The people I am acquainted with at my church are not among my social friends, yet I look forward to seeing them week after week. We give each other a nod and occasionally exchange pleasantries. Such is my church community. Some of the regulars shift their attendance patterns and then I wonder where they are or if something has happened to them.
One lady I saw regularly, not more than fifty-ish, with mid length salt and pepper grey hair, was always in her regular spot and I came into the church after she was settled, or we spoke briefly out in the parking lot.
The last time I saw her I had parked my car in the lot outside Medical Building 4 at Parma Hospital and was on my way to some testing while she was leaving the building and was going to the parking lot. We both smiled and greeted each other, then went on with our agendas. I never saw her again, not at the church, nor anywhere else. Every time I go to that medical building for annual tests and lab work, I visualize her.
The day before I went there, it was eighty humid degrees and sunny, but winter slapped us in the face with a drop in temperature, strong breezes and cold rain this first day of autumn. A tall gentleman offered me his arm as I made my way from the handicapped parking slots, which I thankfully accepted. He left me at the reception desk, fishing in my purse with cold hands for a mask.
On my way back to my car, a lovely young lady offered to help me and I raised my now wrapped left hand – the lab tech could not get the blood draw without trying two different places on the left arm and hand, a second needle, then she put a wrap around the hand to hold the bandage in place. The blood draw was difficult and left a good sized hematoma where what did come seeped under the skin across half of the hand. What should have been a simple process turned into an unpleasant business.
This is the time of the year when I try to schedule lunches with friends I don’t otherwise see, so we can catch up on each others events and then go into winter knowing we have at least touched base.
It was not my plan to start my autumn stock up from the stores, but when the twenty percent off of all things in the store showed up in my e-mail, I thought I should do that. I liked the Wolfgang Puck tomato basil soup last time I bought it, but there was only one can left on the shelf. I took a can of his chicken noodle too just to try it out. The label said organic, free range and such. That evening I opened it up and heated it in the microwave and it was so very delicious I wished I bought about six cans!
Normally I try not to turn the heat on in the house until the first of October, but when the indoor temp dropped to 65 degrees and only rose one degree the next day, I said, I need to warm the place up and I dropped the thin summer jeans I had been wearing into the laundry chute, they will get folded up for the winter when they are washed.
ponderingalongthemilkyway 