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It's Been an Interesting 5 Days...
Jul. 11th, 2006 02:48 pmBeginning with last Friday:
My older sister Anne, who lives in Rolling Meadows, has MS and has to call Pace to send a wheelchair lift van when she needs transportation. Friday Anne had to go to the eye doctor in Palatine. As it happens, I had a 'play date' with my friend Sharon in Palatine for our monthly Scrabble game, so Anne was going to call me when the Pace van picked her up and I was going to go and help her get settled back in her house.
At 2:00 Anne called and said she had finished early and Pace was going to send a bus early to pick her up. At 3:15 she called and said the medvan had pulled into the strip mall, driven to the north end, and driven away as she sat at the south end frantically waving. She had called Pace and the operator said the driver had called Anne in as a 'no-show.' So they dispatched the bus that was supposed to come at 3 and she was waiting for that one.
Since Anne was at a mall very close to Sharon's house, we went over there to wait with her. When we arrived Anne was fit to be tied--van #2 had come in the lot and done the same thing as the first one! So Pace said well, they'd send a bus when one was free, implying that Anne was screwing up by not being in the mall. Sharon and I are standing on the sidewalk talking with her when van #3 pulls in and again heads to the north end of the parking lot!
So I jump into the road and start running after it. Well, it turns the corner at the far end of the mall, and I pray that there isn't an exit from the back of the mall. I round the corner, don't see it, resume jogging, turn another corner, and the van is all the way down to the south end of the mall on the backside of it by the dumpsters--but it is not moving, so I manage a burst of speed. Just as I get close the driver starts to pull away! I start yelling and waving, and the driver stops. I can hear her talking on the walkie-talkie saying that there isn't anyone there to pick up! I get to the driver's window and manage to convey that the rider she is looking for is here at the south end in the front. Thankfully the driver offered me a ride back around, and we steered to the front of the mall where, surprise, her passenger was waiting!
So Anne gets on the van and I follow it back to her house. As I'm driving my youngest daughter calls.
She had taken the blue line to her job at the Duncan YMCA at Roosevelt and Halsted that morning because she was going sailing from Monroe Harbor at 6 PM with the homeschooling group, which she had done last week too. CTA bus #127 goes from Roosevelt and the Y to Michigan and Monroe, which is perfect.
Well, she got on the same bus number, but the driver stopped at State and Roosevelt and made everyone get off, saying it was the end of the line--and she didn't have any more money on her bus card and only a $20 bill on her. My child who has just been diagnosed with exercise-induced asthma was informing me that she was going to walk down State Street from Roosevelt to Monroe in the heat. I told her to go into a store and buy something to break her $20 and then see if she could get a northbound State Street bus. She ended up getting change and walking to the red line station, so everything worked out for her.
Then my middle daughter called from Phoenix and mentioned that she'd just talked to my oldest daughter, and the Mustang Sally band was having bus problems. At that point I told the middle one to drive home carefully and don't go out any more today.
Talked to Sarah on Saturday and heard that the bus broke down outside of Harrisburg PA which fortunately was where the band's Friday night gig was. They managed to get to the gig, but the mechanic who looked at the bus said he couldn't fix it. The bus needed a part and they were stuck in PA until late Monday.
Then Saturday, as I turned off Foster Ave. onto Northwest Highway after exiting the expressway coming home from my shift in Orland Park, I hear a thud-thud-thud--and I had a flat tire! I drove the last 3 blocks home very slowly, exceedingly grateful it hadn't happened on the expressway!
Monday morning my neighbor rang my bell at 9:30 and gave me a cat she had found under her porch "since you lost your cat last year and you might want another one." Adrienne begged to keep him, so I took him to the vet to be checked out and spent $273 on x-rays to find out he has a broken pelvis that would cost $2000 to fix. The vet's initial recommendation was that euthanasia would be the kindest thing, but I knew Adrienne would never forgive me if I had him put to sleep.
I ended up getting him admitted to the Treehouse animal shelter where they will fix him up and adopt him out.
At 4 PM Monday Erica calls again from Phoenix. She has decided that she is going to return to Chicago at the beginning of August, live back home till she gets a job, then get an apartment and go to school part time. Her reasons make sense, but when she left for Arizona we emptied our storage locker and put everything in her old bedroom. Where am I going to put her? And while I am sure she will get a job, will it be enough to survive on in Chicago's economy? And is she going to have the energy to work and go to classes? Aaauggghhhh! I thought she was off on her own! Don't get me wrong, I love her and will be glad she's close again, but this a a major mental readjustment! And of course there is the matter of her driving home with all her stuff...Thinking about the logistics make me crazy.
The universe has a reason for all this, right?
My older sister Anne, who lives in Rolling Meadows, has MS and has to call Pace to send a wheelchair lift van when she needs transportation. Friday Anne had to go to the eye doctor in Palatine. As it happens, I had a 'play date' with my friend Sharon in Palatine for our monthly Scrabble game, so Anne was going to call me when the Pace van picked her up and I was going to go and help her get settled back in her house.
At 2:00 Anne called and said she had finished early and Pace was going to send a bus early to pick her up. At 3:15 she called and said the medvan had pulled into the strip mall, driven to the north end, and driven away as she sat at the south end frantically waving. She had called Pace and the operator said the driver had called Anne in as a 'no-show.' So they dispatched the bus that was supposed to come at 3 and she was waiting for that one.
Since Anne was at a mall very close to Sharon's house, we went over there to wait with her. When we arrived Anne was fit to be tied--van #2 had come in the lot and done the same thing as the first one! So Pace said well, they'd send a bus when one was free, implying that Anne was screwing up by not being in the mall. Sharon and I are standing on the sidewalk talking with her when van #3 pulls in and again heads to the north end of the parking lot!
So I jump into the road and start running after it. Well, it turns the corner at the far end of the mall, and I pray that there isn't an exit from the back of the mall. I round the corner, don't see it, resume jogging, turn another corner, and the van is all the way down to the south end of the mall on the backside of it by the dumpsters--but it is not moving, so I manage a burst of speed. Just as I get close the driver starts to pull away! I start yelling and waving, and the driver stops. I can hear her talking on the walkie-talkie saying that there isn't anyone there to pick up! I get to the driver's window and manage to convey that the rider she is looking for is here at the south end in the front. Thankfully the driver offered me a ride back around, and we steered to the front of the mall where, surprise, her passenger was waiting!
So Anne gets on the van and I follow it back to her house. As I'm driving my youngest daughter calls.
She had taken the blue line to her job at the Duncan YMCA at Roosevelt and Halsted that morning because she was going sailing from Monroe Harbor at 6 PM with the homeschooling group, which she had done last week too. CTA bus #127 goes from Roosevelt and the Y to Michigan and Monroe, which is perfect.
Well, she got on the same bus number, but the driver stopped at State and Roosevelt and made everyone get off, saying it was the end of the line--and she didn't have any more money on her bus card and only a $20 bill on her. My child who has just been diagnosed with exercise-induced asthma was informing me that she was going to walk down State Street from Roosevelt to Monroe in the heat. I told her to go into a store and buy something to break her $20 and then see if she could get a northbound State Street bus. She ended up getting change and walking to the red line station, so everything worked out for her.
Then my middle daughter called from Phoenix and mentioned that she'd just talked to my oldest daughter, and the Mustang Sally band was having bus problems. At that point I told the middle one to drive home carefully and don't go out any more today.
Talked to Sarah on Saturday and heard that the bus broke down outside of Harrisburg PA which fortunately was where the band's Friday night gig was. They managed to get to the gig, but the mechanic who looked at the bus said he couldn't fix it. The bus needed a part and they were stuck in PA until late Monday.
Then Saturday, as I turned off Foster Ave. onto Northwest Highway after exiting the expressway coming home from my shift in Orland Park, I hear a thud-thud-thud--and I had a flat tire! I drove the last 3 blocks home very slowly, exceedingly grateful it hadn't happened on the expressway!
Monday morning my neighbor rang my bell at 9:30 and gave me a cat she had found under her porch "since you lost your cat last year and you might want another one." Adrienne begged to keep him, so I took him to the vet to be checked out and spent $273 on x-rays to find out he has a broken pelvis that would cost $2000 to fix. The vet's initial recommendation was that euthanasia would be the kindest thing, but I knew Adrienne would never forgive me if I had him put to sleep.
I ended up getting him admitted to the Treehouse animal shelter where they will fix him up and adopt him out.
At 4 PM Monday Erica calls again from Phoenix. She has decided that she is going to return to Chicago at the beginning of August, live back home till she gets a job, then get an apartment and go to school part time. Her reasons make sense, but when she left for Arizona we emptied our storage locker and put everything in her old bedroom. Where am I going to put her? And while I am sure she will get a job, will it be enough to survive on in Chicago's economy? And is she going to have the energy to work and go to classes? Aaauggghhhh! I thought she was off on her own! Don't get me wrong, I love her and will be glad she's close again, but this a a major mental readjustment! And of course there is the matter of her driving home with all her stuff...Thinking about the logistics make me crazy.
The universe has a reason for all this, right?
