(The Canadian Side of Niagara Falls. Photo Niagara Vacations.)

The roar of V-twin engines woke me before dawn. Normally.

I waded pensively through the lead story in the NY Times this morning on the challenge of the kids returning from Afghanistan. I remember painfully well what it was like. The first couple times were extraordinarily weird- we got back from deployments to the Indian Ocean that were timeless in their quality of boredom, punctuated by frenetic activity. We tanned because sometimes there was nothing else to do.

We were black, and layers of skin would peel off all at once like we were reptiles molting.

That was the first deployment, while the second one had the capture of the American Embassy in Tehran in the middle of it, and a lot of adrenaline and then hurry-up-and-wait and real planning for things that were very scary indeed.

Anyway, the guys with families were absolutely beside themselves as the miles between them and Home Port diminished. Seeing the gals and the kids all dressed up- there were no women on combat ships then- was a trip. But since the Home Port we were returning to was Yokosuka, Japan, and foreign soil a world away from the Land of the Big PX, the bachelors just shrugged and walked to the O Club to get hammered and wonder what all the fuss was about, and when the next at-sea period would be.

Completely different than ground combat, of course, though the coolest homecoming was from the cruise to the Med during which the Wall fell in Berlin. The Airwing staff got to fly off with the squadrons, a full day and a half before the dreadnaught would steam up the placid waters of the St. John’s river to moor pier-side at NAVSTA Mayport.

Anyhow, the recollections of deployments gone by, and the period of readjustment to normal non-adrenal life, powerfully resonated this morning along with the roar of engines celebrating the sacrifice of a now long-ago war.

I don’t know what to do today. I should take flowers over to our people at Arlington, whose murders set off all this madness. I need to swim for an hour, now that the pool is open. I should finish editing this edition of the Quarterly, and finish my research on the parent’s taxes for last year, and complete the package requesting duplicate titles for the cars…and go down to the farm, where have chores waiting.

I finished scanning the Times and opened the e-mail and was surprised to see that my Sister Anook had not been sleeping, and was on foreign soil with Big Mama. I read her update with growing agitation:

“She smells.”

Anook gazed across the hotel room her Mother and daughter were sharing.  Big Mama looked small and fierce in the corner chair squeezed between the window and the double bed.

“She smells old.  I opened a window.”

“Where’s whatzhiz name?”

Big Mama was asking about Raven- her husband of 64 years.

“Whatzhiz’s name is in Michigan.  We left him home.”

“Really?”

Raven was at the people kennel.  Anook, Anook’s family and Big Mama were on vacation.  The vacation had changed when Annook could not find Big Mama’s passport. There was no time to get a new one, but with a birth certificate and a driver’s license, crossing the international border would be possible.

Of course, Anook could not find that document either.  The birth certificate for Big Mama could be obtained from her birth county in Ohio, and so instead of driving to Canada from Detroit, the merry band headed south to the most Southern county seat for Bellaire, Ohio.

It was Friday afternoon before Memorial Day weekend.  They got to the Department of Records ½ hour before it closed.

“That will be $25.00.”

Anook pulled out her debit card.

“Cash.”

After driving back down the rolling hill to the ATM at the crowded holiday gas station and back again, Anook was handed an official birth certificate with a raised seal from the great state of Ohio.

“You all certainly did not have to come all the way here to get this. You could have gone to any of the county seats in Ohio, as long as she was originally born here.”

“That’s not what the website said.  It said original county seat of birth for same day or 6 weeks delay.”

“Old news, sir.”

Damn Buckeyes.  Damn their lies.

Anook’s husband turned to her.

“A famous person once said, when a journey changes that is God’s way of making you learn how to dance.”

Anook would rather not have learned they did not have to go all the way downstate, and only slightly growled at her husband when she told him she could learn to dance.

“Remember what you said, dear – Big Mama wanted to go home, so this was Divine intervention.  Remember?”

Anook accepted that there were greater hands at play.

Now, if Anook had a large marker and a map she would  mark a series of dots with a picture of a car going south to Bellaire, North to Pittsburgh, East to Erie, North to Niagara Falls, and would have added a picture with a green light blinking “GO” over the bridge from New York to Canada.

“Yippee!!!!!”

In three days they had been to 5 states and two countries and had yet to see their first play.  Anook’s daughter saw Niagara Falls from the Canadian side for the first time.

“Awesome.  USA sure got ripped off on the view.”

(The Colonel Butler Best Western in Niagra-by-the-Lake. Photo Best Western.)

The car headed North to Niagara on the Lake, home of the Shaw Play Festival.  They checked into the Best Western.  They had two hotel rooms on the second floor – no elevator.

“Do you have something on the first floor?  My mother is having a hard time walking and climbing stairs.”

“We are full.  You should have said something before getting here.”

“Sorry.”

When Anook and her husband had walked up to the counter to register, the woman had said “hello,” and then asked them what name their reservation was under.  As Anook and her husband have two different last names they said “Notsocotra” and “Socotra.”

The woman pulled out the reservation for Notsocotra.  It was for 2 people, 2 nights.  Anook’s husband said they needed 2 rooms for 4 people 2 nights.  The woman became quite distressed.  She most certainly did not have an extra room and there was no possibility that there was an error on their part.  Anook asked her to look for another reservation for Socotra.  There was one.  She told the two of them she would deal with the second reservation when she was done with the first one.  Annook asked whether she could not be filling out the form, while the woman dealt with her husband on room number one, which really upset the clerk.   The clerk said she didn’t want to mess up the credit cards –

“Same credit card, thanks.”

– the billing address, car info –

“Same billing address, car info”

– who was in the rooms –

“All family, 2 rooms 2 people each.”

– but they had to track each room by individual key –

“Three keys each room.”

The clerk got to the end.  It almost seemed like she resented the husband and wife for taking one of the hotel rooms together.

“Here. Welcome. Bye.”

The family made the long walk down the hall with baggage to the staircase.

Big Mama had been breathy over anything physically assertive.  Anook made a note to take her to the doctor as well as Raven next week.

The town is adorable with old houses and beautiful flowers and rustic stores and eateries and small streets packed with theatergoers.  It was a busman’s holiday for this group.  Anook’s daughter took off on a well-deserved walk.  Knowing they could not walk Big Mama up and down the stairs, Anook and her husband stocked up on food and drink and parked Big Mama in the room with the TV on and plenty of things for Big Mama to read.  Big Mama got on her teal nightgown.

Anook went downstairs to use the hotel Internet.  Anook’s husband went on his own well-deserved walk.  Anook was immersed in returning correspondence when Big Mama burst barefoot and angry into the lobby.

“Where’s my key!”

“What?”

“You all deserted me without a key.”

“Come on, Big Mama.  Your key is in your room.  Come with me.”

Anook started down the hall forcing Big Mama to follow.  Big Mama stopped in front of the hotel room 102.  Big Mama’s room was 202.

“This is my room and I don’t have a key.”

“That is not your room.”

“This is my room and I don’t have a key.”

Big Mama started to pull up her fist to pound on the door.

“Big Mama, that is not your room.  You put that hand down and you follow me.”

Annook and Big Mama went to the stairwell and made it back up to the second floor with Big Mama huffing and puffing.  Annook opened Big Mama’s door and escorted her back into the room.

“I still don’t have a key.”

Anook picked up Big Mama’s key from the light stand between the beds.

“Your key is right here.  Right where it has always been.”

“How was I supposed to know that.”

The night before, while in Pittsburgh, Anook’s daughter said Big Mama had gotten up and gone out to the hall at 4am insisting it was 4pm and time for dinner.  Big Mama would look at her watch and more often than not, assume it was day instead of night or night instead of day.  It didn’t matter if it was light or dark out.

“I’m pretty sure Mom that Grandma hauls Raven around everywhere 12 hours early or late always claiming it to be at the wrong time of day and demanding that someone was making them miss some kind of meal.”

And all these months we had blamed Raven for all the late night mischievous activities in the elder’s ongoing routines.  No wonder they were both exhausted.

Big Mama really cannot hear and long ago swore off the possibility of hearing aids.  But when she isn’t just angry Big Mama, she is really quite funny and charming in the way she navigates through her changing elderly world.  We knew after last year Raven could no longer travel.  We will have to reevaluate after this trip if that is true for Big Mama as well.

“Where’s watzis name?”

“Not here, Grandma.”

‘Really?”

“Yes, Big Mama.”

Copyright 2011 Anook and Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com