Grandma Henke

Every day I lose more marbles.   Some days I go from room to room looking for things, hoping that something will spark my memory so I will remember what it is I’m looking for.      Some nights I struggle to remember all the interesting things I wanted to write in my journal.   I know there were interesting things I’d thought of or done that day, but what were they?     I even had something I wanted to blog about tonight, that I thought of while Lynn and I were driving to Costco this afternoon.   But danged if I know what it is.     My mind is about like my house.   There are so many things hidden in safe places that it’s literally like a gold mine; if you can only find it.    At night when I’m on the brink of sleep I make resolutions and schedules of how I’ll spend the next day, but many times I don’t think of them again until I’m on the brink of sleep three or four nights later.   I know I should have written them down but that would have meant bringing myself out of my almost sleep.    I tell myself that these are “senior moments” but sometimes I feel I’m on the very edge of an everlasting “Cuckoo Land”.

Oh!   I remembered!     I remember what it is I wanted to blog about and it turns out to be my most famous “senior moment” ever.    It happened before I was even remotely qualified as a senior citizen.    I was an innocent 46 years old.   

I was still a fairly new Executive Director for The Arc of Washington County and was under pressure from a rogue auditor who would NOT finish his work because he loved the sunny winters in St George and didn’t want to go home where it was snowy and cold.   Every year our Federal Audit that should have taken one week to complete dragged out for three and sometimes four.  

He filled his time by talking non stop.      He talked in a monotone voice about anything and everything that had nothing to do with the business at hand.      I dreaded going to the office every day and had to take work home every night because it was impossible to accomplish anything while he talked on and on from his temporary desk in the corner of my office to anyone foolish enough to make eye contact with him.    It was impossible to get him to stop.   If I walked out, he followed.    The only door he didn’t cross through was the women’s bathroom where several of us planned little getaways throughout the day.     By 2:00 every day I had a screaming headache and stiff neck from clenching my jaws and biting my tongue.    Every afternoon at 4:00 on the dot, Mr. Auditor would pack up his things and leave for the day so he could drive down to Mesquite for dinner, social hour, and the one armed bandits.    Every night and morning I’d pack up a box of  files, mail, calculator and a heavy laptop computer, and carry it to my car and then from my car to the house or office.   

One of those nights I was packing files into my sturdy little cardboard box, gathering things together like my sweater, my purse, my refillable mug, and my keys.   But, oh!   Wait!   I couldn’t find my keys!    I reached into the pockets of my sweater, my pants, looked in all my desk drawers, and dumped out my purse.    No keys.    I’d worked through my lunch hour so hadn’t used the car since I arrived early that morning.  I got down on my hands and knees and looked under the desk and rifled through the garbage can.    I took everything out of the box to see if the keys were inside.   I wondered if my gabby auditor had accidently scooped them up with his papers and carried them of to Nevada for the night. 

My headache worsened as I started getting that sinking feeling in my heart that my keys might be locked in my minivan.  Because IF for some reason my keys were locked in the Astro, I was on my own since Lynn (who is my normal rescuer) was out of town. 

With dreaded anticipation, I walked down the long hall to the back door that led to the East parking lot.    With each step closer I knew I was going to look in the car and my keys would be in plain sight on the seat, but completely inaccessible.      I leaned in nose to the window, and put both hands on the car to steady myself as I squinted to see through the darkened glass.  Sure enough, they were in plain sight  …  hanging proudly from the ignition.    I wish that was as bad as this senior moment got.

My hands were feeling a vibration that shouldn’t have been there and I was confused as I leaned even closer to put my ear near the hood.   What in the world?    I was absolutely dismayed when I heard the engine of the car purring quietly away.     My car was running, the keys were in the ignition, and the doors were locked.    AND IT HAD BEEN RUNNING OUT THERE BY ITSELF ALL DAY LONG WHILE I WAS STUCK IN THE BUILDING LISTENING TO MR. AUDITOR!!!    I realized I was going to have to confess to Lynn that I’d used a tank of gas and I hadn’t even gone anywhere.   I realized I was going to have to call one of my children to rescue me and that before that child managed to get me my extra keys everyone in the county would know what happened.   

I knew I was doomed then, but from that day since it has been one marble after another and I don’t know how long they are going to hold out.   One of these days I’ll run right out of marbles and then I’ll just sit quietly in my little wooden rocking chair, with a warm little shawl thrown over my shoulders, while I rock back and forth on the front porch and wave and smile as people whose names I have forgotten pass by on the sidewalk.   

Gee, that doesn’t sound so bad now, does it?