Grandma Henke

Something else I wrote a while back …

June 18, 1999

Today I had a few minutes left of my lunch hour and decided to run to ZCMI and pick up a long skirt to wear to the family reunion Saturday. I really shouldn’t say “run” … because my left leg sports a cast that goes from the tip of my toes to just below my knee and I’m barely learning to hobble. Yesterday when I hobbled from my car to the office, I found two of my supposed best friends gawking at me through the window … laughing because I waddle like a duck … an old duck. I’m a pretty easy going person … not one to believe insults are intended to insult … so I just sank myself into the nearest chair while I caught my breath and let them laugh.

I hadn’t been shopping long when I thought “This is my lucky day!” Right off I found a skirt I liked … and a jumper, and two T-shirts, and a pair of pants. They were all crying my name, saying “Take me! Take me!” As much as I hate to try on clothes … even at classy department stores … today I felt I had no choice. I needed to make sure that I bought something that looked reasonably good with my cast. After all, I am going to a reunion.

Dressing rooms are always a challenge for a claustrophobic person like me, but these particular dressing rooms are the worst. They don’t have air. I don’t mean they just don’t have cool air … they plain don’t have air. Walking into one of them is like walking into a sauna. I could hear the hum of what I supposed was the air conditioner, but I swear there was not one tiny molecule of air moving in that room, and it was as hot as the inside of an oven. Since I’d spent a good portion of the morning taking the curl out of my hair I really wasn’t too keen about sweating it all back in. It was a dilemma … but I decided I had no choice. I had a mission to complete. Just entering the dressing room put my sweat glands into gear. I wish I could say I merely perspired … but my pores were spraying like lawn sprinklers. I could have put out a fire.

The dress was easy to try on and I liked it. It was loose and long, pretty much covered the cast, and it was on sale. I should have stopped right there but we all know you just don’t go around buying the first thing that strikes your fancy. The first T-shirt had a neck size that would have been small for an 8 year old … Getting my head through it must have been similar to moving through the birth canal. The dang thing just wouldn’t dilate! I felt sweat running down my forehead and neck … and there was an actual stream running down my back and thighs. I could actually feel my wet hair fighting the layers of spray net that held it smoothly in place.

The jumper fit reasonably well, but didn’t match the T-shirt so I re-entered the birth canal and tried on the second one. I liked that match, but the hair was destroyed. I might have passed okay on the Vegas Strip or in Seattle, but it really wasn’t the “do” for our conservative little community.

I tried the pants on last because I was a little apprehensive about getting them over my cast. They were made of flowing material that’s supposed to “waft … or was it wist” as you walk. I don’t know if it has the same affect when you clump. The pants went on okay, but after checking myself out from every angle I decided they just didn’t “flutter all that well under the circumstances. I didn’t want them … but I couldn’t get them off. You know how it is when little kids stick their heads through stair railings? Sometimes they just don’t slide back out. Same thing with these pants.

I tried everything I could think of to do while hopping on one foot in an oven, but nothing seemed to work. I couldn’t make them go back over the heal of my cast. I considered buying and wearing them back to work but they were so jammed I couldn’t get them to pull back up either. I could hear whispering outside in the hall and realized I was bumping around, grunting and making obscene breathing noises. I was afraid the “helper” was going to bear down on me. I hate it when sales ladies stick their heads into my dressing room when I’m standing in my underwear with my thighs hanging out.

No sooner had I thought about her, when what do you know! She appeared out of thin air! My heart skipped five beats when I saw this hateful looking woman come at me with wild, angry eyes! My first impression was, “Holy Cow, she’s about to have a stroke!” Her face was red and splotchy, her wet hair looked like she’d just run through the jungle … and believe it or not … she was standing there in her underwear! It wasn’t much comfort when I realized it was me.

My good leg was starting to weaken and the danged pants weren’t moving at all. I would have removed the cast but they were twisted and stuck so tight around my heel I couldn’t reach in to pull the Velcro fasteners apart. The way I saw it, I only had two choices: (1) I could use my cell phone and call 911 … or (2) I could sit down on the dirty dressing room floor so I could hold still enough to operate. I chose the floor over the squad team.

Dressing room doors don’t start at floor level. Did you know there’s actually quite a little gap down there? I found out where the whispering was coming from … two little girls who were sitting in the hall waiting for their mother. I smiled and said,”Hi”. About then, though, I could have cared less if they saw my er-la-la. Life and death situations put a new perspective on modesty and I was being cooked alive. I’d started feeling pretty light headed by then, and remembered the cleaning lady who coached my daughter, Angi, through the delivery of her baby. I realized I must not be breathing correctly … maybe not even breathing at all! “In … Out … In … Out … Head down … Shoulders high … Woo, Woo, Woo, Woo!” It helped! I felt the pants slide into transition! A few more pushes and there they were … laying beside me on the floor! No mother could have been prouder! I had just given birth to a pair of polyster pants!    I would have liked to sit and savor the moment but the little girls were looking at me like I was the wicked witch of the west (or was it east?) melting in a puddle of water.

It’s not easy getting up in a situation like that. There is nothing to hold on to. What I saw in the reflection of the mirror after I was dressed made me want to sit back down on the floor and practicing my breathing again. I didn’t have a comb (little good it would have done anyway) and there was no way I could dry my body or camouflage my red face … so I girded up my loins and mustered enough courage to face the fancy ZCMI shoppers. I had decided I deserved not only the dress, but the jumper and T-shirt as well.

Waiting just outside the door was a very proper looking sales woman who lifted her nose and said, “Please walk this way to the check-out stand”. If I could have “walked that way” I wouldn’t have been in such a fix now, would I? I hobbled to the cash register where I wrote out my check. I admit my hands were shaking and my voice wavered a bit, and I probably looked even worse than I thought, but still I was taken back when she said, “I’ll need to see your Driver’s License, PLEASE.” (This is the same lady who has willingly collected my money for the last twelve years.) I went through my wallet three times before I was convinced my Driver’s License wasn’t there. “Hmmm,” I said. “It appears my license isn’t here.” “Well”, she snapped, “I cannot take this check without a Driver’s License! Or, perhaps you’d like to charge it on your ZCMI charge card?” By this time she’d raised one of her eyebrows to her hairline. “I don’t suppose you have a ZCMI charge card?” she challenged.

Sometimes, enough is enough. I started putting my belongings back into my purse and told her I’d changed my mind, when she suddenly seemed to remember her commission. She smiled and said, “I hate to see you leave these lovely items behind now they’ve been rung up and bagged. If you take your check to Customer Service they can call your bank and verify your funds.”

I looked at her, looked at the clothes, looked back at her … and really wanted to walk away … but also really didn’t want to leave them there. By this time these clothes and I had bonded. I picked up my check and hobbled, in my own dignified way, to Customer Service. All I heard was “clump, step, clump, step, clump, step”. And all the while … I was still sweating!

Finally, an hour and a half from when I first entered their doors, I was done. The dress, the jumper, and the T-shirt were mine. My check was in the register, and I went clumping my way to the car. My thoughts? “It will surely be a cold day in hell before I pass through these doors again!”

Today it actually passed 110 degrees here … not exactly a cold day in hell … but definitely a hell of a day. I got clear to my car before I realized my keys weren’t in my purse. Hobble hobble hobble back through the doors, hobble hobble hobble to Customer Service, hobble hobble hobble back to the check out stand and the smirking clerk, hobble hobble hobble around and through the clothes racks, hobble hobble hobble to the sauna/dressing room … and finally, there laying silently in the corner … were my keys. Hobble hobble hobble back past the check out stand, hobble hobble hobble through the store, hobble hobble hobble out the door, hobble hobble hobble through the parking lot, and hobble hobble hobble back to my car.

Apparently … it was cold day in hell.

@ Edna Henke, Ivins, Utah 84738

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