“You just never know what might happen.”
Mom’s last car was a two-door Honda Accord LX. A ‘78. Manual transmission. She wouldn’t own an automatic because “you’re not really driving.” She’d given up her ’69 Toyota Corona two-door hardtop because brother Beebo needed a car for his frequent commute up to Central Oregon and, although it was far from worn out, she’d pass it on and get a replacement. Mom didn’t like in four-door cars. It seems that decades before, some little kid was riding in the back seat of a big old Buick or Packard when the back door swung open rounding a bend somewhere near Pasadena and the kid fell out knocking his head on the pavement. The kid probably died. I don’t know. But that’s why she’d never let Dad buy a car with more than two doors.
The Honda was a pretty good car. Honda’s always have been. With gold paint and the upgraded LX appointments, this purchase may may have been the only time Mom, having grown up during the depression, splurged on much of anything. As a teenager, I recall her Hoover being older than I. And the ancient Sunbeam Mix-Master was still working when Dad purchased a shiny new Kitchen-Aid for her one Christmas – a gift for which he was roundly excoriated.
Mom loved the car. Long retired, she rarely drove anywhere other than to Safeway once a week and to Partridge Elementary School to pick up a grandkid when needed. Every month-and-a-half she’d take a six-mile round trip through town to the Chevron station between Broadway and Main Street on Eighth. There were countless gas stations between her north-of-town home and that Chevron, but this one was most convenient because she could turn left out of the little subdivision street onto the main drag that would lead a one-way that headed south though town; left into the station; then left out of the station onto the one-way leading north. She believed in filling up before it got to half-a-tank because, “you just never know what might happen.”
Once, I exercised some courageous temerity and asked Mom why she engaged in an eight-mile round trip for gas when there were so many other options so much nearer. She corrected me: “It is only six miles!” and suggested, “When you get older, you’ll understand.”
Indeed, I was a bit older when I came to understand. One day, shortly after that little Q&A, Mom gave up driving. “Macular degeneration,” she explained. “I can’t see well enough to drive anymore.”
“Macular degeneration. Yikes. That doesn’t sound good.”
“It certainly isn’t good.”
“How long has this been goin on?” I asked.
“Oh, for some time now.”
The question I didn’t ask was whether she thought she could see well enough when she was driving around that grandchild, but she volunteered: “I drove down to Eighth and Main for gas because I could see out of the driver’s side of the car better than the other side. Left turns always seemed safer.” My eyes still grow wide and my heart still skips a beat or two when I think about that statement. “At my last exam, Dr. Lott, my ophthalmologist, asked how I got to the appointment. When I told him I drove myself, he asked for my keys, which I gave him and then he called your brother Beebo, to pick me up.” She paused. “I didn’t like that he called me ‘crazy.’”
The Honda would sit on slowly flattening tires for years until she finally let it go. I think to Beebo. (I certainly didn’t need it. It only had two doors.)
Career necessitated my move out of town – two, maybe three hours away. That conversation took place during one of my once or twice-a-month visits. I would take Mom on errands and then to lunch at the Olive Garden. “Livin’ kinda high on the hog, aren’t we?” she’d comment as she stashed once-warm breadsticks in her ancient purse.
Mom learned to take advantage of a ride service called the Clipper. At her age, the pass was free or nearly so. With a mere phone call, she could arrange trips to doctor appointments or to Safeway. “It’s so convenient and so simple and the drivers are so nice. They help me in and out and load my groceries.” She smiled over her tepid cup of minestrone and looked at me through her dim brown eyes and smudged – because it no longer mattered if they were smudged – glasses. “Everyone should use the Clipper.”
“Everyone?”
“Well, everyone who gets to be a certain age,” she said. “You know, Barbara’s still driving and so is Grace. Tooling around town in those big old cars. Probably blind as bats. Ellie is too and she’s at least eight years older than I am.”
“So is their vision beginning to fail?” I immediately wished I’d not chosen that word.
“I don’t know, but they’re all far older than seventy-five and that’s just too old to be driving around. They’re just accidents waiting to happen.”
“Have they already been in accidents?”
“They’re all at least seventy-five! You know your Dad had to stop driving when he was seventy-one.”
“But Dad had a stroke and was suffering with dementia. Couldn’t find his way around.”
“And he couldn’t even find his damned glasses!”
I had to nod.
“I was seventy-five when Dr. Lott made me stop driving and I think that’s about old enough for anyone!” Adding, “You know, you just never know what might happen.”
Mom lived independently for at least another decade fumbling blindly around the house, and then in assisted living for about another ten years.
I find I am often haunted by Mom’s words. Some more than others. I sip the occasional whiskey and smoke the occasional cigar. I like my steaks medium rare rather than well done. I listen to some rock n roll music along with some classical and some show tunes. I’ve long been registered a Democrat. Our Subaru has four doors as have most of our cars. Hell, my ‘91 Jeep didn’t have any doors at all and neither of our kids nor any of their friends ever fell out of any back seat of it or any car we ever owned.
So what I think I’m most haunted by is Mom’s ‘still driving at seventy-five’ decree.
You see, in May of this year, I turn seventy-four.
© 2024
There was no arguing with Frances. A Clipper driver bought that car.
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