Mrs. Muleshoe

When Mom is laying flat, between procedures, feeling and hearing gurgles in her tummy and worried about what's next...when none of us have words that will help because we just don't know what to do...what do you do besides feel helpless?  Sit and be quiet and wipe a tear from her eye, readjust the cables that seem to all lump up under her chin to under the blanket, knowing they will creep up again but this one tuck might make a difference...  The snake's den of cables rivals what's in Dad's computer room.  What can you do?

You can thank God for sending you the little lady from Muleshoe, Texas, whose husband is in ICU, to sit by you and chat.  Surrounded on both sides by 20+ members from a coughing, raucous-talking, tattooed and pregnant, and recently surgically-released family of someone in the ICU, she and I sat for a while today and just chatted quietly.  We decided that those 20 people, minus the 4 small children with them, probably didn't have jobs.  We weren't very kind in our behind-the-magazine-so-they-don't-see-us-being-snippy talk.  They probably didn't even know we were there, so caught up in their family reunion they were.  I'm sure their strength and volume will help heal their loved one.  Lots of love in that family evident from their vocal superiority.

Mrs. Muleshoe was a nice lady, and we bonded.  And she planted a seed in my head of a memory that Mom might like to revisit.  So that's how we helped pass the time before the GI team came in for their procedure this afternoon...which they are doing right now so I can't blog about that...but I wanted to keep this story fresh because it was fun.

From 1973 - 1979, we lived in Clovis, New Mexico. Back then, Clovis had a Kmart and a Sears, a Tankersley's dress and shoe shop, and I think a Rutherford's shoe store, which was beside the jewelry store where where Mom, Jennifer and I got our ears pierced in 1979.  Except for Kmart, which was closer to our house, all these stores were on Main Street, a brick-paved street that I marched in with my brownie troop during Christmas parades.   That's about all you need to know about Clovis.  That, the barber shop and the A&W drive in, and you've got the whole city covered in the mid 1970's. 

Partially due to the lack of variety, and definitely due to the need to get out of town, each year when we needed new school clothes, we drove to Lubbock, Texas.  They had a mall there. I loved going to Lubbock.  I remember being squished in the back of our gold 1978 Honda Accord coupe, the first year they were available (in Clovis anyway).  That was a great car.  I remember driving past the best barbecue place in town that had the paper towels and white bread loaves on the picnic tables inside, past the motels and car dealerships, past the back of the Welcome to New Mexico sign, which of course I always turned back around to see, and to Texaco, New Mexico. Then, bump bump bump across the railroad tracks to the VERY EXCITING STATE of Texas. 

Farwell, Texas led to Muleshoe, Texas (here's the memory seed) where there was a Dairy Queen (or similar place, I remember it as a DQ but Dad says he doesn't...I think he doesn't remember because he never stopped and I remember because I asked him to every single time) and a statue of a mule.  It was a very big deal to drive through Muleshoe. 

So I asked Mom today, what did we pass when we drove from Clovis to Lubbock? In a little town after Texaco and Farwell?  She remembered with a real smile, "The horse!" she said. Close enough, it's a very horse-looking mule.  I asked what else is in Muleshoe?  She thought quietly and shook her head..."Nothing."  "Well, that's true, but there are 2 distinct other things in Muleshoe. One of them is cows.  And what comes with cows?"  "I don't know."  "Flies."  "Oh yea, there sure were lots of flies." Her face relaxed, she was really remembering driving with all of us piled into that car.  She was with me in the car...

Fast forward to the mall at Lubbock.

Me "What did we always get to eat in Lubbock, something we only got at the mall, and we loved it so much? There are 2 things specifically."

Mom, seriously thinking, relaxed face, eyes closed, "I don't remember...at the mall?"

Me "Here's a clue...it's a color, you drink it..."

Mom "I don't know...tell me."  (several rounds of clues)

Me "Orange Julius"

Mom, completely relaxed now, big grin, eyebrows raised "Oh yes, Orange Julius! That was so good!"

We walked the same walk with Hickory Farms, remembering how we always snacked on the beef stick samples and the Havarti cheese.  Then we talked about the big fat pretzels with the white rock salt on it.  And we talked a bit about Red Lobster, where Jennifer lost a tooth on a saltine cracker, and where to this day none of us can go without re-telling that story  

We walked the walk through the campsite where we would for a very special occasion go camping in our Midas Mini Motorhome, white with a orange stripe and orange/green shag carpet inside.  We saw in our  minds the little prairie dog town that I remember loving so much, watching those cute little animals play and play.  

It was a little 20 minute chat, probably not more than that, but a nice walk sharing memories with Mom.  It reminded us of happy, carefree times.  A little mental break from the physical difficulties of today. 

A flood of memories, thanks to a chance encounter with the little lady from Muleshoe.