TITLE: Need a Lift? By Judith Gayle Smith-Owens Vitouswykegardinerclark 01/30/13 |
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"Major Senior Moment All The Day Long!"
Tuesday - Beading Class! Yay! Called Trimet Lift to schedule a door-to-door transit lift bus. I actually remembered to specify NW and not SW! A plus for me!
One minute late getting outside - waved good bye to the lift bus as I was starting down the ramp.
No choice but to take the big city bus - Barb pushing me several blocks in a rickety manual wheelchair because my faithful Hoveround blew a front tire.
Bus driver very helpful but flirtatious - kinda nice to still be flirtable at almost 68 years old.
My favorite necklace - the one I am wearing - chooses this very moment to break.
Had to transfer - another kind driver took us all the way to NW Northrup St., enabling us to find our way to the Church where the beading class beads.
Barb has all her beading necessities in extremely heavy bags on back of wheelchair. My purse rubs against the wheelchair wheel and dislodges a favorite panther pin - which quickly became lost to me, but a great find for whoever discovers it.
Uphill - Barb faithfully pushing me, wheezng and gasping. I clamber from chair and push for awhile - gasping and wheezing. Praising God I had the foresight to go for my comfortable Croc's - rather than my "pretty" leopard shoes. Oh yes - we are "The Leopard Sisters''. Remembering how I ripped open the right shoe by miscalculating the lowered lift. My fault - I had a huge box on my chair's platform! Amazing - tore the shoe from ankle to big toe - but nary a scratch on my foot! (Thank you YHWH!!!)
Only 40 minutes late to beading class! Not bad. I had anticipated over an hour's delay!
Waiting for lift bus to go back home - over 45 minutes. Called Trimet and found our return ride had been cancelled in error.
Headed back the way we came, looking for an Eastbound bus on Northrup. Barb pushing me up Northrup, gasping and wheezing. Repeat me pushing chair wheezing and gasping. Finally find out that we had to go to Lovejoy to find an Eastbound bus. gurk.
Make connection! Again, yay! A pretty gal boards the bus, resembling a friend who worked with me years ago. I queried whether or not she or her Mother worked at RBCBSO and she was unfamiliar with any family members there. Howsomever, the bus driver caught my query and threw it back to me - her sister worked there! Not only did I know the driver's sis, but she had been a veritable instituton there! So happy reconnection! I pondered all the moments of the fiasco that led me to finding a sweet old friend - missing Trimet Lift, taking the city bus - finding at last an eastbound bus home - wow.
Transferred to a bus heading straight home - decided to stop at Carl's Jr. for their incredible chocolate malts and six dollar burgers to surprise Mike (and to avoiding cooking!). Headed out the wrong door with our food, hit a bump on the road crossing the wrong street and wound up with whipped cream and chocolate malt all over me and the chair. Tasty, albeit messy.
Caught the next bus. I decided not to sit in my wheelchair, and sat on a bus seat while taking napkins to my face and clothes and hair. Looking to use my bus pass, I asked Barb to remove my purse from the back of the wheelchair. I placed the holder storing what was left of the chocolate malts on the wheelchair seat. Completely forgetting all the weight on the back of the chair. Whereupon the wheelchair tipped over, spilling the remainder of the malts on the back of the chair, our beading supplies, my purse, and creating quite the flood upon the floor. I grabbed the holder with the remaining malt and held it over my lap. A nice young man boarded the bus and asked if I was aware that I was dripping all over my velvet skirt and leopard velvet overblouse.
Finally limped home, smelling of chocolate. Our Psychotic Parson's Russell Terrorist was extremely wag-happy to welcome me home.
Barb handled it very well .
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