Another Day in the Country
Out of sync
Contributing writer
My mother, at the age of 90, had lived in the country, in her own little world, for so long that when she came to Ramona she felt out of sync.
In her part of the country, she’d lived in a church world with people who believed the way she believed and worshipped the way she did. She’d lived on a little farm with my Dad for the last 30 years, far away from hustle and bustle. Once a week, Dad drove them into a nearby town to “shop.”
She went down the same aisles and bought the same food. If there were a sale advertised in the local paper, she’d buy fabric for dresses. And, “when I have time,” she’d say, “I’m going to make me some dresses for summer.” The fabric always was similar —polyester — and the colors the same — pink and blue — and the patterns had been used for years and years. It was familiar paths that she was walking in her later years — until she came back to Ramona to live with her daughters.
Even though Ramona was similar to what she’d remembered as a child, most of the people were different. Their pride in their property was different than she remembered.
“Why don’t people paint?” she wanted to know. “It doesn’t cost that much to grow flowers,” she said.
She had been raised to be tidy and in the winter, you cut flowers out of colored paper, put them in your windows or out of fabric, and sewed them on your curtains.
We took her shopping for a “good dress.” She encountered many pantsuits but not a lot of dresses to her taste.
“I think I need to just get off the planet,” she’d lament.
Things had just changed too much. She’d been adjusting all of her life but these final adjustments were the most difficult.
Driving to Salina the other day, my sister Jessica said suddenly, “I feel so out of sync with the whole world. My mistake is that I didn’t think I would.”
There was silence in the car.
“All this twittering and blogging about nothing” she continued. “The texting and abbreviations — LOL, OMG — just don’t cut it for a ‘word person,’ like me. I think I just need to get off the planet.”
I laughed.
“Already, you’re feeling this?” I said to my sister, 12 years younger than me. “Really?”
Being out of sync seems to be a larger problem in life than finding the right dress. There are a lot of adjustments to make in life these days. I was standing in line buying groceries and a couple of men were behind us. Their conversation, as conversation always is, was very revealing of their character.
“I told my old lady I was gitten a U-Haul if she didn’t shut up,” said the one. “Ohhhh,” the other one said, grinning through his missing teeth. “A slam-down!” (Loud laughter and back slap.)
“A slam down? Are these guys out of the movie Deliverance?” my sister muttered.
“Real charmers,” I thought.
I’m definitely feeling out of sync in this place.
I have a car that talks to me, a computer that won’t. I’m feeling out of sync. I yearn for more simple times. I love to read books, not screens. I love to hear real words and complete sentences that are inspiring, not shortcuts, bad grammar, and slang. I relish food made from scratch with real ingredients, not things out of boxes that call for egg substitutes. I love to play games — real games, not fake games, standing in front of the television.
Even as I write this column, I bumped some unknown button on my laptop and suddenly the type is red, and it’s underlined, and I don’t know how to undo the phenomena. Why won’t the delete button work?
On another day in the country, I’m definitely feeling out of sync.