Last spring, my 94 year old nextdoor neighbor, Euel, voluntarily turned in his car keys. “I’m concerned I’ll hurt someone or myself and I don’t want to risk that.”
Euel has been a widower about six years, but remained active driving to Denny’s each morning to see the “regulars” at breakfast, bowling with his long-time team and chairing the local Coca Cola Club meetings.
All that stopped when he quit driving.
It took a couple of weeks of his car not being parked in front of his house for me to realize something had changed. He told me he had made arrangements with a grand niece (the only relative in the state) to take him grocery shopping, the doctors and other errands. She was only coming by once a week though.
I take multiple short walks daily and so started knocking on his door once a day asking, “Do you want to take a walk?”
he was unsteady at first I decided it was the cane his doctor told him to use. Not sure who’s idea it was to put people on a cane for balance when the cane actually causes one to lean over.
So I went to REI and bought Euel trekking poles. He immediately stood straight and had much better balance. We walk not once, but twice a day now. He always says “yes” when I knock on the door.
He knows more about current events than most anyone you’ll meet, but we agreed we have to limit those talks because we are both horrified at what our country has become. So he tells stories and I listen to clues about what he wished he’d done to be better prepared to be ninety-four.
His first lesson: Keep Up With Technology. Euel has not. He has an old computer and basically can only look at existing files. he’s not updated the program and so can’t view most of what he searches.
He has a flip phone and struggles to see who’s calling and how to return the call.
He can’t order Uber or Lyft or Door Dash.
In short, he is radically dependent upon others for everything. He knows that not such a good thing.
Other neighbors have noticed I take walks with Euel and their reactions have been interesting:
-One said, “You’re making us look bad, Betheny.”
-Another said, “I don’t really know what to do around old people.”
-A third has started taking him to the market with her each week and asks him to walk on the days when I’m out of town.
I remember Euel’s Lesson #1 : Keep Up With Technology each time I want to be lazy and have my husband or son do something on the computer for me because I can’t figure it out.
Once again, my grandfather’s ancient pickup truck required a “rolling start.” He released the brake and we rolled down the hill behind his farmhouse where he parked for just such occasions.
My grandfather, or Gaga as I called him, turned the ignition Nothing.
“One,” I thought.
He tried again with a little more force.
“Two.” I looked out the windshield with several weeks’ worth of bugs splattered on it.
He turned the ignition once more. This time there was a little bit of a grind to the motor.
“Three.” At least we’re getting closer. I looked at the back of the truck and saw Joe, my grandfather’s bird dog, shivering, partly because it was cold and partly because of the excitement of “going somewhere.”
Another turn of the ignition. The motor caught, my grandfather popped the clutch, and we lurched forward, bouncing out of the yard onto the gravel road in front of the house.
“Whoa!” we both said as we hit one more bump and flew off the truck’s vinyl seat.
As we bounced down the road, I smiled and pulled my winter coat up around my neck, settling in for the ride to the “bottom” to hunt for a Christmas tree. We’d been doing this for as long as I could remember. The weekend before Christmas we would always go the low land in the country we called “the bottom.” We’d search through as many pastures as it took before we found the perfect tree.
Mo matter what, it was always cold and a little damp, but we would go, he and I. It was our tradition. Joe’s too.
I think the bird dog knew when it was time to “go hunting.” He’d see Gaga throw the hand saw in the back of the truck, and then Joe would come running and hop up with it. He wagged his tail so hard that it would literally shake his body back and forth, a perfect case of the tail wagging the dog.
Everything was gray. The sky. The trees. Even the grass. But not Joe. He was white and brown and stood out as much as anything could on a gray day.
Gaga and I usually didn’t talk very much on these trips. We’d just drive along in that old white truck of his and wonder if any heat would puff out of the vents so our feet wouldn’t freeze. His truck didn’t have any insulation or padding on the dashboard, the sides or the ceiling. I don’t know if it ever had any or if it had been ripped out or fallen out before or after Gaga bought it from someone in town.
The ”bottom” wasn’t much more than a low area in an otherwise completely flat part of central Texas, but, standing on Gaga’s front porch, you could see a gradual and definite decline in the terrain. And that’s where we would go.
We followed a precise ritual. We’d drive down to a place in the middle of the bottom and pull the truck off on the side of the road. Gaga never pulled too far off because he had done that once and ended up sliding into the ditch.
Once he parked, we would climb out and walk to the back of the truck. As excited as Joe was, he would never leave the truck bed until Gaga lowered the tailgate. Of course, it would always take a couple of yanks before the tailgate would oblige. Once down, Joe would scamper out and head for the fields.
He’d run out ten to twenty yards then turn and run back to us, jumping and barking. Then, he’d run out again, and, again, come back to us, jumping and barking. He’d keep this up until we lifted the tailgate, grab the saw and set out in some particular direction.
We usually didn’t walk very far before we had to get to the other side of a barbed wire fence. So that we wouldn’t leave some “momento” of our journey hanging on the fence, Gaga would hold the top strand of the barbed wire with one hand and push down the second strand with his boot. It was easy to loosen the wires because most of the fences in this part of the state were as old as Gaga’s truck. I’d lean over and climb through the opening Gaga made for me and my short legs. Gaga would just step over the top of the fence with his long, long legs.
Once we’d cross the fence, we’d walk. And walk. And walk. We could never select the first tree we found. You just didn’t do that when you only went “hunting” one time a year.
Sometimes Joe would catch the scent of something and head off in a certain direction. But, he never went far. If he did start to stray too much, Gaga would call for him. “Joe” was all he would say, and Joe would come right back. I once asked my grandfather how he was able to get Joe to return with just saying his name once when I knew most people would yell and scream at their dogs. He shrugged and said, “Joe’s his name. I’m not gonna call him Larry.”
Joe would bound back, pink tongue hanging out and a steamy breath smoking in the chill. He’d run straight to me, jump, put his muddy paws on my coat and slobber. That was our ritual.
When we found a tree we thought might be “the one,” we’d circle around it. Gaga would squat down and study its base, looking for rotting wood, ants or anything else that might be a problem. He’d stroke the needles, feeling for brittleness. He’d scape some of the bark with his thumbnail checking for moistness.
Somehow, we would both know at the same time when we found the right tree. I’d usually say, “This looks like the one for this year, Gaga.” He would walk around it and mentally measure its height to make sure that it would fit inside the house. He’d bend over and look under the branches. Then, without saying a word, he would draw out his saw and cut down “our” tree.
Hauling it to the truck was never easy. We each had to stand on one side of the base, grab a limb and drag it back over “I-don’t-know-how-many-steps” we had taken back to the challenge of getting through the barbed wire fence, now with a six foot tree. But, that too, was part of the hunt. The struggle was always worth it.
The years have passed now, and so have Gaga and Joe. I don’t “hunt” for Christmas trees anymore. I don’t even have a real tree. I have an artificial one. It’s better for the environment and my allergies. Still, “hunting” for Christmas trees remains as much a part of my Christmas tradition as it did all those years ago.
Today, when the rush of the holiday season becomes too much and the commercialism too unbearable, I climb into my white truck, go home, turn down the lights, sit with my son and husband in front of the fireplace, and tell stories about Gaga, Joe and finding the perfect tree.
BethenyReid 