I have been battling allergies since Friday, but for the most part, it has been a lazy and enjoyable holiday weekend around here, which means plenty of cat and dog smoochies and thinking about how life, generally speaking, is good. Yesterday, we had a brief period of excitement that really brought that home to my husband and myself.

My husband was outside finishing up mowing the lawn since he had been chased inside the day before due to some major lightening. I was taking a nap and trying to breath through my nose. About 30 minutes later, he came in and told me to call 911. There was an elderly lady wandering around our street. She didn’t speak any English, but from the little bit of Spanish my husband knew, he thought she was lost.

It was pretty hot outside, so he brought her a glass of cold water and got her to sit down on a chair in our garage as I called the police. I went outside and tried to see if she was hungry, but I know zero Spanish, and though my husband asked her in Spanish where her family was, she didn’t understand. After the police came about five minutes later, they told us she has dementia and is well-known to all of them. She was supposed to wear a bracelet with her name and address on it, but she didn’t have it on. However, they knew where she lived and were going to take her home.

What is weird about this whole thing is that my husband would have probably not been out yesterday since he had planned to do the yard work the day before. It still gets pretty hot down here in September, so there was not one other person outside on our street that day. Luckily for her, he was outside. And, it is pretty scary to think about her out there alone. So many things could have happened.

Physically, she seemed to be in fairly decent shape considering she is probably in her 80s. I thought about my own grandmother who is 90, in a nursing home now, and also deals with memory loss and confusion. I’m sure, like my grandmother, this woman was once full of energy and worked hard most of her life.

So yes, I’m pushing 50, could lose about 30 pounds, and have allergies, but I also have a great husband who has a good job, the teaching job of my dreams, and plenty of freelance writing/crafting work to boot. I will try to remember her the next time I get frustrated that I ruined my diet or experience a sneezing fit.

Here’s to wishing all my readers a blessed Labor Day!