I WASN'T THE VOLUNTEER YOU'D HAVE THOUGHT I WAS:

[Originally, this was written back around 2007]

As I was sailing down the road from Montrose, I decide to take the back road that would lead up to my first customer... eventually.  It's not a shortcut.  As I ascend up the hill to the top where it evens off, I stop and take another picture of the many of a gorgeous overlook to the left  Further on, I see what could be a wild animal in the road.  Turns out to be someone's mutt, and as I get closer, as grin plays across my face, as in his mouth he has some bedraggled muddy roadkill of which he   appears to be as thrilled with as a hunter who's bagged an eight pointer.  I'm sure his owner won't think this 'cute.'  

Further on I pass a road that comes in from the left, remembering the woman on the corner of this intersection to whom I brought meals last year... a recent widow then, and grieving so much that it was ruining her health.  While off for the summer, she had pulled herself together, and didn't want to wait around for the meals, and quit them.  A success story when it's more of a nuisance staying home to be there to wait until the meals come than not.

Then I head towards my first client's road, but not before passing an old tool shed with a rusted tin roof on which someone had painted, "I LOVE YOU JULIE!"  Each time I pass this, my mind wanders and wonders who Julie is or was, and why and how some boyfriend (perhaps) took the time and trouble years ago to profess his love in such a way.  

I had overdone yesterday, and todays route was going to be for filling up that inner spirit that felt so tapped out at the end of yesterday.  So far I was doing fine.  I wonder about the next customer--a younger man than the usual senior citizen I serve, and I wonder what his problem is.  MS?  My brother had that... maybe that's what he has.  He's pale and slender, but seems to be functioning just fine.

From there to the main drag I let the car roll with the shift in D (drive), to see if it is possible to coast all the way to State Route 706 without touching the gas pedal. It is.  Then I head back towards Montrose, turning left before it's only traffic light, towards my next customer.  Going north, I head up to State Route 167 on one of the steepest paved hills in Montrose. On the other side of the hill, I'm to go on the first dirt road on the left which "plunges" downward at such an angle that if it isn't kept cleared of snow and sprinkled with ashes, it simply is not drivable. One's car turns into a sled... even those cars with snow tires... they just coast slower.  Fortunately her road has been kept clear and well sprinkled with whatever the black grit is they put on roads.  When I get out at the bottom of her steep driveway, I notice that my light sand colored Elantra is now half and half black at the bottom, and sand colored at the top.  If this bad weather keeps up, I don't know when I'll be able to get some of the crud removed.

Entering the house, I surprise the dogs.  Three of them.  One, a beautiful female husky with those riveting blue eyes sings a mellow song of happiness, while their black Lab shows me his toy.  He seldom is seen by me without a favorite toy in his mouth, and it's obvious that he is proud of the toy and wants you to comment.  Sometimes I will take it and throw it to see him gallop like a pup to pick it up and bring it back.  And, there's a cocker spaniel that is as high strung a dog as my Bear ...my own English Cocker.  Only this one is friendlier to guests-thank goodness-as my cocker scares people until he gets used to them... usually through the gate of our bedroom where he's been banished.

The next customer is a grown woman who has Cerebral Palsy, and always has an aide with her.  The aides are nice as is the customer, and I get to know everyone on a first name basis.  The NEXT customer, a 'boy' to me, as he looks so young... must be on SSD.  Has really bad diabetes and the neuropathy caused by the disease, he's said.  He's moved back to his bigger but dumpier apartment over the stores.  When he lived there before, a girl he met wanted to move in with him; he let her. As soon as she moved in she invited "her fiancee' and they stole money, leaving him pennyless and in debt.  I understand that now she has moved in with him again.  

Some of these customers live the life of a soap opera.

The next customer is a debonaire guy and his odd little wife.  They have a cat that is 23 years old, and they are keeping track of the Guiness Book of Records for when the cat can take the place of the now oldest cat.  They are a classy couple, and even their bell sounds it.  I told them that.  It rings a ring-ring-ring--ring.  Like the beginning of Beethoven's Fifth.  That got a smile from the Mr.

The next customer has a beagle.  Or I should say her daughter in law does.  The beagle greets me like it had waited all of its life just to meet me... and shows the same enthusiasm each and every time.  This customer has Alzheimer, and reminds me otherwise of my aunt Dorothy, which I've mistakenly called her.  She's a lovely woman, and is so far easy to care for...  hasn't tried to take off or get belligerent yet... thank goodness.  The daughter in law with the help of other family members, makes sure their mother is never alone.  One time she was standing when I came with her dinner.  She came over to me, giving me a big hug, while telling me "Well, THERE you ARE. It's been so long LONG since I've seen you last."  I didn't want to say, "Oh, but you saw me just last week," so instead, I said, "Oh, it hasn't been that long, it just seems like it when we finally see each other."

The next customer lives way out on a road with her own name on it, and back when, they probably had that road to themselves.  She's a short white-haired lady who has the spirit of a woman half her age, and acts it, though her body is giving out.  We talk birds, animals, and the rural life.

My last customer is back near the Senior Center on a side street that until recently I had to drive out of my way to safely get into his street... built right on a curve on the most active road in Montrose.  I do him last because he likes to sleep late.  Ah, someone I can understand, so I don't fault him that. One day when I had to cut through the cemetary  through the mud and slush to get to his house from a safe direction, he said, "Look for the mirrors at the end of the street."  Sure enough, there are two huge round mirrors attached to some utility poles which show if traffic is coming.  But one has to remember "objects are closer than they seem," so I carefully stare watching for ANY movement on the road below on the left, as if you see something that looks a mile away, 2 seconds later it will pass in front of you.  Even when I see it's all clear, it's hard not to spin the wheels getting up to speed in case there was a car I didn't see.  Which is impossible... that is unless there's a vampire car.  Dum, dee, dum, dum.  Then I'm back to the center, putting away the warming oven, and jotting down my mileage.  They pay a good stipend, but I don't do it for the money, though, I couldn't see doing it without being reimbursed for gas... but much is left over for pin money, so I'm happy with my job.  It doesn't seem like work; it doesn't seem even like volunteering.  It just seemed like FUN.  

IMAGINATION

Something made me think about the written/printed word, and how wonderful a trick the mind has given us in 'the imagination.'

What is it to read?  We are the only animals to read.  Our mind's eye is the interpreter, for it isn't always picked up by sight, like the blind man with his fingers reading raised dots, or...

...What was it to hear when stories were told-centuries ago or last summer at a kid's camp by firelight.  Yet, other animals can hear.  They can also sniff and their minds pick up a scent, and know (imagine?) what they smell.  They can recognize the sound of their Master's truck with their keen hearing, and recognize the footfalls of those with whom are in their "pack"-in our case with whom they live.  They can track not by sight but by smell and they know, and ... and when it's something wild and under the snow, how do they know... do they hear, smell or both?... and what do they "imagine"?  Perhaps they only know it's something wild and therefore it's their wild dog clicking in instinctively, they are looking for food... for survival. And what about the dreaming dog, whimpering on the couch with his paws moving in its dream of chasing rabbits, or in a bushy field flushing out pheasants.

Animals can imagine, but people are the only animals that can read the written word and imagine... to sink into the book and in our minds roam the streets the author takes us on, or become a 'fly on the wall' observing his own imagined story, or relating a truth he found in life by letting us live it vicariously.  How great is that!