Journal of a Living Lady #240
Nancy White Kelly
I was fixing to. You know, Southern talk meaning about to do something. Well, I was fixing to step out of the shower. The phone rang. Dilemma. Take a chance that it will be a short call and I won’t freeze to death. Or, let the phone ring and maybe miss the most important call of my life. Choice number two won. A dripping wet hand grabbed the wall phone in the bathroom.
My acrylic teeth involuntarily chattered as I said, “hel…lo” in the most pleasant voice I could muster.
It was a recording. “Congratulations. You have won a trip to Florida, the land of white sandy beaches. That’s right. Three-days and three nights…”
I slammed the telephone back into its holder and hastily grabbed my terry robe. Hmm. The chance of my winning a trip with no strings attached was zip. Zero. Zilch. My savvy mama taught me that early in life. One of her favorite phrases was, “There ain’t no free lunch, or supper or even breakfast.”
I dried off and finished dressing. It was still early morning and I had a day full of appointments, starting with a trip to the cancer clinic for my Procrit-like shot. Got to keep those blood counts up. Our grandson is due in about six weeks and I plan to be there for his arrival. I double-dog dare anybody to try to keep me away from that event.
Our own son, Charlie, was a miracle baby born long after everybody else gave up hope. While he was in kindergarten I developed breast cancer with a poor prognosis. After a twelve year remission, the cancer returned.
Though the doctors gave me 18 months at best, God gave me an even better deal. I lived to see Charlie graduate from high school and then college. Soon after, he married his college sweetheart. Now he is about to be a first-time daddy. He’s happy. I’m happy.
But life isn’t perfect. Now and then disappointment comes. Buddy and I had a trip planned for April to celebrate our 40th wedding anniversary. Looks like that isn’t going to happen. An unexpected double root canal, accompanied by a couple of crowns, will drain our splurge account and then some. Buddy gave me the news with all the temerity of a man announcing an adulterous affair. We both have been looking forward to celebrating.
To be honest, the news didn’t cause me to sing and dance. Neither did I moan and groan, though I reminded Buddy that he should have gotten dentures years ago like I did. But, no, he wanted to keep his own teeth. How impractical. Teeth are teeth in my book. Who cares if they are real or not? Besides mine are whiter and I haven’t had a tooth ache or a dentist bill in forty years.
Then my sensible side took over. Of course, it was a no-brainer decision. Buddy’s teeth have priority. He deserves to be able to chew his food. How selfish of me to think otherwise, no matter how briefly.
It will be okay. We will take an imaginary trip. We’ll go back to Bermuda where we honeymooned in 1965. We’ll ride those little scooters all over the island and laugh at the policemen who wear those funny hard hats that look like buckets. Perhaps, in our imagination, we will locate that coca cola bottle that we buried in the sand by the sea, pledging to come back again someday to claim our beachside property.
That someday was to be when we were older, after we had raised our children and finished our careers. Regardless of ailing, failing teeth, we can still rejoice that we have had four decades of loving each other through richer or poorer, for better or for worse. That new grandson will be celebration enough.
nancyk@alltel.net
