Taking Jean to Vote

This morning I took Jean to vote early in the November 2010 elections. 

First, I went to vote to make her trek there as short & painless as possible. I learned the last time we went the time it takes to help her out of the truck, stand behind her as she moves with the walker, helping her in & out of the chair at the voting booth.

Before I voted, I told the polling judges (including our long-time friend & neighbor, Miss Melanie) that I would be returning with Jean.

Because I knew that Miss Melanie would make sure that Jean was treated with respect & that her voting experience was pleasant & stress free.

While the polling judges have offered us the option of taking the booth out to the car, Jean will not hear of this.  She wants to participate in the process, the whole experience.

So we load up the walker (necessary to ascend & descend out of the Blazer) & the wheel chair & head off to Meadows Place City Hall.

Meadows Place residents vote & Election Day turn out can be a nightmare.  Early voting is less crowded, no lines, but fills the small parking lot of city hall.

There are two handicapped parking places in the parking lot of Meadows Place City Hall.  Only one is wheel chair / walker accessible.  Unless you are loading & unloading from a van designed for the handicapped with rear entry & exit.

The one wheel chair accessible spot was occupied by a very well kept red truck & the vehicle in the spot adjacent to the other handicapped spot had parked over the line.  No chance of getting Jean in & out of the Blazer.

So I parked in a nearby drive & waited.  Then I got militant.  Why was there only ONE wheel chair accessible space?  

I turned on the A/C, put on the emergency brake, told Jean not to let anyone kidnap her (she has really, really fierce blue eyes) & walked over to that very well kept red truck to verify that it had a handicapped sticker.

It did.  

I took a lot of deep breaths on my way back to the Blazer & Jean until I looked back & 

saw a very fit, very well kept young man, walk from City Hall to the very well kept red truck in the only wheel chair accessible space.

And I wanted to ram that very self-indulgent young man & his well kept red truck with the Blazer.

Peace Corp Vets

Thinking of Richard Pulley.  The Peace Corps Alumn, the Navy Vet, the only man I have ever heard of except for Rosy Grier who did incredible needlepoint.

Not to mention the man who introduced me to mystery novels.

And how he came down the street to my Montrose apartment & told me it was time to come the party.

 

On more than one occasion.

How he cut his wife Marguerite & I off the margaritas at The Spanish Village, always with the excuse – “I can handle either one of you alone but the two of you together. . .”

Marguerite . . .who found my first inner city apartment.  With her friend John Chambless, who took us out in his little MGB to Spanish Village..  

Marguerite & Richard, Rice grads.  Richard in Geology.  Marguerite with a PHD in Philosophy.  Richard working as a geologist.  Marguerite as an accountant.

Adopting me & introducing me to an amazing group of people. 

 

Richard went into the Peace Corps during Vietnam.  He found water.  He hung out with some Jesuit priests.  Richard had some interesting adventures.  It is not my place to tell those stories.

But I do remember my “last” birthday party – my 29^th – when Richard & Marguerite took me to the zoo & then to a picnic along Buffalo Bayou.  

 Complete with linens & Waterford & chocolate covered fruit & little slivers of white bread & beluga caviar Richard had purchased at the Russian Embassy in Afghanistan.  And champagne.

I don’t remember what possessed us to look at my driver’s license but it turned out to be my 28th, not my 29^th birthday.  Richard & Maggie took the sacrifice of the beluga in stride.

I miss them.