Busted

For the last four years I’ve kept secrets. No crimes committed or acts of indiscretion - just

simple missteps that didn’t hurt anyone - not even me. Kinda like a ten year old kid crawling outside his window at night for a few hours of adventure and back again before anyone noticed… The feeling of “I shouldn’t have done that, so I won’t tell Mom” - yet a black cloud of guilt floating over me.

 

The secrets started in my ninth decade.  The occasional trip in the garden, The knee that wouldn’t keep pace with the rest of me.  Once I fell from the side garden onto the cement driveway and struggled to right myself by grabbing the wheel of my car to pull myself up. My escalating call for help produced no one - my closest neighbor is very hard of hearing.  I began to accept my fate until people began walking by after supper.  And so, I was ecstatic when a neighbor working at home in the second storey of his house saw me engaging the wheel of my car and wondered what I was doing.  He came over, lifted me out of the knot I’d

created, went home and told his wife what had happened.  She thought I’d probably benefit from

a  fall detector. It was the right time to hear that, so I complied.

 

Shortly after that, another fall in the front garden and then my Lively gizmo kicked in.  A person was ttalking to me through my necklace and connecting me to emergency services in town.  I sat on the sidewalk waiting and while waiting, the police drove by so I began waving for help.  They only acknowledged my wave by waving back. Thankfully the emergency folks came soon after that.

 

While I wasn’t hurt in these minor falls I took, I did fall have two face meets sidewalk falls that

required stitches but nothing was broken save only my pride.

 

Misjudgements on the road and parking lots produced visible scrapes and dents on my car that took me to the auto repair shop. But, no one was hurt, and so I didn’t think my daughter Megan needed to be bothered with that detail.

 

Yet, in August of 2024, I was busted.  My daughter, one grandgirl, and I were at the cozy family cabin on the Iron Range in Northern Minnesota.

 

On a Wednesday, I got up at 9 am, reached for something to steady myself as I stood, misjudged the distance, fell, and came down with a floor lamp on top of  me.  You hear everything in the cabin, so the crash brought my wide-eyed daughter to examine me and undo me from the rubble.  I wasn’t hurt, but the specter of my fall re-ignited her concern for my well-being. Three years ago, I was a captive audience for the admonitions about living alone in my large house.  After the summer sermon, I immediately went to Silver Maples and put a thousand dollars to get on the waiting list. I could not imagine living in a one-bedroom apartment, so I requested a two-bedroom.  They are difficult to get, but I was quite happy to wait for many years.

 

Three hours after my comeuppance in the cabin, Megan received a call from Silver Maples  retirement community saying there was a two bedroom apartment available for me now. Why didn’t my phone ring when they tried to call me?  Was this divine intervention? A message from the universe? The stars aligning? No matter - I must make my decision by 5 pm on Friday. The fourteen hour drive to get to see the apartment left me with little time for a decision. Since it was a fluke that my name rose to the top of the list, I decided to make the move.

 

Mind you, I really don't want to leave my home with character around every corner, my front porch, deck, and gardens. How is Sammy, my cat, going to survive this commotion?  Nonetheless, I’m downsizing, and making decisions about where things should go -

Facebook marketplace,a  free online website, the consignment store, or the curb?

 

Passing through my hands are decades of memorabilia and scenes of my life pass before me daily. My life was in review for several hurried months and a thousand decisions sat on my shoulder with sadness. Temporary, I hope.