The Australian Phone Company

There are days when a good laugh is welcomed. Others when the need for novelty leads one to explore the heretofore ignored bizarre. Today was both.

I've been ignoring a multitude of recent phone calls labeled "Scam Likely" coming in to my cell phone. But today was a "what the heck?" kind of day. It had the same area code my cell has, and I can pretty much guarantee any incoming calls I want to hear from with that code are already in my directory. But like I said....

After two hellos, a bit of static came on the line, followed by a voice purporting to be from some Australian phone company. She was doing me the wonderful service - on a Sunday, no less, when everybody does their business because, why not? - of informing me that my land line (lordy, how many years since I've had one of those?) service was to be disconnected due to late payment. (Ahem: I stay ahead on my phone bill, not just current. Always.) I could fix that, of course, just by... garbled couple seconds... and punching "1" to connect with their technician....

Let's see, can you count all the things wrong in that one minute spiel? I haven't even mentioned yet her horrible quasi-Australian accent, or grammar quirks. Nor why they would be operating in the US, or calling somebody with a Minneapolis area code because - I suppose - they found a way to imitate or secure a phone number with the same area code. And presuming they wanted money, why should I believe a technician would be the type of employee to fix a monetary problem for me?

Really, how stupid do people have to be to fall for all this nonsense?

It was tempting, it really was, to play along for a few minutes, punch 1, pretend fear over the threats for as long as I could stand it, and then give them an earfull of just how idiotic they were being. But then I reconsidered. If I gave them any tips at all of what they needed to fix, they might just go and do it. And just maybe the next poor sucker would fall for the new improved version.

No thanks. Better to just save it for one of those rainy day stories, something to haul out of the dusty brainpan for another quiet chuckle.

Getting Impatient

"You Are Here".  Remember those on maps? Steve and I have been all over the place lately, so it's time to sum it all up-to-the-moment. The "Here" for both of us is impatience.

Steve first:  The dominant influence on his life since November has been his back. He's tried painkillers, muscle relaxers, CBD, chiropractic manipulation, even spinal ablation to try to ease his pain. It's meant he's had to give up all those places he went with his scooter because any pebble under a wheel is a sharp jolt of agony. Those include his card clubs, heading to the shopping center which has his grocery store, his favorite Mexican restaurant, his barber, his bank, his pharmacy. To get to the grocery, his doctors, everything but his clubs, I drive him since his pain meds prohibit him from driving. I'd take him to the clubs too, but he needs that scooter once he's there, and it's too difficult to dismantle for transport in the car. His one outing that wasn't a basic necessity was the recent funeral of a long-time friend.

Needless to say, it's been quite discouraging. He's been trying everything he can while also not becoming a drug addict. Relief is minimal, brief, or even countered by supposed fixes. Recently he had to readjust his pain scale - the one from 1 to 10 - to put what was a 9 down to a 5 or 6 so he could add more levels on the top end. We are both trying not to be totally discouraged. And yes, emphasize the "courage" in the middle of that word. It's bad enough having to watch that  kind of pain. I can only imagine having to live it and still not lash out at everything and everybody around you. He doesn't do that.

There is still a ray of hope. A cousin of his has had intractable back pain, until she was pointed to a kind of pain interrupter that functions by having little electrodes inserted surgically along the spine, along with a battery giving off a current which interrupts the pain signals trying to reach the brain. Steve has an appointment to see a doctor who can do that. Of course, no appointments were available for the initial consult until next week. (Maybe if the Doc needed this procedure himself he'd find a way to be more available?) So: IMPATIENT!!!

Me next:  After a long journey to get all my meds to do what they could, I now have great blood pressure, no toxicity, and a heart whose ventricles forgot the speedy rhythm this body learned in junior high marching band. The cardiac ablation surgery went well, so far as can be determined. A-fib for me when unmedicated was very intermittent at its worst, and while it hasn't recurred since surgery, I'm not ready to rule it out forever. It's not on my worry list.

However, the progressive bradycardia has definitely been living up to its name. Yesterday was the first day in over a week where I didn't have anything from a single episode to hours of repeated episodes of it. At worst it could happen when I was sprawled back in my recliner, thinking I was about to faint. Steve was ready to call 911 and I was almost ready to let him. It could be something as simple as standing at the bathroom sink for a couple minutes and needing to reach for a chair. Luckily, most bathrooms provide one of those! Lest I think yesterday meant good news, today is already disabusing me of that idea.

Friday I called my cardiologist's office. Earlier in the week I'd found out from staff (while getting a blood test) that he has a partner who can implant pacemakers, so I thought I'd try to get an appointment set up as quickly as possible to get that rolling. Like I said: magic word is "progressive". I received a surprising answer. While my regular guy doesn't do the procedure, I'd be stepping on his toes if I switched, even temporarily, to his partner who can. Worse, my guy was on vacation and wouldn't be back till today, so the staff couldn't ask "permission" until then/now. Which they haven't yet.

Really? I mean, seriously? #RU4REAL?

So yeah, impatient!

Oh, and to those of you for whom it's relevant, we're not traveling north until after both issues are resolved and travel is ... well, permitted. And that also involves juggling surgery schedules so one of us is capable of doing necessary things while the other can't, of which driving is only the most obvious.

Stay tuned.

Iran, Warmongering, and... Endtimes?

A lot of folks believe in what they term the "endtimes", where complete destruction of the human race will open up the way to the Kingdom of God.

I don't happen to hold that belief. Spoiler alert.

The last few decades, there have been repeated unrest and wars in the middle east, which if unchecked, and now that so many of those countries have nuclear weapons, could actually make this planet uninhabitable. A common thread in discussions of this unrest is the assertion that the warmongers, both from there and from over here, have been trying to promote the endtimes as a good thing to happen, the sooner the better.

The latest example is the US withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal, and representatives like Bolton working as hard as they can to promote war over there. Not the only, just the latest.

So I have this question for all you warmongers and war sympathizers out there anticipating the imminent arrival of the endtimes:

Even if - big if - you happen to be both sincere and right in your endtimes and kingdom-of-God beliefs, just WHO THE HELL ARE YOU TO TELL GOD WHEN IT'S SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN?

Misty Fjords, Alaska

This morning's news reported a tragic crash in Misty Fjords of 2 of the bush planes (float) so common for transportation in a state where water abounds but roads don't. My memories of the location came rushing back, a particular high point in a cruise trip which my late mother-in-law brought me on many years ago.

This was the trip where, among other things, I hauled along my Pentax K1000 camera, still my favorite ever, with a supply of 36 rolls of 36 exposure film, Kodak Ektar for its very fine grain, and shot every single frame of them. This was despite my very modest budget and having to pay to develop each into prints. Yeah, people thought I was nutty. However, as a thank-you to her, that X-mas I presented her with a large photo album with a representative half of those photos. It was returned to me upon her death. I treasure all of them. I trust she knew how much I appreciated the opportunity, if she hadn't earlier.

It was incredible to her that, upon receiving her invitation to join her since two tickets had been purchased and her planned trip-mate was unable to come, I had to consider whether I could afford to take the time off of work in order to accept her incredible gift. Yes, that's how modest my budget was. I'm sure she was offended that I didn't immediately jump on her offer - which emotionally I did - but perhaps years later came to understand my economics, raising three children without benefit of child support payments. It took me years before I was willing to admit to her some of the flaws of her son.

We flew from MSP up to Fairbanks, looking down on some fantastic scenery along the way. This started as a land trip: river rides, gold panning, viewing examples even then of the issues with building a house over permafrost.  Waking in the wee hours, I found out just how absent dark skies were at that longitude in early July. I also was impressed by how the light levels managed to grow humongous cabbages in nearly every garden. I think two would fill a pickup bed. Maybe three.

My first ever train ride took us down to Denali, where the group toured the park by bus and were pointed in the direction of where the peak was (always) hiding behind clouds. Braided rivers fascinated me, along with the blonde grizzly bears. A little garden tour introduced me to monk's hood, along with stern warnings of how deadly it was, even just to touch without washing.

All meals were taken care of during the trip, except for Denali. I was shocked at lunch to find a modest sandwich, banana and (Coke?) totaled over $21. I had thought I was hungry but definitely not enough to eat (spend) more than that.

Our train was a double decker, the top of each car sporting a glass dome where we could see at eye level abundant bald eagles in the pines lining the tracks. Mountains, meadows, streams were also in view. On the way downstairs to have lunch, we could step out to the platform between cars, hang onto a railing, lean over and watch fishermen taking advantage of the seemingly endless red salmon swimming upstream when the rivers meandered close to the tracks.

From Anchorage we bused to Seward where our cruise ship awaited. I can't recall its exact name, but Holland America's ships all bear names like Amsterdam and Rotterdam, or as our captain would say, "all those other Dam Ships." It was a lovely ship, fantastic food, great staff, and a sweet little cabin with twin beds, a mini living room, and bathroom with tub/shower facilities. We also had a window to the outside with no balcony deck outside on our level, affording us open drapes with complete privacy.

The ship also offered evening entertainment, useful as a time-killer, a casino which neither of us bothered to enter, a bar, ditto, and swimming pools which my body image prevented me from entering and joining all those hardbodies in bikinis. In other words, the best part of the cruise was getting off the ship. Fortunately, those trips were well worth going on.

We flew over glaciers, whale watched in a boat that had to call the ship to report us arriving back late so they wouldn't leave port without us because there had been too many whales worth watching, particularly the humpbacks busy bubble-net feeding. We hiked through a Sitka rain forest sampling ripe salmonberries which are a poor imitation of raspberries, toured old Russian churches, enjoyed a meal where we watched sturdy young men with hefty poles chase bears away from the huge outdoor salmon grill which was attracting them from miles away, and had melted glacier water to wash the food down.  When a flight was grounded by fog, a boat took us around the waterways for close up views of grizzly and black bears, moose, foxes, sea lions and seals, eagles, and whatever else might be around. Which it was. Reliably. On a walk along a dock returning from a trip, we looked down into a swarm of moon jellies, some quarter size, some hand size. A canning factory dumping fish waste in the ocean supported a huge number of eagles fighting over the pieces, with the occasional gutsy gull sneaking its own turn at the feast.

Misty Fjords stood out, even after all of that. Ketchikan itself was not awe inspiring. The city is on the edge of an island at the southern part of the Inside Passage, separated from its airport on another island, the only transportation between being by ferry. The "Bridge to Nowhere" was proposed to replace the ferrys, but never built. It was our launching place to our true destination, Misty Fjords National Monument Wilderness.

This was a two-fer journey. One either flies out in a bush plane to a dock, transferring to a small boat which brings you back along the shore, or boats out and flies back. Each plane or boat takes a different set of passengers each way, never deadheading. We flew low enough that we missed the true picture of how high we were climbing on the way, missing the true impact of mountainous terrain. It was the return trip which resides in memory.

Our captain gave us plenty of warning to get our cameras out before we came around the bend. He promised a sight we would likely never see again. A whale had beached and died, or perhaps died and washed up, several days earlier. We'd all never know, and it didn't matter. Most of the carcass lay up out of the water. Busy taking advantage of their feast were both bears and eagles, enough of a feast spread that they weren't doing any more than a token claiming of territory for their meal. Luckily, we were upwind, particularly as the boat was maneuvered in as closely as safety allowed. This was to be the only time in our lives when we would be able to see a whale, bears, and eagles in the very same picture. We all soaked in the view for almost a half hour, imprinting the scene in our collective brains.

While today's plane crash arouses sorrow, the lingering connection in my heart will always be to that pause in our trip back.

Parry's Agave

We're enjoying about a month, so far, of a rare and spectacular beauty from our living room window. It never looked like it might hold that kind of promise, all those years when it was just sitting in the corner of the lot across the way under the street light. It was just another low pokey thing, kinda scruffy, totally inert, mediocre dirty blue color in common slender leaves. I never would have thought it had that potential. I may have passed over them in garden centers and turned up my nose at how they would - not! - decorate my lawn.

Considering housing turnover rates down here, with an aggressive rental rate as well as snowbird abandonment for part of the year, I wonder if the current property owner, seen occasionally doing maintenance on the house, even has a clue what's just happened here. Did whoever planted it have a dream of the promise for years to come? Or was it just a random desert hardy plant plunked into the corner to fill a space? These particular plants, after all, live very ordinary lives for 15 to 25 years before they die in a burst of glory.

Earlier this spring this scrubby agave began to change. Out from the center a thick stalk resembling a giant asparagus started to grow. It became noticed when it rose about a foot over the surrounding leaves. It grew taller, then taller still. I watched it approach the level of the bottom of the roof, where it began to branch out from its single stalk, and rose finally to about it's final height of about three feet taller than the peak of that roof. Each branch developed into a kind of a horizontal paddle, and the many of them surrounded that stalk and decreased in size until the very top. It looked like a Christmas tree perched on top of a flagpole.

A red Christmas tree.

It practically glowed from the sides in the rays of sunrise and sunset. At night under the street light, dim as that light is, the crowning top emerged from the black as if it were an indispensable part of the night, a gift to us mere mortals, teasing you to believe it softly luminescent rather than reflecting back something piped from underground. I so wished I had the camera capable of recording it in those light levels.  I had started shooting it in daylight when the stalk first appeared, and still do as it changes.

It does change. Not the stalk, maintaining its original green. But as those "paddles" broadened out, their tops became pebbly-surfaced as red buds grew upwards across their tops. Like the rest of these changes, it started at the bottom branches and moved placidly into the very crown. As the buds grew, the tips became more yellowish, giving a bicolor look to each branch. Each bud opened to let a feathery center emerge above the petal tips, making it truly spectacular.

Now it was really becoming noticed. I'd been crossing the street taking multiple shots for days, attempting to capture each stage, even capturing the swarming tiny insects working to gain whatever pollen or nectar they were seeking. Saguaros are blooming now as well, and my camera captured what I presume are the same little critters. Close as I was, especially on neighborhood saguaros with blooming lower limbs, they never approached me, never stung, never hummed in my ears, never tickled my eyes or tried to fly up my nose. They had a job to do and humans had no part in their world.

With the start of the color change, the top of this flowering stalk was still solid red while the bottom was changing from bicolor to solid yellow. Throughout this stage it became the neighborhood attraction. Cars were stopping, some doing u-turns, and groups of people emerged with their cameras, pointing out parts of the plant to their companions, shooting a photo or three before leaving. The next carfull wasn't far behind.

I fully understand that, cruising the area as I do myself to capture all the various blooms of the season. Never, whether visiting many years ago or living here, even at the Desert Botanical Gardens, have I ever seen this particular agave bloom. I've seen others of this asparagus shape, including one just a couple blocks away, nice enough in ordinary green to ho-hum yellow. But never one of the Parry's red color. While it blooms, it is the most splendid thing around. I'm still shooting it myself.

Others have pretty much stopped coming by, now. Solid yellow has climbed to the very tip, and the bottom is slowly browning, looking old and wasted. The flowers have done their work. Now it's time for seed production, a time when less attention is a good thing. I expect the seeds will be finished sometime in mid summer. They'll likely be big so they will be slow to mature. I hold little hope that the dried up stalk will even be there when we return, much though I'd like to harvest some of the seeds. Someone, perhaps the owner, perhaps a grounds-keeping hired helper, will have decided before then that it's ugly and have chopped it down. They may never even know what beauty was produced on this corner, much less the value of offering seeds for generating more plants that most of us here will never live to see bloom.

But, oh, our yard has some corners....

Wired Again

I didn't expect this again, but it's going better than the last time. Yep, I'm wearing another event monitor. It's recording a week's worth of EKG to establish whether the ablation surgery did what it's supposed to.

I guess it's good that they check, since those procedures only work about 80% of the time. Still, I'm not sure just what they'll find out if they don't find anything. The last one, lasting 3 weeks, never showed any A-fib during that time. Back before it was properly controlled by medication, it only happened every several weeks or so at the most often. Monitoring between times would have recorded me as normal - however you want to take that. Normal except when you aren't is like trying to take the car into the mechanic when your problem won't manifest in the shop.

We've made one change with medication since the surgery. The last monitor record showed progressive bradycardia. Since that time, in coordination with my regular cardiologist, I've been cutting doses of the metoprolol, 1st, by half the morning dose, then by half the evening dose, and now gone altogether. That medication is supposed to control rapid A-fib by slowing the heartbeat. With each step down in dosage, my heartbeat sped up. Now it's usually a hair under 70 rather than under 50. If A-fib is still likely, it's more likely to show up now.

There is also the added bonus of fewer bottles in the medicine cabinet.

The medicine cabinet has another change as well: a dosage schedule for Warfarin is taped inside the door for reference, as it changes each day in a pattern that we've painstakingly worked out to maintain proper thinness in my blood. Regular dosages in the sizes available from the pharmacy don't do it, but cutting and combining various pills do. I could keep it all straight until the surgery, but for a while after - and hopefully no more but why risk it? - I couldn't always remember which dose on which days. Now it's right there instead of hiding under the cutting stone.

Anyway, I've digressed a bit. I mostly actually like this monitoring system. It's a different brand. I no longer have to restart its cell phone several times daily to prompt it to "find" a cell signal that never actually went away. The support staff who contact me speak English as a first language in an accent I don't have to fight through, and they can actually physically see what's coming in over the monitor rather than transferring me to somebody who possibly knows something in order to answer a question. It uses 4 leads which snap to little round sticky patches that stay on till they won't, rather than a strip I need to remove twice a day, more if I get wet.

The only drawback I can see is the possibility that I'm allergic to this adhesive, despite it being hypoallergenic. One of those sticky patches is itching. So we'll see. I'm not counting the fact that the little gadget which records and transmits has a tendency to fall off my waistband at odd times as an actual drawback. Either it dangles by its wire connectors and swings for half a minute, or only drops to the rug by the toilet. No harm, no foul, eh? I'm simply reminded to check it's properly clipped on, and take care when changing clothes, becoming active, etc. When too many hands are needed, the hard case it's in fits nicely between the teeth!

For several seconds, anyway. If I keep my head up, I don't actually drool.

As a final bonus, once my test week is over, the device signals me when I change the last battery that I'm done. Rather than boxing everything up and taking it over to UPS immediately to avoid extra charges, I just bring it in with me to my next appointment. For a little extra perspective here, that appointment is only about a third of the distance as the UPS store.

So says the retired driver used to 500 miles a day!

Farewell To An Old Friend

Old? I guess you could call him old, being 81. He was physically showing signs of it, systems no longer in tip top shape, slowing in his movements, although his mind, from what I could see, was still mighty sharp and he never became that "grumpy"old man.

I'm referring to Bob (Robert) Kroll as an old friend, however, having known him since 1983. That makes him one of the three very dear friends I've known the longest who are still in my life.

Were. It's an adjustment.

He died suddenly this April 24th. They believe it was a massive brain hemorrhage, the kind that would take him from walking and talking to fallen on the ground and forever unresponsive. My mom went the same way,  silenced in the middle of a sentence while talking to Dad. Bob had experienced a few minor falls which worried them both enough to seek a medical opinion, so the idea of TIAs had already been brought up. While Joan originally thought the fall had caused the damage, the coroner thinks it happened in reverse, the damage causing the fall.

Almost as bad was what happened after. Bob was Catholic, devoted to his Church. He would have wanted last rites. It never came into question. It's what Catholics did. Until they could be performed, he was put on life support. The hospital's chaplain assisted Joan in finding Bob a priest. It was a long hard slog. The first, his own priest for many years, declined to attend him, saying he was out of the priest's district. Others were  contacted, more excuses given. At some point Joan commented to the chaplain (what we all think at least for a flash at this point, admit it) that this was surprising considering how much time they apparently had to spend molesting children. After a long search, a willing priest was found to give Bob his last rites. Life support was removed. Joan said her last goodbyes while he drew his final breaths.

Memories remain.

Back in 1983 I was directed to a support group in the Twin Cities called We Care. It was originally founded by a minister who was looking for a way his "re-singled" parishioners, aka divorced, separated, or widowed, could connect and help each other grow and heal, all having many similar issues. Now several years later when divorce was still not a topic of "polite" conversation, this was one of the rare, and perhaps only non-religious, ways for many of us to gather. By this time it had grown to many branches scattered around the metro area, had trained facilitators, and had a non-profit management board in place. There were ground rules which made it a safe place to open up and share your experiences and feelings with small groups of others going through the same things. Those conversations were extremely open and deep, topics ranging widely with several offered each meeting to choose from. Friends made there were the kind who lasted.

I made three extremely important ones that year, all of us there after a divorce: Bob Kroll, his now-widow Joan, and my Steve. For a while, We Care was one of the most important things in our lives. Each of us either was or soon became one of those trained facilitators, and each served some time on the Fellowship for Renewed Living board, some in officer positions. We attended special weekend-long workshops developed by FRL to explore different issues in great depth, offered one or more times a year. Professionals were brought in as workshop speakers  for the large groups before attendees split into small discussion groups, same ground rules applying. It was something which Joan and I shared at one particular workshop - and confidentiality still applies - that brought the two of us close. When one is feeling very vulnerable about something previously unshared with anybody, and someone else understands and has something similar to offer back, the bond can be incredible.

I've already explained how I met Steve, and how that friendship is still the core of our relationship. While I can't recall just how and where I met or noticed Bob, I knew I liked his keen mind and unfailing kindness. He was an electrical engineer for the phone company, aka Ma Bell, and many from We Care in his particular circle of friends also worked there. (I had briefly myself, but hate to talk about it because it was the only job I've gotten fired from. 'Nuff said.) Bob had divorced his first wife, having three children, one of which they'd adopted.

Bob and I dated for something over a year. During that time I learned a lot of details about him. I'd tease him about being a Pole who was born on St. Paddy's Day. It made his birthday memorable even if it was a lousy joke. He had come to Minnesota from Detroit, having a brother and parents still there. For years he wore a mustache, giving him a very prominent upper lip. I was shocked to see how his face changed once he shaved it off, leaving that lip flat. Surely that hadn't been all hair?

As a couple, we were comfortable together. I thought that was enough. It certainly was orders of magnitude better than my marriage had been. Bob was wiser than I, however, deciding to break it off. Problem was, he/we kept reconnecting and disconnecting. That process took so long that it was finally Joan who came to me and told me Bob was already in a new relationship - with her! She couldn't believe I would forgive her for "stealing him" from me. I couldn't get her to believe I'd known this had been ending for months. What's to forgive? It could finally be a clean break - and was - and besides, who better for him to leave me for than Joan? I still consider her my best woman friend, Steve being my best man friend.

Bob had helped me in several ways during that time. First, there was the reassurance that my ex was wrong in saying there would never ever in my life who "loved" me as much as he did. Or at all. I'd never find another guy who wanted me. While I hadn't wanted to believe him, the fact that this relationship lasted over a year meant my ex was wrong: it wasn't me who was the problem. I wouldn't have to spend the rest of my life lonely. Bob left me knowing I could find decent guys to really care, perhaps someday "the" guy.

He also helped me when I was starting my courier career. Because he lived at that time in downtown Minneapolis, I harbored the silly thought that I could find his place, that meant I could navigate my way into and out of "the loop". My very first day at work I found out with great frustration and humiliation just how wrong I was. Each different street wound up in a different spot, some dumping onto a freeway, some crossing into a different, and isolated, neighborhood. I'd gotten so tangled up that I nearly cost the company a customer and myself a job. I found a phone and called Bob, inviting myself over so we could put together a handwritten map "cheat sheet". I referred to that for about a year, until I knew where every street went and how to get everywhere from everywhere else.

One night early in my travels, I was in the process of trying not to get lost in the Eagan area. It was night, snow was moderately deep, and there was no place to pull over on the freeway to make sure I hadn't overshot my exit which seemed like it should have been miles behind me by now. I'd even forgotten the name of where I wanted to get off, frustration doing that to me a lot those days. My solution was to pull off on the next ramp and park off on the side of it away from other exiting traffic, where I could check my map book again. Unfortunately, the plows had cleared a level path out of the snow over where the actual land underneath had sloped away. I was stuck in the snow.

New as I was to the job, and my earnings low enough yet to be unable to afford a tow, I called Bob for help. Now it occurs to me to wonder just where I found the phone, since it would be years before I broke down and bought a cell, but whatever I did is lost in the deep dark recesses of my brain. Regardless, I persuaded him to come out there, driving up the same exit ramp I was stuck on, bringing a sturdy rope to pull my car forward a few feet to where there was dry pavement with full traction. I had to assure him he himself would have dry pavement to keep his car on so he wouldn't get stuck too. He not only believed me, I got pulled out in plenty of time to finish the run I was on.

Bob and Joan dated until he was relocated by Ma Bell to a southern office. Minneapolis to Phoenix allowed them to spend serious time together only a few times a year, so Joan relocated. I was the one who drove her moving truck down there, picked because I liked to drive, had familiarity with one-ton trucks, and just plain volunteered for it. She'd been considering another offer but was leery of letting that person drive all that way with her treasures, so once convinced I really meant the offer, told me she happily accepted it. Another friend of hers, Carol, came along to share the driving of her car.

It was a memorable trip, and while this is about Bob, I include it here as much to refresh Joan's memories as she reads this, as to show how happy I was that those two were getting together even if it meant I would miss seeing them. (That, of course, would change later.) Besides, by then, Bob was a part of the inseparable unit of Joan-&-Bob.

I'm used to traveling as cheaply as possible, but Joan booked us in motels which offered actual breakfasts before we hit the road again. Her picking up the tab was her way of "paying" us for helping her. The road trip itself would have been fine reward for me. One night when we'd been going westbound into the setting sun, we pulled off for dinner and to save our eyeballs. Getting back on the freeway became a part of this trip's story, however. A semi was parked on the ramp. Their compact car scooted right past, clearing it with no problems. I couldn't risk scraping the truck on one side and/or dropping wheels off onto an unknown surface on the other, and had to wait a few minutes for it to move. We'd had a plan worked out for signaling each other for needing stops, but it hadn't occurred to them that there would be an issue, and they were so quickly gone that I had no way to signal them. Remember: way before we had cellphones. I proceeded along the freeway, never seeing them pulled over to the side, just hoping somebody would notice eventually that I wasn't following and would find me. It was completely dark, so identifying each other's vehicle was really a challenge. Dark car is just another dark car in a universe of dark cars. Headlights and taillights are just more of the same. Nothing says, "Joan". Eventually we reconnected, adjusting our contingency plan for this unforseen  issue.

Joan decided part of our reward, since we were ahead of schedule for arriving in Phoenix where Bob had would have an unloading crew ready, was to stop at Montezuma's Well. I'd never heard of it, despite by then having traveled this route several times to visit my snowbirding parents, and thoroughly enjoyed the stop. Leaving meant a climb out of the Verde Valley: beautiful, curving, long, and steep. By about a third of the way up, the truck decided 45 mph was now its top speed, even with the pedal floored. I accumulated an annoyed following, this being before a third lane for slow trucks was added. At least, in daylight, Joan and Carol quickly figured out what was happening and adjusted accordingly. With all that, we still arrived at Bob's house on time, unloading crew ready to get to work. Joan did the figures on trip mileage before returning the truck. The odometer claimed 1850 miles, Minneapolis to Phoenix. This was back when they charged by the mile for the rental. My car trip meter shows the trip from 55 miles further north at Shafer to Sun City on the same route to be a mere 1813. Guess which I trust?

After a few years living together, Bob got his Catholic annulment and married Joan in a tastefully pretty little wedding chapel in Las Vegas. I flew down for it, sharing a Motel 6 room with another mutual friend from We Care named Rosemary. She and I took the bus tour to the Hoover Dam while Joan and Bob were tending to all the pre-wedding details and out-off-town family. Rosemary and I walked (!!! Yeah, that's how long ago it was) down the strip, taking in the scenery, shooting fountains, lights, architecture. There was actually one stop inside a casino where a quarter was wasted at a slot machine that might have actually paid off BIG to a lucky somebody else. The wedding itself was lovely, the reception had good food and a great cake, and the loving supportive relationship the two had before marriage continued as before. Only now, Bob's Catholic conscience was soothed.

Their move to Arizona meant I was once or limited in my visits to Joan and Bob to the twice a year times I came down driving my folk's car while they flew from St. Paul. While there I also pruned the many plants around their 10' x 52' Park Model with a covered carport, discovering early that everything that grows in Arizona has thorns. Some are just nastier than others. Leisure time during those trips was spent visiting Joan and Bob, now relocated from northeastern Phoenix to Sun City West, just a couple miles away from my folks. After my folks quit heading south, I'd manage to fly down for a few days most years, and hour-long phone calls continued.

I liked their previous home well enough, but this new one had advantages. It was a senior community, providing lots of amenities you'd have had to travel well out of your neighborhood for before. It was single level instead of two, and my knees were getting ready to tell me just how that mattered. The new yard, stones instead of grass, open instead of fenced, surrounded the house on all sides instead of three, where before one side of their house was part of the wall on the next neighbor's yard. This new yard had citrus trees, and the house a glassed-in lanai within which to watch the birds and bunnies, and admire whatever might be flowering within view or ripening for picking. The cats may not have had grass to wander freely through, but that seemed like the only possible downside. Aside, that is, from having to clean something that big.

Yes, of course there were cats. Joan is a CAT PERSON. Don't confuse this with the stereotypical house filled to the brim with cats and stench, not in any way. But Joan has always, so far as I know, loved and had a cat or two. Bob surprised me by getting his own cat after moving south, as when I'd known him he hadn't had one. Possibly that was a landlord issue. I'd never thought to ask. That orange tom, Sunny, was the only cat I ever met who liked cantaloupe. After all the cats then in the family had died, they discovered a program called Seniors for Seniors. It gives homes to elderly cats, considered unadoptable, with older owners. It also takes care of vet bills of the cats, often unaffordable by retirees and preventing them from considering taking in a cat, however wanted.

Once they moved close to where my parents spent their winters, visiting them had become easier. It might be a short visit to their home, or a trip to see some feature of the state we all wanted to visit. At least they were willing to go see whatever it was without complaining they'd perhaps seen it 5 times before and it was still there. With the advantage of being able to schedule a visit far enough in advance, I secured tickets to Kartchner Caverns for the three of us shortly after it opened. Often I would become acquainted with a spot on a trip with them, and later turn it into some place I'd take the folks too, as by then their own driving became fairly limited. Recently, those same tours get made with visitors to Steve and me.

Bob had his own unique way of pronouncing place names. Or should I say mispronouncing? I may never actually know whether a certain peak is PEEK-ah-choo or Pih-KAH-cho. It'll always be both now. I'd hear all these names because while Bob drove he was ever the tour guide, pointing out anything of interest. It's because of him I knew where the new Intel plant was going up before I'd barely heard of Intel. Back then it was in the middle of nowhere. Now, it's still visible from the freeway, at least.

When I had decided that for my own retirement I was going to try to move down here at least for winters, I still believed it would be impossible given my finances. The two of them showed me the local market over one of my visits. There were plenty of open houses, so we saw duplexes, single family houses, condos, and even a brand new mobile home park (not so mobile) going up fairly close to them. I knew there was no way I was ever going to aim for anything as big as where they lived, but also wound up finding it hard to believe I could find anything I both would want and might be able to afford. But despite my doubts, I now had the grounding to work and dream from. Ironically, the Recession made it possible by bottoming out home prices.

Lately, even after moving back in close proximity to Joan & Bob, actual time spent together remained much less than I had imagined. One thing changed that: Grandmothers For Peace. We spend two mornings a month demonstrating together, carrying on conversations between periods of high decibel road noise. Hugs are also exchanged, something started in We Care and never abandoned.

Two weeks ago was the final one Bob attended. While usually I sit next to Joan for conversation, this time my chair was next to Bob. For most of an hour and a half, we talked. Some health stuff, some family, mostly politics. The organization isn't partisan, but many of us individually are and with the same leanings. Down here it's too easy to feel the minority in a very strange land. So the ability to have that kind of conversation with a long time friend feels good.

It was the last one we had. While I know the friendship will continue with Joan, and know we can share good memories and feel his loss, it was a good friendship and he will be missed. Rest in peace, Bob.