Audrey's Lung Cancer Story

Audrey joins the Red Hat Society

On Monday, October 3rd, Donnie and I came to Knoxville to see Dad and to take Mom to her Red Hat Society meeting. My brother, Steve, and his wife went around on the weekend and bought mom some red shoes with purple hats on them and they also bought her a white bear with a purple boa and red hat that played the song, Girl's just wanna have fun. They also bought her a bracelet that has red hats on it. Steve was very anxious about me taking Mom to the meeting. He called up Sunday and asked what time I would be there. I said I would be there at 1 p.m. to take her to the 2 p.m. I ended up being there at 12:30. She was already dressed and waiting in the front room of the nursing home. I went back to her room to get the bear and when I came back I found out the meeting was in the garden room. When I went in there, there were several other women. The regular leader wasn't there but another lady led the meeting. She had brought some silky purple and gold pajamas, a bag full of unclaimed clothes from laundry, a premade straw paper pumpkin which had a red hat on it and a wheel chair. She had the ladies roll the clothes up in a "jelly roll" to fit in the arms and legs and slowly but surely, a scarecrow was made out of the pajamas and the head. There was one lady there that was partially paralyzed. She kept saying she wanted to do something and one of the ladies said, "You can't do anything Nancy (Gustine), you can't use your hands." Well I went over to Nancy and I rolled some clothes over her hands while standing behind her. She seemed to enjoy participating in some way. Mom sat there untangling some beads to put on the scarecrow. She made herself at home. I wanted to thank you for sending the clothes to Mom. We received them yesterday and last night she was wearing the pant suit when we played dominoes. Barb Perry, Ramona Stickell, Menona Moorehead, Donnie, Mom and I all played. It almost made me cry to be able to play a game again with Mom. Especially after how bad she was just a month ago. I hope you were able to view the photobucket pictures. If not, let me know and I can send regular pictures.
I had so much fun at the Red Hat Society Party. I got to see some people I hadn't seen in years. My 5th grade teacher, Dorothy Larson was there. For roll call they asked everyone their name and asked if they could remember a special halloween costume they wore when they were a kid. Most could not think of anything special. When they got to Mrs. Larson, she didn't remember any special outfit. I had to tell everyone she was my 5th grade teacher and I remembered what I wore for halloween when I was in her class. I dressed up in a box as a color TV set. It was back when RCA Victor came out with their jingle about Wow! we've got color TV.... in our home there's color now. It was one of my favorite outfits for sure.

I really enjoyed myself. Violet Wadham Hudson was the secretary. Her husband used to work with dad at Sears. After he died, she ended up marrying Aunt Barb Perry's brother, Bob. He has died also. Anyway, for roll call they asked people if they could remember a special outfit they dressed up for at halloween. Most could not remember anything special. When it came Mom's time to speak, she had me show the bear to everyone around the room. After that My 5th grade teacher, Dorothy Larson was introduced. She didn't remember any special outfit. I had to tell everyone she was my 5th grade teacher and I remembered what I wore for halloween when I was in her class. I dressed up in a box as a color TV set. It was back when RCA Victor came out with their jingle about Wow! we've got color TV.... in our home there's color now. It was one of my favorite outfits for sure.
Later they served ice cream and I went around delivering napkins. I was picking up on people's names as I went around. They decided to have a door prize drawing so the leader asked me to write down everyone's names to put in a hat while she went to get Mom and another lady (Cynthia) their red hats. I told the ladies I felt like I was on Romper Room. I was able to go around the room and name each person. " I see Shirley and Sharon and Martha and Cynthia...." The winner of the doorprize drawing was Violet. Then the leader came over to Mom and presented her with her choice of 3 red hats. Someone had bought several of them when they were on sale at Walmart one day. How nice of them to do that! Soon the meeting was over and I rolled mom back to her room. She was tired and decided to get ready for bed even though it was only 4 p.m. Donnie had waited outside during all of this. We went back to dad's for a while. Earlier Dad had told us that we were invited to go play the marble game with Mom and Barb at 6:30. When we called her at 5:30 she said she was already heading out there. She asked if we could bring the dominoes out. When we got there, Ramona and Menona were playing the marble game. I went to look up the pictures of the red hat meeting I had put on photobucket earlier. Their computers are a little slow. I bearly found the pictures before we had to start playing dominoes. I did get to show barb some pictures.
Anyway, all 6 of us played dominoes. I lost big time. I would jokingly whine when Mom would play a tile right before I could play it. Ramona took my whining seriously. But that was O.K. It was fun to be playing dominoes again with mom. She did very well with her plays and counting up her tiles. Of course, she always had low scores and didn't have to count too high. She ended up winning.
We went back to dad's and spent the night. Donnie and I went to see Mom in the Morning. She didn't look as well as she did the night before, but she was still with it. We took her out by the animals. We sat out there for a while and then came back in. We didn't stay much longer. We decided we would leave before noon. It was a good trip. Gas is fluctuating now between $2.99 and $2.79. Our favorite gas station on river drive going out of town has closed. I am filling in from the 13th. I will write more later.

posted by Cindy @ 9:23 PM