The receipt

Teddy’s mum and dad back in the 1940s

After my last post I thought I would share two stories. A couple of weeks ago we had another incident on an Interstate just north of Houston, close to where we live. It’s another funny yet sad tale. In the middle of the night, police officers noticed an elderly lady driving a Buick (isn’t it always a Buick?) down the center lane of Interstate 45. She had no lights on and although the police tried to pull her over, she continued on her trek. If she had kept going she would have either caused a major accident or ended up in the Gulf of Mexico. They decided that the safest thing was to lay a strip to burst the tires which was successful but then she kept going on the wheel rims until finally she came to a stop.

When they got her out of the car, she was a disheveled older lady who probably had a dementia of some sort. She must have a guardian angel because no-one was injured and hopefully she now has the care she needs. This was on the main thoroughfare between Houston, Dallas and further north. Every month or so, we have what is now called a Silver Alert on the road signs, asking us to look out for an elderly driver who has run away from home. Guess what 90% of them drive – BUICKS!

We were so fortunate that Teddy’s mum who had Alzheimer’s disease had long since stopped driving and was not inclined to do so. That said, one of the neighbors found her ‘repairing’ the top of the garage (at the top of ladders), she ran away from the mall and generally caused havoc with her many disappearing tricks. Teddy’s Dad had not lost his faculties but he was too old to be driving but no-one could persuade him to stop. Both sides of the car were scraped along the side where he had misjudged the garage. Now that both have passed on, our grief is being mellowed with humorous memories. Teddy had been scanning old photos and found this receipt in his Dad’s driving licence. We both burst out laughing because it brought back Dad’s obsession with keeping receipts, putting them in strange places and in this case misspelling BRASSIERES. Only a man of 93 would refer to them in such a way.

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