I remembered the story I was going to tell the day after I published the last post without it. So I will begin this post with that one.

***

During the height of Covid everybody ate in their rooms. When I first came here, they were starting to use the dining room again, but most people preferred to continue eating in their rooms.

When a meal is prepared, a staff member writes the name of the person who ordered it on the box that holds the entrée. They get your name from the dinner menu we fill out each morning.

I have found that staff members learn the names of residents at astounding speed. But my name was not familiar and my writing gets continually worse.

One evening, the word “Karma” was written on my box!

I really laughed at that one. I hadn’t been asking “Why me?” or “Why is this happening to me?” but if I had been, I imagine, but of course don’t know, Karma would have been Amma’s answer! At least it would have been MY answer.

***

Last Saturday I had company. At one point I said I usually walk out to the front desk lobby area or beyond five times during the day. I remember when I walked to my room for the first time. It seemed so far. I couldn’t imagine doing that walk every day even once. Even by the next day, the distance didn’t seem so far.

Back to the story at hand. I listed the reasons why I went out to the lobby area so much. 1: pick up the free pastry that’s put out every morning for us and to fill out and submit the menu for dinner 2: pick up the free afternoon cookie that’s put out for us 3: pick up my to-go dinner 4: pick up mail or a delivery and/or 5: to meet a visitor

The visitor that I was telling this to laughed and said that the staff had certainly found good ways to keep us moving. I also laughed when I realized that what he said was true. I’m not going to pass up a free freshly made pastry or a free freshly made cookie. Especially when I can rationalize that they are small. and I was also not going to miss out on a dinner, a delivery, or a visitor.

***

I was wondering what my third story would be. And then Pat came back from vacation and provided the perfect opportunity. (If you don’t know who Pat is, read or reread the last story in Part 2 of this series.)

I had walked out to the lobby to get my cookie for the day. I picked up the cookie and then decided to also get some cold water. I put a lid on the water and then put it on the walker seat next to the Amazon packages that I had just picked up.

The water slid off the walker seat and spilled on the floor. The lid had come off. It created quite a mess and I was mortified. Especially since I couldn’t clean it up myself.

All of a sudden I heard “Karuna’s water has broken. Karuna’s water has broken.” Being the mother of two children and an ex labor and delivery nurse, I had no doubt what he was referring to. That was so funny considering I’m 72. What could I do other than laugh.