A Witty Elderly Ancestor With A Sense of Humor

My 97 year old mother, Ruby, who was living in the Meadows Nursing Home in Central Illinois for the last 10 years of her life, had a very weak body but a sharp mind — and you never knew what she was going to say.

She was a living testimony to the fact that some people don’t lose their wittiness or sense of humor just because they get old.

Some Ruby Stories

I had been in her room a while — working on her favorite clock that wouldn’t even run a mite.

I thought she was a bit subdued, but maybe she was just worried that her designated clock fixer just didn’t have it.

“Well, I’ve fixed your clock,” I finally said proudly. “That’ll be $10, please.”  “Charge it!” she shot back, without skipping a beat.

______

“Oh, that’s way too much,” Ruby exclaimed with conviction when I plopped the medium chocolate malt down on her bed stand. “I couldn’t possibly drink all that.”

Then, 10 minutes later, I heard that loud “slurpppp” that can only be caused by someone sucking on a straw, hoping against hope to get just a little more good stuff from the bottom of the container.

Then, looking up with a large smile, Ruby deadpanned, “Well how on earth did that happen?”

______

“I need a haircut today,” said Ruby, who adamantly refused to use the hair dresser services at the nursing home.

And I, her only son — with a very limited skill set — was her choice as cutter.  Probably only because of proximity.

She was not at all worried that I couldn’t give her the needed thinning, so I proceeded to “snip, snip, snip,” as I whittled her mop of hair down to size.

“Okay, I’m finished cutting your hair. You look like a million dollars,” I said.

“Without the zeros,” she quipped with that wry smile.

______

Ruby had few psychological hangups, but adjusting to new eye glasses was one of her downfalls.

It happened more than once.  A trip to the optometrist, a test, quite a time choosing frames, and finally, trying on the the new glasses.

“I can’t see out of these glasses,” she said, as she put them on her table and put the old ones back on.

“Just try them, Mom, you have to wear new glasses for a while to get used to them,” I replied.

After half-heartedly trying for a few days, she pronounced, “They don’t work. I don’t see right.”

“You couldn’t see with the old ones when you were getting your eyes tested,” I said.  “What do you say to explain that?”

“I say that some things just can’t be explained,” she responded with a voice of finality.  And that was that.

­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­ ______

“So you took Dana (our grandkid, her greatgrandkid) to the dinosaur display at the museum, huh?” Ruby asked. “How did it go?”

“She really enjoyed it,” I said. “It was a wonderful display, and the dinosaurs were so amazingly realistic.”

“So how would you know about realistic dinosaurs?” she asked with a twinkle in her eye. “Just how many real dinosaurs have you seen in your life?”

______

I asked Ruby what she wanted for her  97^th birthday, which was fast approaching.

“I would like to have some bacon,” she asserted without a second thought.

Her cholesterol was approaching 200, and she hadn’t been allowed to eat bacon.  But she was going to be 97 years old, and that should count for something.

“Bacon it is, then,” I said.

We brought in a cake and used the kitchen to cook some bacon.

When Ruby had eaten more bacon that one would think possible, it was time for dessert.

“Do you want some cake, Mom?” I asked. “It looks pretty good.”

Ruby looked at the cake, looked as my wife Harriet and I, smiled, and said, “Well, if I have to make a choice, you take the cake — I’ll take the extra bacon.”

_______

“The doctor. is coming to see you today,” I said.  “Think of some questions you want to ask him.”

“Okay, my arthritic hands are causing me a lot of problems,” Ruby answered with obvious concern.  “The fingers bend both ways and way back.”

“Well, maybe the doctor can give you some help on that,” I said.

“He’d better,” Ruby responded decisively,  “If he says it’s just old age and nothing can be done, we may have to get an older doctor.”

______

I walked in her room on December 22, 1999.  The idea of my computer being Y-2K compatible (being able to not get all screwed up when the year changed from 1999 to 2000) was on my mind.

“You’ve got a problem,” I said, as I looked her in the eye.

She knew I was setting something up.

“What do you mean, I’ve got a problem?”  She frowned, as if to say that if she had a problem, she’d know it.

“You’re not Y-2K Compatible,” I said.

“What do you mean by that?”  she asked.  I explained the Y-2K compatible idea, and she allowed she had seen things about it on TV.

“Why do you say I’m not Y-2K compatible?” she asked.

“It’s like this,” I said with feigned seriousness. “If you die after the end of the year, your gravestone will be all screwed up. Etched in stone, it now reads ‘Ruby Odaffer, 1902 – 19 – –  .’  But then it should read 1902 – 2000. What are you going to do with the ’19’ ? ”

“Well,” she said with an air of finality and a bit of smugness for getting the last word. “ I’ve got worse problems than that.  Furthermore, the way I figure it, it’s more your problem than mine.”

Postscript

My mother died on January 4, 2000, shortly after our Y-2K conversation.

She was absolutely right. Y-2K was my problem, not hers.  It took me four months to get a new gravestone from North Carolina.

I look back fondly on these, and many other instances of my mother’s wit and good humor.

There is something beautiful about an ageless wittiness and sense of humor.