dontravis.com blog post #595
I lost my best friend, my confidant, my conscience, and my buddy
three years ago this past Easter Sunday. I miss Bobbi Adams as much as I miss
my departed wife Betty, possibly as much as I miss my son Clai. That means
little to readers, but it means everything to me. Please indulge me in a little
maudlin wallowing. The following is published exactly as was the original
piece.
Miss you, gal.
****
I met Bobbi ten years ago in a writing class at the
Bear Canyon Center, the very class that I now co-host at the North Domingo
Multigenerational Center. I walked into the classroom—open to anyone then as now—and
took a vacant seat beside a tall blonde. She was busy talking to someone but
soon introduced herself as Bobbi. What an inauspicious beginning to such a firm
and lasting friendship. She didn’t know it at the time, but I had recently lost
my wife after a four-month battle with pneumonia. She must have sensed
something, because she latched onto the emotionally depleted stranger and never
let go… until Easter Sunday of this year. But that comes later.
Bobbi originally hailed from Gallup, New Mexico where
she was a rebellious member of a prominent family. She left home at her
earliest opportunity and became a United Airlines stewardess—I guess they’re
called “hostesses” these days. She retired from United and for a time piloted
(yes, she was also a pilot) transport aircraft into hostile areas as a contract
carrier for the US Defense Department. So by the time I met her, she had
virtually been all over the world.
When I talked of my trips to Hong Kong, she topped
them with much more adventurous stories of the colony. When I told her about
Macau, she’d been there and won more money than I had lost at the gaming
tables. When I told about my years in the army in what was then West Germany, she’d
been to every place I had visited and all over the rest of Europe, as well. She
was brimming with great stories based on her travels, hence her participation
in the writing class.
She did publish a few of the stories, but soon became
swept up in other activities like the Albuquerque Police Department’s and the
Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Citizen’s Academies, and for good measure, the
FBI’s equivalent course. She reveled in the firing range sessions and the
ride-along nights. Her politics tended to waver now and then, but never her
support for law enforcement. She volunteered every Thursday at APD’s crime lab
on North Second Street.
And then there was the Albuquerque International
Balloon Fiesta. Early October was taken up by volunteer work for the fiesta.
She acted as a guide for puzzled tourists, ferried police and fiesta officials
around the huge park, and even worked with Homeland Security to guard against
bombers and other terrorists. I believe this was truly where her heart lay.
In the meantime, she took care of her family. Although
she was married and divorced two times, she had no children. No human children,
that is. But she did have a family of six dogs and three birds. The cockatoo
squawked a lot, one canary sang at the drop of a hat, and the other took lots
of baths. At one time, she also had a pet turtle that came to her when called.
That one, I never met.
But her real children were the dogs, all of them
rescue animals. Even though I became great friends with each one, I couldn’t
begin to tell you what kind of dogs they were, except for describing them as
small, happy, and yappy when someone showed up at the front door.
But they were not the only vagabonds she took in. A
few years back, when I fell and injured my back, she saw me through the
resulting operation and then took me into her home for close onto three months
while I recovered.
Bobbi’s life had been plagued by health problems as
well as adventures. Years before I met her, she had breast cancer, resulting in
mastectomies. She had other infirmities as well but refused to allow them to
get in the way of living. Not even when she was diagnosed with bone cancer a
year and a half ago. She took the chemo and kept to her schedule, even when she
was not feeling all that well. As the disease wore down her immune system, she
was advised to avoid crowds. Although she took precautions, she continued to live
her life as usual, including six days of volunteer work at last October’s
Balloon Fiesta and her weekly volunteer day at the crime lab.
I went with Bobbi to most of her oncology visits and
was there when they increased her chemo after her weekly blood tests began to
escalate. I was with her last March when the doctor reviewed her latest blood
chemistry and declared it as unsatisfactory but not alarming.
I generally phoned Bobbi after the 10:00 p.m. news and
did so on Saturday the 20th. I started off by asking what kind of day she had.
She might have put up a front with others, but she was usually frank with me.
She told me she had a good day. No headache (she was subject to ferocious ones
at times). She had worked in the yard and probably overdid it. Tired, but
otherwise okay.
Easter Sunday, I decided not to call her because of the
good report the previous evening. Around 11:15 that night, Rhonda, another close
friend of Bobbi’s, called and asked if I had talked to Bobbi that day. She was
worried because she hadn’t been able to reach Bobbi. After talking it over, Rhonda
decided to call the county sheriff’s office and request a wellness visit. I
told her to tell the dispatcher I would meet the deputies at the house to let
them in with my key.
When I arrived, the house was dark, which was
alarming. Her home has both a doorbell and a voice call button. I always used
the call button. No response, except from the dogs, which were still in the
living area, not back in the bedroom where they normally slept. I knew
something was wrong, but I waited for the deputies before entering the house.
I did my best to keep the dogs in the living area
while the deputies searched the house. They found Bobbi dead in a bathroom just
off the kitchen area. I called Rhonda who said she was on her way from her home
in Los Lunas, south of Albuquerque. OMI (Office of the Medical Inspector)
arrived and asked us questions about her health and her doctors. Then the woman
told us Bobby had been gone for at least twelve hours, but in her opinion,
death had been quick.
Rhonda stayed to care for the dogs, but I remained
only until OMI took her from the house. Then I left and said goodbye to a wonderful
woman and fantastic friend as I wept while driving home. I arrived around 2:00
a.m. to spend a sleepless night thinking about life without Bobbi…poverty-stricken
by her absence, yet rich with memories of her.
****
Thank you for your indulgence.
The next post will be a three-part
guest post from my Okie buddy, Mark Wildyr about a set of triplets. It will run
contemporaneously on both his post and this one. Not sure exactly how I allowed
him to convince me to do this, but I did.
Sorry, but I can’t resist one more goodbye: Bye, Bobbi, love you
and miss you more than you know. Hard to believe you’ve been gone that long. I
can still hear your voice, your laugh. Rest easy.
The
rest of you tay safe and stay strong.
Now my
mantra: Keep on reading and keep on writing. You have something to say…
so say it!
A link
to The Cutie-Pie Murders:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/ambxgy7e5ndmimk/CutiePieMurders%5BThe%5D.zip?dl=0
My
personal links:
Email: don.travis@aol.com.
Facebook: www.facebook.com/donald.travis.982
Twitter: @dontravis3
See you next Thursday.
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