Estimated reading time: 5 minutes
Sing it, Louie!
This morning, I woke up quietly and tried to be sneaky so Mary could keep sleeping. I tiptoed out of the bedroom around 6:30 am and turned off the heat. Instead, I went to the TV room, grabbed a fuzzy blanket, and wrapped myself up like a burrito. I even turned off the iPhone’s ringer just in case I got an incoming call!
Since I had some time, I watched several YouTube meatball recipes, so I’m basically a certified meatball technician now. Tomorrow I’ll be attempting my first field mission: meatballs with angel hair pasta—because nothing says “confidence” like pairing my cooking debut with noodles that can overcook if you blink.
We had our coffee and an energy bar before Mary had to get ready for her painting class. Our neighbor will pick Mary up about noon, and I will go fetch her at 3:00 pm so we can get prepared to depart for the Seagerstrom Theater to see “The Notebook”.
On the way to get Mary, I stopped at DMES Medical Supplies (which turns out to be just down the street on Chapman) and rented a full wheelchair because I knew the walker would NOT work this evening, because it was too far to walk from the restaurant to the theater, the pavement was rough and there were curbs, and it would be a slow process with a lot of unnecessary bumping around. Poppy to the rescue!
This store was adjacent to the Armed Forces Recruiting Center, where Mark (Colleen’s wonderful husband) was stationed after they got married.
I got to the class around 2:30 pm, just in case Mary’s back was giving her fits. What Mary did NOT KNOW is that I stopped by and rented a wheelchair because I was worried about her attempting to walk from the Silver Trumpet to the Theater and back using the walker.
Arriving at the Senior Center, I walked in and immediately found a room full of ladies enthusiastically splatter-painting as if it were an Olympic event.
Mary must’ve been doing PR again, because several of them greeted me with, “How are you doing?”—apparently, my hospitalizations are now community bulletin-board news.
Mary, on the other hand, was clearly feeling great… because her painting was actually really good.
We came home, freshened up, and headed to dinner at The Silver Trumpet adjacent to Seagerstrom Center for the Performing Arts.
When we arrived at the restaurant, and I started to get out of the car, I feigned stupidity (an easy task for me!) and told Mary, “I forgot the walker… I must have left it in the garage while I was refilling the vehicle’s drinking water supply.”
Mary’s expression was priceless—she frowned, pushed herself up out of her seat, built up a full head of steam, and marched toward the back of the car like she was about to file a formal complaint with the universe.
I popped the trunk and wrestled the wheelchair out like it was a tangled-up metal octopus. Mary just stood there cycling through every “A” word in the dictionary—amazed, astonished, astounded, awed, and startled.
And then… I finally got the big smile.
I tried to get one with flames painted on the side, but alas, all they had was basic black.
Dinner was fantastic—and it’s always more fun when Jim and Vicky show up to raise the class level (and the volume) of the whole evening! Mary and I had Lamb lollipops, which are individual lamb chops—usually rib chops—that are trimmed and “French-cut” so the bone is clean and acts like a handle, kind of like a lollipop stick.
Mary popped into the wheelchair, and we were off for a stroll to the Theater. Vicky took over and rolled Mary all the way to the seats because the bill was a little late getting to the table. Jim and I tried to catch up, but we had difficulty seeing through the dust, dirt, and burnt rubber left hanging in the air behind the girls. Remember, Vicky was driving!!
“The Notebook” is a stage adaptation of the novel (and later film) about Noah and Allie, two young people who fall in love in the 1940s despite differences in class and family pressure pulling them apart.
The play typically frames their relationship across time: you see their romance begin, fracture, and later rekindle, alongside an older couple where one partner is living with memory loss/dementia.
The “notebook” is the written story of their life together—read aloud to help her remember—so the plot moves between passionate young love and the later-life reality of holding on to that love as memories fade. Themes include enduring love, choice vs. circumstance, aging, caregiving, and what it means to keep someone’s story alive.
Well, Mary and I could not get into the story, primarily because of the sound. There was a lot of yelling, fast talking, and multiple people talking at once. We left at halftime. Vicky loved the performance as she had seen the movie several times.
We were home by 9:30 pm and headed to bed.
