The Best Years of My Life Ch. 02

Not long after Pauline's funeral, I was sitting in my kitchen preparing lesson plans for the next day when I remembered the numerous times I borrowed money from her to buy Addie a birthday gift, Christmas present or whatever the occasion called for.

It was Pauline's generosity that allowed me to start college in the proper fashion when she was denied the same dream. Times were tough during the Depression and money was scarce but she never refused my pleading and anxious requests.

A veil of tears covered my eyes as I realized that I owed a debt of gratitude to Pauline for her selflessness.
   

Like many towns in America, mine changed as time passed until it was almost unrecognizable.
 
 The once proud and majestic Wilburne house was turned into apartments and eventually demolished in the name of progress. A Walgreen's occupies the space now; in fact an entire block no longer exists for the sake of a strip mall.

The same thing happened to Woodrow Wilson Grammar School, an Acme Supermarket claims the same real estate. At least my old high school was converted to a neighborhood community center.

Downtown is a mere shadow of what it once was. The Crown Theater, the premier movie house of the 1930's and 40's, fell to the wreckers ball and a McDonald's fast food restaurant sits atop the ashes.

 The stationers shop closed up long ago, victim to the mall that was built on the edge of town. The sidewalks that were choked with people and shoppers from Monday to Saturday are pretty much deserted except for the homeless and panhandlers.

The thriving textile and cigar factories moved south after the war because labor was much cheaper. Most of the buildings that weren't torn down were converted to apartments with shops and restaurants.

The trolley car lines that criss-crossed the county gave way to belching diesel busses. A poor substitute for a gentler/cleaner means of transportation.

Only a few buildings that existed in my youth still stand.

Barnes Drug Store occupies the same corner with the same marquee but the inside looks completely different. The fountain that dispensed ice cream sodas for ten cents is now just a memory.

My career as a teacher lasted until mandatory retirement at age sixty five. I derived a tremendous amount of satisfaction from my job and volunteered as an aide at the school. I dearly loved seeing the smiling faces of the students and accepted the occasional hug with supreme gratitude.
  
My once slender body thickened, drooped and sagged with sparse gray hair on my head and deep set wrinkles lining my face and hands. Sometimes when I looked in the mirror, I failed to recognize the reflected image.

"That's not me," I would silently think with dismay and remember the girl with the hand me down dress at Addie's St Valentine's Day party in fourth grade.

Now, I'm a very old woman who is slowly dying in the last room that she will occupy on God's earth.

 The nurses come every four hours like clockwork with pills designed to treat the myriad of aches, pains and ills that besiege the elderly.

Except for my weekly visit from Beverly, all I have for company are the precious memories from my youth.

 The two volumes of love poetry, the photo scrapbook of Addie and all her letters including her last before she left for England are safely tucked away in a safe deposit box. Beverly will decide what happens to them.

I have been living for a long time, much longer than I suspected that I would be. I honestly thought that Ted's second hand smoke would poison me with cancer or some other terminal disease.

As much as I believe in God, I think He played a cruel joke on me by taking the one person I truly loved at a very young age; then letting me live until I was sickly and bedridden.

Some days I pray for death to come and take me. I think about the people that I loved and made the journey before me. In my mind, I see their faces but when Addie appears, I smile the widest and my heart fills with joy.

When my time comes to leave this mortal coil, I know in my soul that I will meet Addie again in a far, far better place.

Literary Credits:

"I Love Thee" Eliza Acton

"Sonnets from the Portuguese, 43",
  Elizabeth Barrett Browning

"Beautiful Dreamer" Stephen Foster

"Longing" Matthew Arnold

"Song: To Celia" Ben Johnson

"When We Two Parted" Lord Byron

"A Tale of Two Cities" Charles Dickens