Visiting the Tall Texan in Vacaville

Photo credit: City of Davis

We're headed to Vacaville this afternoon to visit my Uncle Wayne and attend a hospice benefit at the Northbay Wine & Food Jubilee. Family and friends have made generous donations in the name of my late Aunt Helen and several cousins will be coming into town for the event.

My cousin, Cynthia, has been sending out reports on how her dad, my Uncle Wayne, is coping with losing a beloved partner after 64 years. She wrote last week:

"As Dad tries to deal with living alone, he has set a routine for himself to go out every day to the store, usually timing it around the deliver of the mail. So imagine 2 p.m. in the afternoon, Dad pulls up in his car next to the mailbox, gingerly gets out of the car and retrieves his mail from the box. He quickly assesses if it's all junk mail and can spot the real mail, i.e. cards and post cards right away. I can see on his face how much that means to him to get real mail.

Clothing catalogs addressed to Mom are tough for him. Dad has called the companies and asked for her name to be deleted. He has had to do that lot. And usually, he gets a kind voice on the other end who extends condolences and assures him that his request will be processed.

One of the toughest tasks he did back in January was to go by Mom's beauty shop to pick up a elevated toilet sheet she left there for her use. The ladies didn't know, and Dad had to tell them. I thought I was going to pick it up for him. But he beat me to the punch. And it was probably just as well. Dad has been very brave in dealing with the day in and day out of letting people know Mom has passed away."

On this visit, we'll stay overnight (courtesy of donated hotel rooms because of the benefit) and take the opportunity to ride our bikes through Davis and explore the town as a possible next place to live. Our exploration is a tiny step forward on my hard-won battle to move out of our house. Jeff has decided to embrace my desires and added "out of the country" as one of the many possibilities. Today, we start with Davis.