Old Age

Have you ever had to call the non-emergency police line? Tonight I made use of that number to report a situation I encountered while out for an evening run.

I was near the end of my 3 mile run, waiting to cross the street when this car came down the hill- on the wrong side of the road. The car was not going fast, but was swerving in and out of their lane, eventually driving completely on the wrong side of the road. Another car came down the hill, passed the swerving car and stopped in the middle of his lane. The first car also stopped in the dead center of the road, behind car #2. A young guy got out of car #2, ran back to car #1 to see what was wrong with the driver and to figure out how to help. By now, Apache (the neighbor’s dog) and I went over to the car and found a confused elderly woman, Vicky, behind the wheel. Vicky said she was on her way home from her friend’s house but, because of the bright lights in the house, couldn’t see well. We asked her where she lived… over by Byerly’s, so the young man, Nate, offered to drive her home and I offered to follow them in order to give Nate a ride back to his car. (Yes, I do realize that probably wasn’t the smartest decision.) I ran Apache home, told my neighbors where I was going, grabbed my cell phone and drove back over to Nate and Vicky.

I followed the two of them on a windy path to Vicky’s house. It was obvious from the last minute and wrong turns that Vicky was confused about how to get to her house. I felt bad for Nate as he was getting directions from an 88 year old woman who was obviously disoriented and confused, wondered if we were ever going to find her house. After winding through neighborhoods, we finally made it to Vicky’s house.

While Vicky was getting out of her car, Nate and I asked her questions to get a better sense of her situation. She shared with us that she’s basically all alone, that her husband died 11 years ago and her son had also died several years ago. She was visiting her friend, who is also an 80-something year old widow. On the way to her house, I noticed that Vicky’s license tabs expired in September 2005 (!) and wondered if her license had been taken away from her at some point years ago. I commented on the expired tabs, to which Vicky replied, “Oh… don’t call the police on me.” Nate advised her not to drive as the police may give her a ticket for her expired tabs, I advised the same, but explained that not only could she get a ticket, her license could be taken away. Nate helped her into her house, which, from what I could see, seemed to be a mess. There were piles of junk in her garage, the light bulb in her entry way was burned out, there was more stuff piled inside her door. It seemed apparent that she’s been living there by herself for quite some time and probably isn’t able to take care of it herself.

As we left, Vicky thanked us and said she’d pray a rosary for each of us.

On the drive home, I learned that Nate works for a computer company, graduated from EPHS in ’98 and lives in St. Paul. When he asked what I do, I explained that I work in admissions, that it’s natural for me to ask a lot of questions and apologized if I came across as nosey. He was friendly and didn’t mind my questions.

When I got home, I explained the whole story to my neighbors, then to Sheila who encouraged me to call the police in order to prevent Vicky from hurting herself or others with her confusion and bad driving.

So I did. I reported the story to the person who answered the phone, gave him Vicky’s license plate number so they could follow up with her if necessary. An officer called me back to gather more information about the situation and from him I learned that Vicky hasn’t had a license for quite some time. He told me he was heading over to Vicky’s house tonight to check on her orientation and get information from her on tonight’s events, that someone from the county would also be following up with her during the day.

The whole thing made me sad. Vicky seems to have no one to look out for her well being, she’s lost a large part of her freedom and she’s about to lose even more considering the fact that she won’t be able to live alone for much longer without a license.

One positive piece- there are still trustworthy people and good samaritans out there. Had Nate continued driving to his friend’s place, Vicky may not have made it home tonight.

The Springs

It's working. Yesterday was another fantastic day!

Started off with my daily trip to Starbucks (sorry Peaberry, Starbucks is right next to my hotel) where I ordered a yogurt parfait, a cup of coffee and a bottle of water for the road. The drive to Colorado Springs was beautiful, the sun was rising in the east, shining on the snow capped mountains in the west.

My first high school visit was a bust, but the admin was friendly and we chatted about her frustrations with the online system for ordering Rockies tickets. (She tried for hours, as did thousands of other Rockies fans, to order tickets and never made it past the first screen.) I'm friends with the counselor at the next high school and she did a great job of recruiting students for my visit, so there were 4 great seniors who are interested in St. Olaf. While I was in that visit, I missed a call from the mom of a current first year student who was hoping to meet me at the previous high school. We never had a chance to meet throughout her daughter's admission process and she was hoping to connect with me while I was in town. Long story short, she met up with me just as I was finishing up an interview at Starbucks and took me out to lunch. Such a nice treat! Her daughter is loving St. Olaf, which is always good to hear.

After lunch, I had to boogie back to Denver for an interview with another student and her dad. This young woman is about the most unique person I've met! She's written a novel, has an online doll clothing company (she knits clothing for a certain type of doll), taught herself how to create websites, etc. On top of all that, she has a vibrant personality.

Brian Watters and I met at the Denver Aquarium for dinner, which was the perfect end to a great day.

I've gotta run.... off to my last high school visit and then heading home!
Jill

Roadkill

Earlier this month, I was driving down Hampden Ave (in south Denver) on my way to a high school visit when I noticed two large birds feasting on some roadkill in the middle of the road. As I approached the birds, I stepped on my brakes because they were greedily eating their breakfast rather than paying attention to approaching traffic. One of the birds flew out of my path just in time... the other wasn't so quick and decided to fly directly into my path. I slammed directly into the poor thing. Of course I felt terrible about hitting the bird! However, within a few miles, I'd forgotten about tragedy.

I continued driving for another 10 miles when I stopped for gas. After pumping the gas and washing my back window, I remembered the bird and thought I should check for feathers in the grill. Before I even got around to the front of the vehicle, I could see a large wing sticking out of the front of the car. As I came around to the front, I was greeted by a whole pigeon stuck in my grill... and he was still alive, blinking back at me!!

At first, I laughed, but I quickly realized that I would have to do something about this live bird, that I couldn't just leave him to die in the grill of my car. What was I going to do?! There was a nice man pumping gas next to me, so I frantically went over to him, told him I hit a bird that was still alive and stuck in my grill. As he came around to the front of the car, his eyes got huge and he admitted that he'd never seen anything like that before. He proceeded to grab a handfull of paper towels, which he used to protect his hands from the pigeon. The poor bird was so wedged into the spot, it took my new friend at least 5 minutes to loosen the pigeon from its spot. The bird was obviously hurt as bird seed started to fall out of his insides. Yuck, I know.

Eventually, the guy was able to completely remove the bird, which dropped to the ground and scurried under my car. I introduced myself to Brian, thanked him for helping me and drove away with tears rolling down my cheeks. Even though it was just a pigeon, I couldn't help but feel sad for the poor little guy.

Fall Travel... again

It's been awhile since I've taken the time to write. Before I went to bed last night, I looked back at my entries from last travel season and I'm amazed I found the time (or took the time) to write so much! Guess I've been a little lazier this travel season... either that or I've had less exciting things to write about. It's probably the former. I've learned over time that when I take the time to write, I pay attention to the great things that happen to me each day.

I'm in Boulder, CO where I visited two high schools this morning- the first one was quite possibly my worst visit, the second was my most fun visits, so I guess they balance each other out. The first was at a high school where we consistently have several applicants each year (one this year is applying Early Decision!). Normally, this is a fantastic hs visit, but for whatever reason, the group of 11 kids today was non responsive to my "presentation". One kind soul kept adding her two cents as the sibling of a current student. I appreciated her effort to get the group more interested and engaged, but sadly her efforts didn't help much. I spent 2 hours at the next high school, where it's rare for me to see even one solid student. The two students who met with me are girls I interviewed when I was here two weeks ago. They're good friends so had been looking forward to our visit this afternoon. Lucky for all of us, no one else was interested in learning more about St. Olaf so the three of us chatted about their lives for 2 hours! We had such a great time.

Now I'm sitting outside a restaurant called Mad Greens where I had a delicious salad called the Edgar Allen Poe. I believe it was my first salad of the fall (don't ask how my pants are fitting). The weather is gorgeous! Started off chilly on Sunday, but has warmed progressively throughout the week.

This afternoon I'm getting together with Elena, who is one of the few St. Olaf students who transfers away from Olaf. She decided to go to CU Boulder to study opera with a world renowned opera instructor. I'm excited to see her and to hear how she's liking Boulder!

I spent yesterday in Fort Collins, where I visited some high schools and had an interview with a student and her dad. After that, I headed to Greeley where I had dinner with Micah. You might remember Micah from this time last year... he is from Colorado Springs, family couldn't afford to send him to Olaf so he went to UNC. Since then, we've stayed in touch and try to get together when we're in each other's city. Micah is definitely my favorite student who did not enroll at St. Olaf. I appreciate the fact that he contacts me to get together! Makes it seem a little less strange to hang out with a 20 year old who's not at Olaf. We went to Red Robin for delicious 'shroom burgers and shakes.

Hard to believe this is my last week of fall travel. Only having Colorado as an out of state territory makes for limited travel, which has advantages and disadvantages. Of course, I'm focusing on the advantages.

Lookin' for the good in each day,
Jilli

Nashville, TN

Our weekend in Tennessee is already coming to an end. We’re en route back to Minneapolis- Dad’s sitting by the window reading his book, Andy’s in the middle listening to my iPOD and I’m the nerdy one on the aisle with my laptop, alternating between free cell and Microsoft word.

Right away when we got to Nashville, we checked into the hotel and walked about half a mile to the center of downtown- Music Row. Andy has been to Nashville before and suggested that we have lunch at Jack’s, which is a well known bbq restaurant. Much more simple than I’d expected, sort of a hole-in-the-wall restaurant (which we quickly learned are the best, most authentic places to visit) right in the center of Music Row. When we asked about the beef brisket, the guy behind the counter showed us the tender, pull apart meat and Andy and I were sold. From there we wandered through several hole-in-the-wall bars and souvenir shops. We spent some time at a bar called Robert’s Western World, where we listened to a country band with an unusual looking guitarist who had a clear, strong voice.

We pretty much spent the rest of the day/evening downtown, wandering through several different bars, Printer’s Alley, Coyote Ugly (don’t worry, we didn’t stay), Hard Rock Café, the Bluegrass Inn and back to Robert’s. My two favorites that night were the Bluegrass Inn and Robert’s. There was another unusual looking band performing at the Bluegrass Inn, but man they could play/sing. Dad quickly warmed up to the band at Robert’s – the Don Kelley Band. Two of the members have played with very well known bands- the bass player played with Dwight Yokum, a few others, and with Johnny Cash for 10 years. Apparently he’s one of the original Tennessee Three (whoever they are… still have to google them to learn more). The lead guitar player used to play with Allison Kraus and is now playing with Patty Loveless… he’s an amazing guitarist! It’s hard to believe his fingers could move so fast, let alone get all the right notes and sound so good.

Since we had two more full days in Nashville, we decided to drive down to Memphis Friday morning (about a 3 ½ hour drive). The drive was fine- probably would have been better if the sun was shining, but the highway was smooth and the scenery was great… lots of trees and rolling hills. We considered driving through Graceland, but since none of us are die-hard Elvis fans, we decided not to take the time. We got lost, I mean turned around on the way to downtown Memphis so spent more time than necessary in the car. I ended up getting the giggles about the whole thing… all three of us are very capable with maps and directions so it was sort of crazy that we were so mixed up. We blamed it on the maps, which were not nearly detailed enough, and bad signage.

In Memphis, we walked along Beale Street, had lunch at BB King’s and then went through the Rock & Soul Museum where we learned about the history of country/rock/soul music and the roll of music in Memphis during the mid 1900s. So interesting! On the way out of town, we drove through Rhodes College, which has a beautiful campus.

By the time we got back to Nashville, it was after 9pm so we parked the car and pretty much headed right for Music Row again. Being a Friday night, the bars were much more crowded than the night before, but we wandered through a few, stopping where we could find an empty table. One of the places was a karaoke bar- we went there in the hopes of hearing some people belting out some good country music, but it was like any other karaoke bar with some good and some not-so-great singers singing the typical songs. Andy was hit on (big surprise) by a woman from Wisconsin who claimed to have had a conversation with him before, but apparently she was confused, or just had a good pick-up line. After that, we wandered back to Robert’s- this time after 10pm so there was a different band (the Don Kelley Band only played until 10pm). Would you believe we sat there until after 2am?! We met the president of the AHL LA King’s, Andy had his picture taken with the waitress (who used to spend her summers in Delano with family), he also made a new friend with a guy from Nashville who bought him a beer, a shot and put $20 in the tip jug for the band. Somehow they bonded over their shared annoyance with some drunk guy hanging out by our table. No complaints from Andy.

Needless to say, all three of us slept well that night.

Saturday we hit the road again, this time heading straight south for Lynchburg, TN. We stopped at the Cracker Barrel for a heavy breakfast including biscuits & gravy, grits and eggs. The scenery on this drive was breath-taking! More rolling hills, cows grazing and large houses on the hillside.

Lynchburg itself is a teeny little town with a surprisingly cute and historic downtown. After wandering through a few souvenir shops, we headed over to the Jack Daniel’s Distillery for a tour. Our tour guide, Marge, had the thickest southern accent and wasn’t about to take any guff from any of us. She was entertaining, to say the least. When Jack Daniel was 13 he bought the distillery from his family friend who decided to devote his time to being a preacher. Interestingly enough, the distillery is in a dry county, so even though they can sell whiskey at the distillery (the only place alcohol can be sold in the county) we couldn’t have a sample of the whiskey at the end of the tour.

On the way home, we got lost again trying to find Opryland, drove through Opryland and stopped for dinner at the Santa Fe Cattle Company. Once back in Nashville, we parked closer to downtown and went for one more round of Music Row. This time we stopped at a place called the Second Fiddle where dad quickly made friends with a young guy from Huntsville and we listened to a woman sing country music. And guess where we ended the night. Robert’s. It was the perfect place to end our weekend, as Dad was lovin’ the old country music.

The lifestyle of the musician is hard to imagine- they perform at least 4 nights a week, playing the same music for different crowds, passing the same tip bucket around. It was interesting to see musicians from different bars interacting with one another… I’m sure there’s a little sub-culture of Music Row musicians.

There are hundreds of cities we could have traveled to this weekend, but we made the right decision choosing Nashville. All three of us love the toe-tappin’ country music, but I think Dad got the biggest kick out of it, which was the ultimate goal of the weekend. The city itself is nothing special, but the fact that you can walk into any hole-in-the-wall bar and hear amazing live music is pretty great.