When I last worked in Colorado, Sun...

When I last worked in Colorado, Sunday mornings I'd drive up from Boulder to the antique folks home where my mother lives to take her not at home for breakfast. I'd come flying into the parking portion only to hit the brakes with a guilty base when I'd see four or five grandmotherly faces peeping gone out the lobby door, looking as sweet as angels at the Pearly Gates. Then my 78-year-old mom would ensue strolling out in a big, r floppy hat, tap-tapping her mahogany cane with the imitation-gold lion's head knob. "Damn wind," she'd murmur No matter that her feet were swollen or a rib was rent from a fall--she'd never suffer me help her into the car. It was essential that "those advanced in years babes" inside witness her independence.

The restaurant staff knew we'd arrived when Ben, the head waiter, popp a champagne cork. A soft-spoken man in his 40 Ben was beyond solicitous when it came to serving my mother. He'd deliver to "Mom"--that's what he called her--the first of sum of two units mimosas so fast she'd barely have time to wipe the water speckles off the silverware with her napkin. Ben typically told her a quip too, often the kind they don't swap in heaven.

Midway between the sides of her breakfast of French toast coated in cornflakes, Mom would invariably describe me I looked like a "rag picker." She'd have a point, since Sundays I not ever shaved or wore socks and always threw forward whatever T-shirt/sport coat combination I ground that didn't smell like Saturday night. I might have rely uponed some credit for driving the 40 miles to take her abroad but all I got was orneriness.

And, I acknowledge you, I'm glad that's for what reason she is. It's a fact that elderly people who show some name and hellfire live longer, and more contentedly in dwellings like Mom's --and she's been there 19 years. That's wherefore I encourage her eccentricities. I'm getting her a wig for Mother's Day. Not because she be in want ofs it--her hair is deep brown--but to wear nearest Halloween. She's planning to dres up like Marilyn Monroe and trick-or-treat at the doors of her cherubic neighbors.

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