of those following behind us who place an enormous amount of value on exterior beauty.

But here's the real reason why they look away from us. We are the port holes to their future. By avoiding us, they are avoiding their destiny. In a blink of an eye, they will be us. The young man who passed me--the only other living soul in downtown Franklin--without acknowledging me will, day after tomorrow or so it will seem, spot an attractive young woman on a Main Street somewhere in his elderly travels, walking toward him. He will smile and say, "Hel...lo?"

"Oh, I'm sorry sir," she will say, without even looking at him. "I didn't see you."

Like Two Ships

"Oh, sorry ma'am. I didn't see you," the young man said after walking past me a while back in downtown Franklin.

For the past several years, local merchants have tried to revitalize this small, picturesque town located near the great smoky mountains in southwestern North Carolina. Franklin, with all of it's history, beauty, quaintness, southern hospitality, and 1950s feel, hasn't been able to attract much attention to its one block long, 19th century Main Street. And it was early one morning on that very same empty street, devoid of all living souls, no one but me, walking all alone, when I saw what looked like another human being. It appeared to have arms and legs and a head. Yes! Yes! It was human and it was walking toward me. As the person came closer, I could tell it was a young man about thirty. It was just the two of us, all alone, no one else in sight. We were like two ships passing in the...like two ships passing in the...how does that saying go? It's my memory, you know. Not so good anymore.

All that separated us were an empty park bench, a cafe sign advertising sandwich specials, and ten crack lines in the sidewalk. Ten, nine, eight, seven cracks away--he's getting closer. Oh, my. He's a handsome young man. Six, five--I swallowed hard a couple of times, cleared my throat, spit out my gum in my hand, and licked my lips in preparation for our cordial greeting.  Four, three, two, one...we're mere inches apart now. I gave him my best smile and said, "Hel...lo?"

Huh? How could he not have seen me? It was just the two of us all alone together on an empty street. We were like two ships in the...uh...like two...

"Oh, I'm just fine, thank you very much! And you?!" I said to the young man (he wasn't that attractive up close) who looked away two seconds before passing the only other person in town: me.

Without breaking his stride or turning around, the young man, who was quite unattractive upon closer examination, apologized for having not seen me. Really? He didn't see me? How could that be? I know I'm old, but am I also invisible? We were the only two people in town, alone on empty Main Street, the homely young man and me, passing each other like two..like two..

oh, never mind.

A Reason to Yell and Scream

From the book "Raisin' Jason" 

copyright 2008

Caddywhompus at the Moment

For several days now I've sat down at my computer to write my blog, but I have nothing to say. Nada. Zip. Zero thoughts. I'm blank. Still in my pajamas, with a cup full of Seattle's Best, and Maggie Mae napping on my lap, I wait for the inspiration. It doesn't come.

I've been sitting at my computer for an hour now. It's seven-thirty. Maggie is scratching at the door, my coffee is cold, and so far I've written eighty-five words just to say I have nothing to say. And there's so much to tell you, too. Tom's mother, who was doing so well in her new assisted living apartment, was rushed to the emergency room a few days ago with symptoms of pneumonia, and while she was there the staff forgot to give her her happy pills. "I'm leaving this place; ain't nobody gonna stop me!" she said as she yanked the oxygen hose out of her nose. Security had to be called on a ninety-pound, almost ninety-five-year-old woman. Really? Security? Without her little blue pill, Mom ain't happy and if Mom ain't happy, ain't nobody happy.  She's back at her apartment now, but Mom still ain't happy, so Tom has left for Florida, and he ain't happy about that, and Maggie Mae and I are just sitting here with nothing to say. Well, that's not exactly true. It's now nine and she's whining at her food bowl. She has plenty to say and she ain't happy.

Okay, Maggie has a full belly, I'm sipping on a second cup of hot coffee, and I still have nothing to say, and there's a lot going on. My ninety-one-year-old mother, who was doing so well in a nursing home, ain't happy. Her best friend and caregiver for eighteen years (he goes to the nursing home every day) is baffled by her unhappiness and the way in which she choses to express it. "Maybe she needs a happy pill," he says, but the nursing staff says, "If you think she's bad, you should see the residents in the west wing." Nope! Sorry. No happy pill for my mother who ain't happy, so I'm going to Indy this week, and I ain't happy about that.

My third cup of coffee is cold, Maggie's snoring on my lap, and I can't think of anything to write about, yet there's so much happening. The air conditioner is broken, the refrigerator is leaking, the clothes dryer won't heat, the land line is dead and my cell phone can't hold a signal for more than five minutes, the shower won't shower, and the upstairs toilet is drip, drip, dripping water into the downstairs bathroom. Tom is gone and I ain't happy about that.

Maggie is off my lap and scratching at the door, my body is vibrating from four cups of coffee, yet there is not an ounce of motivation to tell you that my decades-long friend and I have begun putting the pieces of our broken relationship back together after a Sunday spat a few weeks ago. Neither one of us knows exactly what happened. All I remember was sitting next to her and thinking, "Oh, my! She ain't very happy right now." And she remembers thinking, "Oh, my. Carol Louise ain't very happy right now."

The coffee pot is empty (did I drink a whole pot of coffee?), Maggie has disappeared with one of my socks, and I have no creative spark. I have blogger's block. I don't understand why because things are caddywhompus at the moment, and there is so much to tell you.  Have I mentioned that Anonymous wants me dead? He said that I and my fellow baby-boomers are responsible for everything that is wrong in this country and possibly the world and the sooner we all die, the sooner he and his generation can fix what we've broken. It was my post of a cartoon character "Bugging the Living Daylight Out of You" where he left the comment about wanting me and you (if you're over fifty) dead. Drawing a benign cartoon character did me in. Imagine that anger. Now that is really scary. Anonymous and awholelotta people right now ain't happy. What in the world (oh, don't get me started about this crazy world) is going on?

Maggie's scratching at the door again and she ain't happy.

Not Happy. Not Happy At All.

And everything was going so well, too. An early morning walk, a treat, the ball chase, a belly rub. But wait! What's that! Doggie shampoo? A towel? Running water? Oh no! Hurry, Maggie. Find a hiding place where you can see them, but they can't see  you.

I can see you.

Not happy. Not happy at all.

All better now.

Bugging the Living Daylight Out of You

Derailing the Message

Sometimes it's the distractions that derail the message.

From the book Raisin' Jason

copyright 2008

On the Lighter Side of Things

A Case of Mistaken Intent

(Read Meeting Anger Head On first, August 24 post)

Okay, so we were mistaken. It wasn't road rage after all. The man's flailing arms and yells were interpreted by Tom and me as anger. Yet, what he was trying to say was, "Your motorcycle is about to fall off your trailer." Oops! Tom handled the case of mistaken intent very well, but I reacted by meeting anger (or what I thought was anger) head on with some anger of my own.

After Tom tightened the straps on his Harley and we continued our drive to North Carolina, I sat silent while a tag team of mind demons had their way with me. I was embarrassed; I felt silly and childish; my behavior had been irrational and immature.

It was the second time in a week that I had succumbed to behavior unbecoming of an adult, and the first encounter a few days before had resulted in the loss of a friend. And, not the kind of friend you meet in the candy aisle at Seven-Eleven, discover you both like Snickers (the ones with dark chocolate), and then you become friends on Facebook. Nope! This was a friend with decades of history. A friend who held me in her arms nineteen years ago when I discovered Perfect Number Six wasn't so perfect after all. A friend who moved her 832 pairs of shoes out of her guest bedroom to accommodate my three-month stay at her home, and she was that one special friend who had her own bedroom in my home. Who but a close friend would agree to spoon inside a black trash bag on a cold winter night at the lake cabin after I had told her that plastic keeps the heat in?  (It didn't keep us warm, but we laughed all night long.) My offbeat sense of humor fit perfectly with her zaniness, and while others may have thought we were crazy mad, we didn't care.  We loved and supported each other through happy times and sad, the good boyfriends and the "what-was-I-thinking" ones. I was the friend companion at her wedding, and she was with me in Paris when I married Tom.

So what happened? No one really knows for certain. The she said/she said details got scrambled up in the passion of the moment. A case of mistaken intent, perhaps? Like the yelling, flailing man who was only trying to help, had one friend's good intentions been misunderstood? And to what extremes does one go to save their friends from themselves? Where do you draw the line? Where's does the safe area end and the danger zone begin? Does the longevity of a relationship blur that line? Is it only natural that close relationships trade the cautious, polite courtesies offered in the beginning for a more direct, to-the-point approach later on?

There are two sides of the story, of course. There always are. The right side and the right side. Supporting both right sides were brutal honesty, explanations (excuses), past transgressions, indignation, pride, and anger. When it was over, it was really over.  At least that's what she said. 

Meeting Anger Head On

"What is wrong with him?" Tom said with alarm, which got my immediate attention. It was early yesterday morning, and we were driving back to North Carolina from Indy. For Tom, it had been a trip he had been looking forward to for months: Rusty Wallace race car driver one day, Moto GP (motorcycle races) spectator the next, and the remaining days spent riding his Harley and fishing. As for me, the trip started out well enough, but ended in disaster. Our intent was to stay until Saturday, celebrate my birthday with family and friends, and leave on Sunday. Instead we loaded Tom's kayak and motorcycle on to the trailer and left two days early.

"All I did was merge from I-465 to I-74. I did nothing wrong yet he's flailing his arms and yelling at me." I looked in the side mirror and saw a man in the car behind us waving his arms frantically. "Did you switch lanes and cut him off?" I asked. "No, I have stayed in the right lane the whole time." Then the man sped up and passed us going 90 mph. Cutting in front of us, he slowed down and began waving his arms back and forth again. "What could he possibly be mad about?" Tom said. The more the man exhibited his rage, the more confused Tom became. I wasn't in a good state of mind before we crossed paths with Mr. Road Rage, and his behavior brought out the worst in me. I met his anger with a little anger of my own and began waving my arms back and forth and vocalizing my displeasure with his antics. Tom--always a man of self-control and reason--reached over and touched my arm. I don't remember what he said but it was something like, "Let's not add fuel to the flames and make him madder," or "That behavior is not going to solve anything," or "Meeting anger head on with anger only makes things worse." 

Road Rage moved over to the fast lane, opened his passenger window, and slowed way down. Tom slowed down as well to avoid confrontation. He was calm. I was agitated. We did nothing wrong. Why is he taking his anger to such extremes? A fast moving car came up behind Mr. Rage and he moved back in front of us, and now his whole body (along with his arms) was waving back and forth. We were both going 40 mph. Cars were racing past us. I wondered how far this man was going to take his anger. Where would it all end? This man was really, really mad at us.

Post Road exit was a mile away, and I asked Tom to pull off so we could lose him. As we slowed down to make the exit, he slowed down too. He was anticipating our next move and was exiting with us. Oh, my. Not good. Not good at all. Then he abruptly pulled his car off the road and on to the shoulder, opened his window, stuck his head out and as we passed he yelled, "Your motorcycle is about to fall!"

Oh...

And So It Began Again

(Read Perfect Number Six dated August 10 first.)

They both watched as I walked down the sidewalk toward my car. When I turned for one last look at the man I had loved for four years, he looked to be in great pain. With both hands on the big picture window, he was crying uncontrollably. Moon, his dog, was crying, too. They didn't want me to go. It was me he loved, not her, he had said.  Our relationship was one of love; theirs was all about sex. Could I ever forgive him? Would I please give him another chance? I couldn't bear to see him so heartbroken, so I walked back up the sidewalk, through the door, and back into his arms.

And so it began again.

At first he was uncomfortably nice. He couldn't do enough for me. I have to say I liked the attention, but at the same time, I knew that hovering focus on me was not him. It was contrived and unnatural and I knew it wouldn't last.  As the weeks passed, Six and I settled back into our normal lives. Well, not exactly normal. Six returned to his original state of being; I never did. My mind was cluttered with nagging questions:

1. Did he ever tell her that he loved her?

2. When they were together, did they hold hands?

3. Did he buy her gifts on her birthday, Valentine's day, and Christmas?

4. Did they talk about buying a farm, too?

4. When I called his house last night, his line was busy. Was he talking to her?

5. Lately he's been working overtime a lot. Is he seeing her again?

6. He hasn't told me he loves me in over a week. Should I be concerned?

7. It's ten o'clock at night and he's not answering his phone. Should I drive by his house?

8. When I was at his house last night I noticed his phone was off the hook. Does he not want her to know I'm there?

9. Whose telephone number was written on the notepad by the phone?

10. He cancelled our date for tonight. Is he seeing her instead?

New normal for me was now the lows and highs that come with suspicion and relief (when discovering the suspicions were unwarranted). Worry, doubt, anxiety were there, too, along with sleepless nights and then depression. I turned on myself for not being able to get over the fractured trust. Meanwhile, Six had recovered from the betrayal quite well.

Then one evening about a year later, Six cancelled dinner plans with me because he had to work late. Suspecting that he may be seeing her, I drove to his office and parked where my car could not be seen. Then I waited and waited and waited. Nothing. He really was working late. How silly I was, once again, for doubting him. I put my Jetta into Drive and pulled out of my parking spot and that's when I saw them. They were walking out of the office building holding hands and laughing. But wait! It wasn't her. It was someone different--the young girl with the assets. Dang it! Did he see me? I didn't want him to know I had stooped so low as to spy on him.

Fifteen minutes later, my cell phone rang. It was Six and he wanted me to stop by his house; he had something to tell me.

I stood at the end of the sidewalk with the keys to my always faithful Jetta in my trembling hand. I turned around for one last look at the man I had loved for five years. He and Moon were standing at the big picture window and they were both crying. One of them didn't want me to go.

* * *

And now for the rest of the story: Six married Miss Asset; they bought a farm and lived happily ever after until death did them part. As for me, I found the perfect number seven. No, really I did.

Perfect Number Six

Taylor Swift shares her life experiences in the lyrics she writes and sings. In one of her songs she reveals that all love ever does is break and burn and end, but on a Wednesday in a cafe, she watched it begin again. It is that cycle of beginning and ending that I can relate to whenever I hear Taylor's song. Watching it begin again with all the hope, giddiness, fantasies, mystery, intrigue, and emotional highs were a part of falling in love that I thoroughly enjoyed. The part I didn't like was the ending. By age forty-five, I had fallen in and out of love five times, but that cycle was about to end with Perfect Number Six.

Falling in Love

Losing one's balance, tripping over an illusion,

careening out of control, sliding down a slippery slope,

 but, oh my, it feels sooooooooooooo goood.

                                                         --Mikidikipedia

When Love Number Five broke up with me over the phone (well, if you had met your soulmate on a Wednesday at a cafe, and you wanted to begin again with her over dinner that night, wouldn't you call your girlfriend right away?) The pain from the breakup was soothed by my own story of beginning again when Perfect Number Six asked me out. He was different from my previous loves. He was not controlling or manipulative or narcissistic or emotionally abusive or mentally unstable or a pedophile. Six was soft spoken and kind with a gentleness that I had never before experienced in a mate. He said he wanted to take this relationship slow and easy to allow it to grow in a healthy and mature way. Ding! Ding! Ding! Found him! My "watching it begin again" days were finally over.

Weeks turned into months and months into years and then one day, he popped the question and I said yes. Well, it didn't actually happen that way. It was more of an implied proposal. There were no knees touching the ground and professions of love, but I knew his intentions when he said, "We should buy a farm so when the Apocalypse comes, we'll have food and shelter," to which I said, "Is that a proposal?" and then he said, "Well, yes, I guess it is."


She hired a private investigator to follow me. For some time she had suspected that I was fooling around, but she needed proof. She cared too much for Six to allow such a despicable behavior to go unchallenged. The investigator proved her suspicions right when he, after weeks of tailing me, showed her the incriminating photos of my lover and me together.

It wasn't long before I received an envelope with no return address, and inside was a long, rambling letter that started with, "I know what you did last summer." Thanks to the private investigator, she did know everything: the romantic getaways to my cabin in southern Indiana, the quickie lunches, the rendezvous at his house and mine. She knew it all. After reading the letter, I had no choice but to meet with Six, show him the letter, and suffer the consequences of infidelity.

"What an unexpected surprise," he said as he held the door open for me. As we stood in the threshold with his arms squeezing me tightly, I was achingly aware that I was watching it end again. Every gesture, every word, every blink of his eyes were in slow motion. I wanted to remember every little thing about him. For a moment I thought about hiding the letter.  I could say, "I was just in the neighborhood and thought I'd stop by," and he would say, "Well, how lucky am I," and then I would respond, "Not as lucky as I am," and then we would go upstairs to his bedroom and talk about the farm we were going to buy and stuff like that.  I could keep the infidelity a secret, and we could continue on and on and on as if betrayal didn't matter.

Too late. He saw the letter in my hand, and so I handed it over to him. As he sat reading about what I had done last summer, his smile disappeared. I asked him if he knew the lady who had hired the private investigator to follow me, and he said, "Yes, she's a friend of mine." "Why would she have me followed?" I asked. And here is...

THE REST OF THE STORY.

She hired a private investigator because she suspected her boyfriend was seeing someone else. They had been together for four years, and lately he had been acting suspicious. When she caught him lying, she decided to have him followed. That's where I come into the story. It was me. I was the other woman. The pictures clearly show us together, so denial was not an option. Without saying a word to her cheating mate, she sent me the letter of discovery.

Six read and reread the letter. He was stunned. As the color drained from his face, he sat slumped on the couch, speechless. The happy-to-see-me smile that greeted me at the door was replaced by incredible sadness when he finally looked into the eyes of the bearer of very bad news.  He was sorry, he said, but the truth was he had been dating the both of us for four years. However, he wanted me to know, before I left, that it was me he loved, not her. Well now, isn't that special, I felt like saying as I stood tall and proud and walked through the foyer, out the front door, and down the sidewalk to my car. Before getting into my always faithful Jetta, I turned for one last look at number six. He was standing in the big picture window with both hands on the glass. His face was soaked with tears. Next to him was Moon, his dog, and she was whining (she always cried when I left). They didn't want me to go, so I didn't.

I gave not-so Perfect Number Six another chance. (You thought I was going to dump the cheater, didn't you?)  But, but, don't you see, it was me he loved. What about our friends, our history, our future, the plans, the farm? After he broke up with her, he remained faithful to me, until...


She rented the office right next to his, and, oh my goodness, was she ever a cute little thing. Young, too. I could have been her mother. Those legs went right up to her tiny waist and her skirt stopped just below her asset. It seems her assets were many and Six couldn't help but notice, considering that she was just right next door.

-to be continued Monday, August 12th.

Stunning without Makeup

Jennifer Aniston goes one day without makeup and it makes national news. She's stunning without it, the Huffington Post says. Stunning? Really? Have the dictionarions changed the definition of "stunning" and not told me? While having some difficulty with that word attached to Jenni Jenn Jen's face,  I Googled it and this is what I found: 1. Causing or capable of causing emotional shock or loss of consciousness. 2. Of a strikingly attractive appearance. 3. Impressive as in giving a stunning performance.

Okay! I was wrong!  Miss Aniston's squeaky-clean face is strikingly attractive, and YES, considering what our society focuses on and deems important these days, I guess it is newsworthy.

I went without makeup this morning just to test the "stunning" definition in my tiny little world on Cowee Mountain, and it worked. "Tom? Tom? Are you okay? Wiggle your toes if you can hear me."  Move over, Jen. I'm stunning without makeup, too.

Caution: Viewing this may cause

 emotional shock or loss of consciousness.

FYI, the clothespins work very well on chicken-waddle necks and droopy jowls, but it's best to not wear them in public, unless you want stunning reactions.

A Case of Mistaken Identity

It was a preview from my future, and it flashed across the screen so fast that it would take several long seconds before I was able to process it. When I finally realized it was a case of mistaken identity, I was not happy, not happy at all.

It had been an emotionally and physically challenging week, but at the same time, invigorating and rewarding. With very short notice from Tom's mother's doctor that she could no longer live alone or drive, her two sons (Bill and Tom) and daughters-in-law (Betty and I) had only five days to find and move her into an apartment in an assisted living center that she would like.

Once we were able to navigate our way past the smoke and mirrors that the competing assisted living centers cunningly laid in our path, we found an apartment perfect (or so we thought) for Mom and began the back-aching, leg-cramping, mate-quibbling process of moving a four-bedroom home into a very small flat. Three days later, our goal was finally accomplished, but my body was screaming for a break. What better place to relax than the front porch where the residents go to get a breath of fresh air.

Most of the chairs were taken so I found a unoccupied bench, laid down, and curled into a fetal position. After a fifteen minute nap, I'd be good as new, I told myself, so off to sleep I went, or so I hoped.

He was ten feet away but I could feel his stare. I opened my eyes and standing in front of me was a nice-looking man about forty-five. He was pushing his mother in a wheelchair, but stopped when he saw me. He smiled. His mother smiled. I smiled. "That's nice," was my first thought, followed by "Okay, you can move on now." But they didn't move on. He looked at me like I look at the puppies at the pet store who need a home. I think they're precious little things and see that they need rescued, but I already have a dog.

"Well, hello there. Having a little afternoon siesta, are we?" His voice was loud and irritating, and his manner sweetly condescending. It was as if he were talking to a poor little dog who needed rescued, but yet he had no intentions of taking her home. He just wanted to gawk, taunt, and walk away. So I bit him.

She Was Here All Along

In the beginning, she loved me. Then, over time, little things I did got on her nerves, and I fell out of favor with her. Every new visit held a kernel of hope--maybe this time she'll see I'm really a nice person--and love me again, and on occasion that did happen.  The visits would start out with proclamations of affection, along with promises (hers) to never go back to that ugly place. But invariably I'd fall short of her expectations, and I'd find myself in trouble again.

A funny thing happens when I discover someone doesn't like me. I avoid them. But, avoidance is not an option when it comes to mothers-in-law. Creative hiding is an option, however, and that's all I'm going to say about that. Instead, let's talk about another funny thing that happened during our last visit in July.

When Tom saw it, I told him I didn't believe it was real. "It's an optical illusion," I said. "Nothing has changed." But I was wrong. There was something different about his mother. She was sweeter, kinder, funnier. Even though the words "It's a miracle!" did manage to find their way into our conversations, we also knew that modern medicine (Thank you, Dr. Johnson) took some credit for her transformation.

But wait! There's more. Here is the real story that I want to share. In my efforts to avoid the "unpleasant," my relationship with my mother-in-law had become benign. It existed but I attached no feelings or emotion to it. It just was. That all changed after spending two weeks with her in July. At first, I hid behind Tom. When I saw the water was calm, I stuck one toe in, then a foot. It was quite nice, so before long I stepped in front of Tom and jumped in fully clothed. I loved it!

FINALLY, AFTER ALL THIS TIME, SHE'S BACK.

She was here all along. This time the hugs didn't want to let go, the kisses lingered, and the words of affection--punctuated with tears--were free flowing and genuine. But where had this sweet lady been hiding for so many years?  Under layers of depression, anxiety, and loneliness...that's where!

Is she here to stay? We hope so, but only time will tell. There was that one yelling incident at the rehab center when the nurses tied her to the bed with ropes, (or was it her oxygen hose that got tangled up in her pancakes?) but who wouldn't yell under those circumstances?

Mom's Story-The Move

"BRING SCISSORS! I NEED SCISSORS!" she yelled into the phone when Tom called to check on his mother. It was the morning of her release from Whitehall Rehabilitation Center after a bout with pneumonia, and in just a few hours she would be walking into an unfamiliar place full of strangers, confusion, and compromise. On this day she would not be driving herself home, pulling her cherished and pampered car into the garage and closing the door on a world she doesn't understand and increasingly gets on her nerves. "Why do you need scissors, Mom?" Tom asked. "Because I need to cut the ropes that they have wrapped around me here. I'm tied up and can't move," was her response.  Oh, boy!

When Mom received the news from her doctor that she could no longer live alone and drive, she was devastated, but he saw what her family didn't. She wasn't safe to herself and others. After living alone for seven years in a big four-bedroom home with the hurricane shutters blocking out the sun and the neighbors, Mom had become a recluse with an attitude. No one was going to tell her how to live her life.

It was seven o'clock in the morning when Tom's mother called to request scissors. The rehab center was less than a mile from Mom's house, so within minutes, Tom was standing in front of her as she angrily pulled at the hose that supplied her with oxygen. "Cut this thing off of me!" she yelled. "It's driving me crazy! I can't move!" After explaining the importance of the oxygen (her survival depended on it), she calmed down and continued eating her pancakes as if nothing were wrong. Tom, on the other hand, was still rattled when he told me the story an hour later.

THE MOVE

"Where are you taking me?" she asked as we drove past the road that used to take her home. After telling her that we found a nice apartment we thought she would like at an assisted living center, she became silent, which was highly unusual for Mom since she had always been a very vocal backseat driver.

"What is this place?" she asked as we pulled up to what looked just like the lobby entrance to a very nice hotel. "This is where you're going to be living now. Isn't it nice?" I said. Silence.

Tom walked around the car and opened the door for his mother. She got out with no help, thank you very much, and walked the short distance to the double doors that automatically opened when they sensed her coming their way. As she entered the lobby, people--strangers--from every direction, all at once, and all talking at the same time, descended upon her. Oh, my! Not good.

But wait! She's smiling. She's shaking hands and saying "thank you" and "nice to meet you, too," and "happy to be here." What?

"No, thank you, I can walk," she said with a big smile when a staff member offered her a walker for her first visit to see her new apartment, and down the hall she went as if she knew where she was going.

Tom opened the door to her apartment and stepped back. Mom walked in and suddenly stopped. Her smile disappeared. Oh, no. She doesn't like it. Did we bring the wrong furniture? Does she hate the pictures on the wall? Is she upset because we brought the blue chair instead of the pink one? What about that table? That's not hers! Is the kitchenette too small? Wait until she sees there's no stove.

But wait! She has tears running down her face. She likes it. No. She loves it, she says. The tears are tears of joy because her family cared enough about her to bring her favorite things and arrange them so perfectly in her new apartment. She walked from room to room (which took about three minutes considering the apartment is only 300 square feet) and praised all efforts on her behalf.

At the end of the first day of Mom's new life, she appeared happy and all was well, or so we thought.


Mom's story to be continued.

Defying the Rules

When I was a little girl, children were treated differently than they are today. Parents didn't run ahead of their little ones to remove obstacles from their path, or fret about the danger that could be lurking around the next corner. Nor did they fulfill every desire, wish, and whim, put their children first, tolerate temper tantrums, or allow their kids to set the agenda for the family. The adults ruled their fiefdom with strict discipline and "Ouch!" to any child who dared break a rule. Children were to be seen and not heard. There was no freedom of speech or the right to assemble wherever one chooses. "Get off that roof right this minute, young lady!" 

Since I've already told you about my father's departure from our family on the very day I was born, I'll just skip over that story and the one about living the first five years of my life with my aunt and uncle, and hop up on the roof for a picnic I was hosting for six of my friends when I was ten and now living in Hazel's house.

"Get off that roof right this minute, young lady!" Ouch!

Up until the age of five, when Hazel talked Mother into moving in with her, I enjoyed a life without rules. With little attention given to me, I was a free agent in the duplex that my mother, sister Judy, and I shared with Aunt Gracie and Uncle Jimmy. Jimmy was always off somewhere flying airplanes, Gracie worked all day, and Mother took a lot of naps. There was little discipline, and as long as I kept a low profile and didn't wake Mother (or get on her nerves), I could say and do whatever I wanted (with a few exceptions that I won't mention here); I could come and go as I pleased. And I did. The sidewalks, streets, houses, and alleys on Walcott were my playgrounds and no one in my family seemed to care about my long absences as long as I eventually came home. My freedom came to an end on the day Hazel changed my address.

The transition from no rules to a lot of rules was so difficult that in the seven years I lived under Hazel's reign, I never adjusted to the rigid discipline and was always in trouble. I developed a standard of behavior that I believed to be good and decent and continued to live my life as a free agent.  But by defying the rules of the house, I had to suffer the consequences: spankings, a lot of spankings (physical abuse by another name).

One day, many years later, during a visit with my mother, she asked me if she'd been a good mother. How could I answer that question any other way than to say, "Of course you were, Mother." After getting the answer she had hoped for, she mentioned the seven years we had lived with Hazel. "You know, I wasn't in favor of Hazel spanking you, Carol Louise." She looked down at her lap as if reliving regret and then looked back up at me, smiled, and said, "But you turned out okay, didn't you?"

"Yep! I guess I did." 

All Hail Broke Loose

My friend, Maggie, Jason and his friend, Josh, and I had just returned home from spending the weekend at our cabin at Lake Patoka in French Lick, Indiana, when the sky suddenly turned black from an impending storm. Maggie and I (where did the boys go?) were unpacking my Volkswagen when I heard the first ping hit the hood of the Jetta. Another, then another and within seconds, all hail broke loose.

It was the summer of 1998. Jason was seventeen and a collector of things. His favorite things were cars--mostly older, high maintenance, money-guzzling, non-working cars. His most recent purchase, a Monte Carlo, had some age on it, but it did run, and it was enjoying the special attention one gives to a new thing. Inside and out, the car was spotless. Unlike his other cars where hoarding made it difficult to find a place to sit, this new car was clutter free.

So when the hail hit, it was no surprise that Jason would take notice. He leaped off the couch, dropped the bag of Cheetos, and raced out to the driveway where his precious Carlo was being attacked, and, and, and, he did what?

Oh No! He didn't! Oh, yes he did!

With absolutely nothing on his mind but saving Carlo, Jason sped past my sweet little Jetta (who had never run over an ant in her entire life), past Maggie's new-to-her Volvo, and drove right into the garage, crushing everything in its path, including my brand new lawnmower.

What's a Mother to do?

Since I don't believe in spanking (physical abuse by another name), and I am not a screamer (emotional abuse by another name, and it solves nothing), I calmly walked up to my son as he stepped out of Carlo and said, "Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and further more, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah." At least, that's what Jason heard.  What I actually said to his back as he was walking away was, "Do you think that what you just did for your own self interest is acceptable? And, further more, do you think I have a right to be upset?" No response.  I followed him back into the house and stood over him as he resumed his position on the couch and continued to eat the Cheetos that were now sprinkled all over the living room floor. "What punishment do you think you deserve for the damage you have caused?" He ignored me.

Obviously my approach at handling this parent/child conflict was not working, so I thought about how Hazel (my childhood surrogate father) would have behaved in this situation.  I marched outside with fury in my soul, ripped a prickly switch from the nearest tree, stormed back inside, grabbed Jason by the collar on his shirt, raising him off the couch, laid him over my lap, pulled his pants down, and WAPED! WAPED! WAPED! his bare ass, while, at the same time screaming, "SPARE THE ROD, SPOIL THE CHILD!"  Whew! Suddenly, after having released all of my frustration and anger on to Jason, I felt so much better.

Liar, Liar. Pants on fyeeer!

Okay, that last part is a lie. Instead, I took Jason's Nintendo away for an afternoon and gave him a thirty-minute timeout.  That punishment apparently worked because he never ran over a lawnmower again.

Mom's Story-Catch & Keep

(Mom's story-Catch & Release is a continuation from July 23, and 29)

We had been given only a short time to find and furnish a small apartment for Tom's mom at an assisted living facility. A few weeks before her release from the rehab center, Mom was excited about returning to her beautiful home and beloved car. But, her enthusiasm turned to dread when her doctor told her the pneumonia had altered her body and mind forever, and she could no longer live alone or drive.

We knew finding a place that was best suited for Mom would be a challenge, but the difficulties exceeded our expectations. In their eagerness to get Mom to come live with them, they offered her the moon and beyond, but the offers, we discovered later, were shrouded with ambiguities and inconsistencies and outright lies. The promises made in the comfortable setting of a lush office were no where to be found or were contradicted in the sixty-five page contract we had to sign but did not read. Who reads every word in a sixty-five page contract?

With two days remaining before we had to move a four-bedroom house into a small apartment, Tom's mom said "yes" to a man who gained her confidence and affection by his charm, smile, and promises.  We signed the voluminous contract and wrote a check for $2,500, a non-refundable move-in fee. (Mr. Charm said the fee was normally $5,000, but, for us, he would cut it in half. How nice of him.)

The morning before the move, we developed buyers' remorse. Unable to sleep and looking for something to read, I picked up the contract. On page one, in very small letters, I read: Move-in fee $3,000. The blatant lie was a deal breaker.

With one day left, we were back at square one. The contract with Mr. Charm was voided and our $2,500 check returned. Now, with full knowledge of how the game of Catch & Keep works, we headed out again. This time we knew the questions to ask and were able to discern reality from bullshit. We found an apartment perfect for Mom, and with no time to spare, it was furnished with her favorite things. But will she go willingly or will we have to carry her there, kicking and screaming?

Mom's Story to be continued

Mom's Story-Hypoxia

(Mom's Story-Hypoxia is a continuation from July 23.)

Her expression was one of urgency when she motioned for me to come closer. She was sitting up in her hospital bed at Whitehall Rehab Center when Tom and I centered her room, and she had something important on her mind.  She was no longer suffering from pneumonia, but her breathing was still labored even though she was connected to oxygen.

"I saw you in the car with him and those five white puppies," she said. "What white puppies?" Tom asked. "Never mind," she told him. Then she leaned closer to me and whispered, "It's okay. I won't tell anyone. We women have our secrets. I'll keep yours." I smiled and told my mother-in-law that I appreciated her discretion.

Later that afternoon, during a visit to Dr. Johnson, she came very close to leaving his office with her driving privilege intact. At ninety-four, she was a good driver and there was little thought given to her ability to live alone, handle her own affairs, and drive anywhere she pleased. But then all of that changed when, at the very end of her appointment when the doctor stood up to leave, she said, "So Dr. Johnson,  how long have you been practicing in Boca Raton? For the last seven years, I've been driving to Indianapolis to see you." Oops!

Now no longer able to live alone or drive, life as Mom had known it for nine decades was changed in an instant. The lack of oxygen to the brain had created a condition called hypoxia, and hypoxia was responsible for my affair with the man who kept five white puppies in his car and Dr. Johnson's move from Indy to Boca. Hypoxia was the reason why Mom could not go home and back to independence.

As the four of us (Mom's two sons and daughters-in-law) hurried to find an apartment in an assisted living facility, one topic of conversation continued to surface. "Had we been remiss in allowing Mom to live alone and drive as long has she had? Had we stuck our heads in the sand because we didn't want to face the consequences from taking away a loved one's independence?" There had been signs that all was not well before she was rushed to the emergency room with pneumonia and spent close to a month in rehab. Bill, her late husband, had made several unwelcome visits to see her, and he always brought along his new girlfriend. The rowdy children who kept running through her house were annoying. And the man across the street had installed a soundbox in her living room so she could hear his golf cart whenever he drove around her house. Should we have taken those hypoxia-induced hallucinations more seriously? Had she been safe on the road? What if she'd caused an accident that had harmed herself and others or, God forbid, killed someone?

We were lucky. Very lucky, but Mom is not buying it--none of it!! She is perfectly capable of taking care of herself, and she is going to continue driving!

Mom's story to be continued

Person of Interest

It happened again yesterday. I was walking down Main Street in downtown Franklin, North Carolina, when a young man about thirty passed me on the sidewalk. I smiled. He looked away. What the bleep? Just because I'm not young and attractive doesn't mean I'm not worthy of good manners. I turned around as he continued to walk away with his rudeness unchecked and yelled, "HEY! I'M NOT INVISIBLE, YA KNOW! Okay, that's a lie. I didn't challenge his rudeness. I just continued on down the sidewalk mumbling to myself about my invisibility and trying to remember why I was on Main Street in the first place. It's my memory, not so good anymore.

Lynnette has always been a person of interest to the opposite sex. Me? Not so much, but there was a period of time from twenty to fortyish when men did take notice, on occasion. I took it for granted. I didn't appreciate the attention when it was so freely giving to me. Now, in its blatant absence--with added insult from bad manners--I, in hindsight, appreciate the perks of youth and, in real time, acknowledge the disadvantages of old age. Putting aside, for now, the aches, pain, and monetary strain caused by the body growing older, I want to share a little elder perspective about the emotional discomfort that comes from one aspect of aging.

RINGA DING, DING

Lynnette's calling to talk about the furrow on her forehead.

Lynnette: "I've noticed a furrow on my forehead."

Me: "My entire body is furrowed, but I'm glad you brought that subject up. I need to talk to you about something."

Lynnette: "Can it wait? I have a date with this handsome man from Michigan, and I need to wax my bindi."

Me: "No, actually, it can't wait. Now that the furrowing has started, I want to prepare you for something bad that's about to happen. It's about the attention you've been getting."

Lynnette: "If I don't wax my bindi before my date tonight, something good won't happen."

Me: "You're going to lose it, ya know. It's going away."

Lynnette: "I've used a laser on it, but it's still there. That's why I need to wax it."

Me: "All of the attention that you've been getting is going away."

Lynnette: "Exactly! If I keep it waxed, no one notices."

Me: "Well, okay then. I have to go now. I need to pluck the hairs on Tom's ears."

Lynnette: "What did you want to talk to me about?"

Me: "Oh, never mind."

The Book of Me

I'm in the second to last chapter of my life. Tom cringes every time I say that, but it's most likely true, unless, that is, the book of me has an early surprise ending. My ninety-one-year-old mother is in her last chapter, but her book is way too long for me. If I had to live through 33, 365 pages, by the end I'd be exhausted, cranky, and loopy.

It's not that I want the book of me to end, but I know it must. It's the way of things. All good books must come to an end, and so far mine--except for a few inconveniences along the way--has been very good. I realize that there have been billions of tomes penned before mine, and there will be billions more after I'm gone, but mine is special. Why? Because it's mine.

Everyone has a book of them. From the peasant who picked weeds in King Henry VIII's garden to the great-grandmother of Prince George Alexander Louis, from the caveman who discovered fire to the inventor of the atom bomb, from you to me, we all have a special cache of stories to pass along to those following behind us on the treadmill of life.

Today I'm on page 24,785. I woke up this morning and immediately stretched myself into five minutes of very painful leg cramps. After the cramps subsided, I thought about getting up, but the room was spinning from an episode of benign paroxysmal positional vertigo. I thought that annoying ringing in my one good ear was from the alarm clock until I realized I don't have an alarm clock. So I'm afraid that page 24,785 in my book will be blank.  I'm going back to sleep, and hopefully I can pick up where I left off with that handsome Hugh Jackman and the Wolverines. It seems my dreams have better stories these days.