Searching for the Misplaced Mother

One of the nice things about retirement is that I can be on call for my folks. They called yesterday. My father had driven my mother to get a colonoscopy but bore she went in for the procedure, he started feeling poorly. She called asking for me to come, help him to the car, wait for her and take her home. Of course I agreed. Then she asked if I knew where she was and I asked if it was the medical center near her house. She said yes. I got a book, my knitting, put the pooch in the crate and set out.

I pulled into the medical center but there was no surgical center. I went in, walked into a Doctor's office and asked for help. The receptionist Kelli, was absolutely wonderful. She called several nearby surgery centers to see if my mother was a patient, but could none were working on a patient my-mother's name.

Since I was near my folks house I went there and looked for clues. The only one I could find said he had an appointment at the hospital that morning. Since the hospital was about 30 miles further north on the same road as the near by medical center I decided that was the right place (even though it was one that Kelli had called) and drove over. I should have listened to Kelli, no mom.

I borrowed a phone book and started calling near by hospitals. I was lucky and found her at the first one I called. Poor dad, it took me two hours to get to a hospital that was 25 minutes away.

Everything ended well. My dad was doing better, my mother was fine and we all had a nice visit and I was lucky enough to run into a woman who spent a lot of her time helping a stranger.