Bumps in the Road

If life is a journey there sure a lot of bumps on the road. Everyone hits places which jolt them and make them ask, “What happened?” as they suddenly find themselves going in an entirely different direction.

My life has had several places where I turned abruptly. I was 23 years old when I married and went from Fort Worth to Chicago. Boy! Was that a change! Thirty years later, after enjoying the quiet streets of suburbia as a mom with three children, I divorced.

Then came a rough patch where the pavement seemed utterly destroyed. I was embroiled in a lawsuit with my ex. After three years of road blocks and delays, the case was settled and I was free to move ahead.

Suddenly I was on a super highway, married to my Polish Prince, who carried me to New Mexico to live happily in the little fake-adobe house on Sesame Street in Albuquerque. After John died, I continued my journey in the company of stimulating friends from various ethnic backgrounds – Irish, Italian, and Hispanic Catholics, a High Church Episcopalian poet, a Jewish Unitarian-Universalist, and an agnostic who grew up in India.

I traveled on jet planes. How I traveled! Even more interesting than seeing cathedrals in France or castles in Germany was watching buffalo and corn dances at New Mexico pueblos with my Indian friend, who was both a devout Catholic and a total pagan. He was also my partner dancing the Texas two-step at the senior center.

That good life hit a “Road Closed” sign when my kidney doctor said I would need dialysis. I moved back to Texas, where I bought a house (at age 77!) near my brother Don and his wife Mary.

The road ahead looked smooth when a Dallas doctor said, "Your kidneys are damaged, but you may never need dialysis." I took a river cruise on the Danube through Eastern Europe and went with an Elderhostel to Prague, Vienna, and Budapest. Last fall I planned to go to New York in October and to India in December.

Then came another road block: My kidneys decided not to work so well. The trips were canceled. In October I had surgery on my left arm, and in January I started dialysis three times a week. No more trips, not even brief ones to Illinois and California to visit my children.

I coped. But again the road became bumpy. Dialysis takes protein out of my body; I was advised to eat two eggs for breakfast. I am tired of cooking and washing the frying pan. Jesus did not come as promised. He always has another job to do when my grass needs mowing.

Now I am making another turn. I found a retirement home with a two-bedroom apartment for a price I can afford. Includes breakfast and lunch, housekeeping once a week, transportation to doctors, aerobic exercise in the courtyard pool, etc. I took possession as of June 30.

The last two weeks have been frantic. Don and Mary moved out excess furniture to “stage the house” for prospective buyers, while I sorted books. In the midst of this, while I was shopping at Kroger, a little man in a big pickup truck tried to make a U-turn into the parking space next to my Hyundai and scraped the side of my car. His insurance paid, but it was a hassle dealing with adjusters and body shop. I panicked when my cell phone was lost for 24 hours, only to be found in the back seat of the rental I drove while my car was in the shop.

Dented car and lost cell phone are mere speed bumps on the little road I am traveling now. My neighbor on the third floor is a delightful man, young enough to be my son, who has surmounted the difficulties of cerebral palsy since birth. We had lunch today with a gal who told about the time her daughter called about a cheap flight to London. The woman said, “I told her, ‘Buy the tickets quick and let’s go.’” My kind of gal!

My life now is on a side street. Probably a dead end. That’s okay. It looks like a pleasant place to end a journey.