Day Two - Rochester

Carrie and I dressed to represent that morning.

“Who’re you wearing?”

“Lynn. He’s my homeboy. You?”

“Holliday.”

Anything to feel closer to home.

7:15 shuttle to Mayo. Mostly pleasant older folks chatting about the cold under strains of crackly radio – Katy Perry’s “Dark Horse”.

The Mayo resembled more an airport than anything else. Expansive temple-like halls and wings.

17th floor. While Carrie spent two hours in her first appointment, Mom and I sat facing a wall of glass overlooking the gray skyline of hospitals and cathedrals. Flocks of blackbirds winging in wide circles.

Paused for a late breakfast in the cafeteria – Jimmy Dean breakfast bagel sandwich (eating hospital food was definitely always super high on my bucket list). Nearby, “karaoke hour” at the baby grand. Some people have a little more difficulty locating their pipes.

Carrie rejoined us after ten o’clock and back down to the cafeteria to get her a wrap.

On the way out, she eyeballed the prim soloist at the piano, warbling like a songbird that just missed out on landing a role in the opera, apparently loving the sound of her own voice. Because it didn’t stop.

“Grrrr…” she mumbled on the way to her next appointment.

After eleven o’clock, we made one last pass near the piano as the same woman screeched through “When You Wish Upon a Star”. I think Carrie was about to snap something in half. We took refuge in the spacious glassed-in lobby, waiting for our shuttle. But the strains of heavily Disney-based operetta continued to swell towards us. Carrie threatened something about a trachea removal.

So Carrie and I typed through our afternoon back at the motel, finally finding a wifi connection. Mom flipped on HGTV and discussed ideas for our upcoming non-busy weekend.

“Oooh. Amish Tours of Harmony!”

Carrie turned around with a look of desperation on her face. “That. Sounds. Like. My. Grave.”

Instead of visiting the Amish, it was Target – nutrients, bottled water, and hand sanitizer.

My boys called in again that evening, surviving well back in home sweet home.

We crashed early again to the symphony of helicopter pad traffic, police sirens, and radiator-gurgling. Things eventually calmed down to a dead silence.