I pull over as far as I can onto exit 14, heading east on the 52. I’m as far to the side on the onramp as possible so that cars can make their egress without crashing into my car. Well, it’s not really my car. It’s my mom’s 1999 Lincoln Continental. It’s going nowhere on its own from here. I am as certain it has a blown transmission as I am of my own name.

Just when you think you’ve been given enough trouble, stress, anxiety—WHAM!! A new problem presents itself, and you must pull on your nearly empty reserves in order to deal with it. That’s what happened to me yesterday. A day with lots of promise, but yesterday went back on its promise.

That’s okay. Happens all the time to all of us, right? Sometimes, though, it just gets old, dealing with one thing after another.

In the moment it took to make it to the side of the freeway, relatively out of harm’s way, I felt myself buckling and I had to reach down into whatever it is that sustains me and grab some pluck. That’s exactly the word for it. Pluck.

Fearlessly, I went into problem solving mode, knowing that the outcome would be a good one if I could hang on to my courage and my thinking skills. Do not panic. Easy to say, but there are cars whizzing by at high speeds and I have to time opening the car door carefully.

Earlier in the day I had tried to open the hood of this vehicle to no avail. I didn’t expect to have a problem with the hood release lever, but it didn’t do its only job to release the hood latch. Damn. How can I check the fluid in the transmission if I can’t get the hood open? Simple answer? I can’t.

I wasn’t having any trouble with the car’s transmission at the time, but the fluid leak had me concerned. I wasn’t positive it was the transmission fluid, but it was my best guess. I went ahead with my plans to drive the car. Bad decision, as it turns out.

In some small way it was gratifying to know later that my supposition about the transmission was correct. Having all the fluid leak out was not what I expected. No way.

My main concern at that moment the transmission stopped doing its thing was that my 99 year old mom was alone and expecting me. Oh, sure, Abby was with her. But Abby is a dog. She’s a good dog too, but she can’t make Mom dinner and keep her from wheeling herself out onto the ramp and then right out the gate to the neighborhood sidewalk. Mom’s been known to do this.

The caregiver is good about putting up the little child gate so that Mom can’t go down the ramp, but who knows if she remembered today? Maybe this will be the day that my inventive mother figures out how to remove the barrier. Squashing these thoughts, I scramble for the AAA membership card and dial for road service.

I’ve been taught (by said mother) to be honest in my dealings with others. In this case, it didn’t work out very well. Telling the woman on the phone that I was the member’s daughter wasn’t getting me what I needed. Instead, she wanted my mother, the AAA Club member, to be the one to request the towing service. Oh, this AAA representative would gladly sell me a policy right then and there, in which case they would gladly get the car off the road for me.

Thanks anyway, Lady. Plan B. I dialed again, hoping to get a different rep, and impersonated my mother. Sounding distraught I explained that my daughter was driving my car when it decided it would no longer run. “My daughter is stranded on the freeway. Can you please send someone?”

Honesty is the best policy, but it didn’t get me a tow. My deception got me the tow. And a ride to Mom’s with a very kind and competent tow truck driver.

Today the old Lincoln Continental is sitting in a shop where broken cars get fixed. I’m thinking it will need a whole new tranny. (That’s guy talk for transmission). I’m going to rent a car for a couple days so I can do some errands. AAA got me a discount on the rental car.

I admit I am sick of problem solving. There has been too much of it going on in my world lately.

However, I’ve learned that it’s not what happens to me that ever really matters. Rather, it’s how I deal with what happens to me. In this case, my life’s mission isn’t a failure. It is merely the car’s transmission failure. This too shall pass.

At 84, when my father-in-law, Jay, got his cancer diagnosis, they told him he had 6 months to a year to live. With treatments he might get another 3 months, but those treatments don’t equate to 3 months of quality of life.

After his doctor told him, I don’t know exactly what went on in his heart of hearts, but what he demonstrated was grace and appreciation. He publicly remarked that he was grateful that he had lived a good life—been all the places he wanted to go and done many things of which he was proud. In the last eleven years he readily expressed how he had found happiness with his (3rd) wife, Valerie. She had brought him joy and given him unconditional love.

Merry Christmas 2007 Jay & Valerie

Disclaimer: Well, except she did make him eat healthier. That’s what a good wife does, right?

Jay had fair warning that death was coming soon. Did he change his way of living? Not at all. There was no rushing around to see more of the world or buying toys or much of anything different for him, even though he felt pretty good for the first 6 months after his diagnosis.

He told me he liked to sit in his recliner chair and read and watch old westerns on TV. He wanted Valerie in her chair right next to him. That’s what made him happiest. Instead of broadening his world, he honed in on it, making it smaller. He was at peace with a simple life. I would go as far as saying he was happy. He never complained. Not once.

And in the last months, Valerie was all about making it what he wanted. When it got to be too much for her to do alone, she asked me to come. I will be forever grateful for that phone call and the time I got to spend with them in the last couple months of his life.

Witnessing the stages when someone is actively dying can be hard on the ones who are there to hold down the fort. But it can be magical too, and precious. A few occasions brought us belly laughs, like the time the three of us were watching a Paul Newman movie and the camera panned to a couple playing poker. We were not expecting to see a naked woman at the poker table, but there she was with her perky, big boobs staring at us. Dad quickly drew in an audible surprise breath and said joyfully, “You thought I was asleep, didn’t you?”

One time I offered to clean his glasses and he was reluctant to let me for some reason. But I was anxious to please and after dousing them with soap and water, I proceeded to dry and polish them. As he put them back on I asked him if they were better. With a twinkle in his eye he told me, “That’s okay for a first try, I guess.” Oh, he could be sarcastic, but that was one of the things I loved about him.

His hospice care was a finely tuned machine. There may have been a few hiccups, but those small instances were overpowered by superb care. Appropriate medicine and equipment was delivered right to the door. The people involved in giving the care are unsung heroes. They anticipate needs of the patient and perform their duties with (dare I say?) what can only be described as love. Mostly things went without a hitch. The family caregivers (Val and I) were supported by hospice as well. They educated us about the stages of dying, so we knew what to expect, and they gave us much needed TLC. Hospice was a beautiful thing.

Between the care given by hospice and Valerie and me, we made Dad comfortable as he participated in his walk with cancer. It’s not all pretty; much of it is messy, and some of it is just plain heartbreaking. But as caregivers our only goals were to allow him dignity and provide him comfort, as he went on with this final journey. Dad died on July 17, 2015. He wanted, and got, a military service. Bless his heart.

If you ever get a chance to help someone die, I recommend you do. It will be tough. Maybe the hardest thing you ever do. But it is the greatest gift you can give—to love someone so much—to help him make a smooth transition from life to death. Rest in peace, Dad. We hold on to our love.

At a Window

BY CARL SANDBURG

Give me hunger,

O you gods that sit and give

The world its orders.

Give me hunger, pain and want,

Shut me out with shame and failure

From your doors of gold and fame,

Give me your shabbiest, weariest hunger!

But leave me a little love,

A voice to speak to me in the day end,

A hand to touch me in the dark room

Breaking the long loneliness.

In the dusk of day-shapes

Blurring the sunset,

One little wandering, western star

Thrust out from the changing shores of shadow.

Let me go to the window,

Watch there the day-shapes of dusk

And wait and know the coming

Of a little love.