Mom, it’s one page. I said, “No.” I did not say it hard. I said it the way you decline a second helping. She started explaining.
The committee met on Tuesday, October 20th. They tabled the matter and asked for a fresh written consent from the member of record because there was a question about the paperwork. She said that last part in a tone that made it sound like a printer jam. I said no again. I said I was not signing anything this year.
And that is when my daughter stopped performing. God, mom, this is exactly why. It’s just easier without you there. It always has been. I said it out loud one time.
You never even answered me. You just went quiet like always and let me be the bad guy. There it was. Not a slip. A position she had been holding for a while.
I did not tell her about page nine or the footer or the counterbook. She said one more thing before we hung up. And she did not know she was saying it. Plet says the committee will move it in the spring if you’d just sign. I said I would think about it.
I did not say what I would be thinking about. There was one hole left and it was the one that mattered most to me personally. The club had been told I lived in a memory care facility. I could prove where I did live. I wanted on paper from that facility the fact that I had never been there.
So on Friday, November 20th, I mailed Sonor and Trails a written request for any records they held concerning me, my own records, which anyone may ask for. I enclosed a copy of my driver’s license and a stamped envelope because the stamped envelope is worth more than the statute. The answer came Thursday, December 3rd, signed by the executive director. They had no record of Roberta A. Chalmer’s.
No residency, no application, no tour, no inquiry, no waiting list entry. She added one sentence I did not ask for. I hope this resolves whatever has occurred. I put it in a green folder with the jury service certificate from February 10th, the 214 pages, the annual meeting packet open to page 9, and the club bylaws with two lines underlined. Then I wrapped four presents.
Josie Wyatt Bo Hollis. Same as every year since they were born. Elma came over the night before I left and watched me pack and said the only useful thing anybody said to me that entire fall. Take the good coat, Roberta. I took the good coat.
It is charcoal wool and it has deep pockets. And into the left one I put a brass oval with a seven worn almost smooth. On Saturday morning, December 19th, I pulled onto the highway at 7:15 with a banker’s box seat belted into the passenger seat. I was not going up there to catch anybody. I was going up there because it was my week.
I pulled into Juniper Mesa at 2:00 in the afternoon. You smell the juniper before the tires stop rolling. Sharp, sweet, a little like jin. Same smell as the folding table and the coffee can. I sat in the car with my hands on the wheel.
Then I went in and set a brass fob on the front desk. Robera Chalmer’s certificate 0071. I have Cassita 12 the 19th through the 26th. Tori looked at the screen. Then she looked at me.
Then she looked at the screen again and her face did a thing that faces do when two facts will not fit in the same head. She said, “One moment, please, Mrs. Chalmer’s.” And she went and got Curtis. Curtis Hobart came out of the office wiping his hands on a bar towel and he stopped about 6 feet away and went the color of the walls. Mrs. Chalmer’s he tried again.
We had you listed differently. I said I know that’s why I came early. He asked if I wanted him to notify my family that I had arrived. I said they have my number. He carried my bag himself unlocked.
Cassita 12 stood in the doorway a moment too long and asked whether I would be available if the club needed to speak with me. I told him I would be right here all seven days. I had 4 days alone in that cassita before anybody came. I used three of them to rest. Wednesday, December 23rd, 3:40 in the afternoon.
Two vehicles, 11 other families checking in around them. Luggage carts. A boy chasing a dog he did not know. I was in the wing back by the lobby fireplace with a cup of tea and a paperback I was not reading. Denise reached the desk first.
Doug behind her with the roller bags, Kurt and Kayla and the four kids coming through the second door. Tori pulled up the reservation and her voice stayed very level the way you train yourself to be level at a front desk. Mrs. Rooker, I’m not finding an associate reservation under Waro 701. There’s no designation of associate members on file for this year, so no associate bookings could be made under that account. Denise said there had to be a mistake.
She said they had come every year since 2009. Tori said the account did have one reservation. Cassita 12 the 19th through the 26th. One occupant, member of record. Denise laughed once.
Then she took something out of her coat pocket and set it on the counter hard. A brass fob, a seven that was not worn smooth. Warren. Tori was very kind about it. She said the fob opens the vehicle gate.