OUR TRIP TO OWENSBORO

Mama and I went to Owensboro today. Lunch, the most important thing, was first on our agenda. We talked about eating at Lic's since Mama had been talking about their chicken salad. I like one of their sandwiches but can never remember which one. Ruby Tuesday was an option since we had to go to the mall. Before Christmas I saw a place on 2nd Street that I hadn't seen before and it looked interesting so we ate there. It turned out to be FAMOUS BISTRO. I'm not good at parallel parking so I barely got the car off the street. We chose a table away from the door, a table with photographs under glass. The photographs were current and some faces were familiar. As I started to look around the room I realized the walls were covered with art and old photographs. Some of the photographs were framed individually but many were matted in groups, some seemed connected, some not. The owner, George, wasn't there but we discovered the photographs are of his family, mostly taken in Greece. Mama wasn't able to see them very well but I took some of them off the wall so she could try and get a look at them. Two of the photographs were of an old man, one shot was of him looking in a store window, the other was a full face shot as he walks away from the window. I can't get the picture out of my mind. Above that frame was a photograph of five women. All had their heads covered in scarfs, two had canes. They are all smiling. The largest frame holds several small photographs, the most intriguing is of a woman sitting beside a table with her hand holding her chin, she is in shadows, a lighted lamp on the table is a direct contrast to the face in the near dark. Fascinating. We had wonderful food, salami grinders, potato salad made with new red potatoes, broccoli salad that was to die for. Plenty of iced tea. It was all so good. Then on to the mall. Our first stop was Sears. Mama isn't crazy about being pushed in a wheel chair so we parked at the Sears end. She had a gift certificate and was looking for a rug to put in the front of her kitchen sink. She wanted to buy me everything we looked at. She decided on two rugs, one for the kitchen and one to go beside her bed. Next we looked for a pair of gray pants, which we couldn't find. All the time, she is wanting to buy me things. We are happy to find the battery she needs for her phone that is for the hearing impaired (she can't hear it ring). Just as we get to checkout she remembers she left her gift certificate at home. She buys the rugs and is happy. We head back to the car and go park at Penny's, again to look for gray pants, which we find, but do they fit, NO! So she says she will buy Coty powder, and will buy me some too. No, I say, I don't use it. I tell her I don't think Penny's has cosmetics, she says of course they do. They don't. Well, they used to, she says. And hand lotion too. Back to the car we go. Next to Staples, which we forget until we are far down the street, back we go for her journal. I forgot to get it for her for Christmas so now she has it. She has kept her journal in the same type of book for many years. Now to Walmart. I have to make a return. She needs a watch band, which we find and the kind jewelry lady puts it on for her, we forget the powder (I just now remember), she gets her glasses fixed in the optical shop, then on to the grocery where she finds everything she wants. To the car and home. All day she has worried that she is in my way, I'm bothering her, she wants to buy me things, she should be dead, she knows I'm about dead, are my ribs hurting (yes, they are, but I don't tell her), can she cook my supper, am I weak (no, I'm not), do I need some crackers (no, still full from lunch), do I have to do anything tomorrow (probably), and so on. She doesn't realize that I'm glad to do these things for her. She taught me this behavior although she was always much better at it than me. It was a good day, a happy day. We ended our trip with her hanging her cane in the strap of my purse which hampered her efforts to get out of the car.