Elegant Lady Joan

She lives two doors down and owns a small black dog. I'd never seen her before today but mum had spoken of her often.
"I saw her heading for the shops. I'll ask her in for coffee."
Mum waited until she saw the snow white crown through the leaves of the Japanese maple.
"If thats her, she's lost weight." Mum hurried down the drive, with her slightly twisted gait, to catch her as she passed. I overheard the invitation and acceptance. I felt terrible for having eaten all my morning tea, not anticipating a visitor.
They made their way slowly up the drive, both pushing the walking trolley up the curved slope.
"I have brakes on this one. Not the one in the car though. People can see the sparks from my heels at times."
I helped mum help her up the stairs onto the porch. We seated her on a comfortable chair and mum went to get coffee and cake.
"Lovely day." I soon felt embarrassed of my boring opener. She humored me for a moment and then proceeded to tell me with wit and class her tales.
"My husband died in December. Sixty years we had been married, you couldn't ask for more. We had three children. We are all very close. Well, one lives in Canberra and two in Port Macquarie. They had the doctor come around with the old age assessment people, to see if I can manage. Well, I told them I could manage just fine. Of course a week later I broke two of my vertebrae. They will go to any lengths to prove a point won't they."
Her blues eyes sparkled and danced at her mischievous comment. My face opened in obvious surprise at her candor. Mum returned with the refreshments and rescued me from my goldfish impression.
"How is your little dog?" My mum loves Joan's dog.
"She's an excellent companion you know. I can't walk her anymore so I pay a young man in sixth form. I used to have boxers you know. When the last one died my vet told me perhaps I was too old for boxers. When i asked him what he recommended he told me a great list of dogs. I said Bob, they're all gun dogs."
Her wide mouth laughed at the memory. Her teeth, all clearly her own, were gently discoloured against the red of her lipstick. "So Bob gave me the address of a place, a farm, and I drove out there to find a dog. There were two gates. You closed the first behind you and opened the second. As I did so there was a great baying as a pack bore down upon me. A golden retriever, a couple of others and a pointer who came up to me and ever so gently took my hand in her mouth. Well, it was clear then. She had been sent to the farm after a hip reconstruction, well suited to breeding. A very intelligent animal she didn't like to walk the same route each day. There would come a point when she would just make it clear she wanted to go in a new direction."
My mother chortled and looked at me amazed. We both sat there being washed over with these never ending, quite fascinating tales.
"I had her five years and held her while she was put to sleep. The hip you see. So I checked the book and that's when I decided on a miniature staffy. My husband would walk her. He was a man of routine, and so is she you see. I wouldn't walk her often but when I did she would stop at the place where they would usually cross the road. Just stop and look at me."
Joan stopped and looked out at the garden. Her face dropped ever so slightly. Her papery skin folded and white, her hair thin and clean. She was beautifully groomed in her camel shirt, decorated with a faux necklace. Mum began talking about the garden and the conversation burbled along without reminiscing for a moment.
I told the story of the little girl who came by selling girl guide cookies,"Do you have a fairy garden?" she asked my mother as she surveyed the piles of moss covered sandstone, tree ferns and over grown orchids. Clearly she could see past the cement mixer, pile of rusted iron fence pickets and other construction materials.
"If a child recognizes it Lenore, you're most of the way there." Joan stated, taking a sip of her coffee.
She told us other tales. Of her being a girl and finding a calf that the mother had dropped on the cattle run and left. She rescued it from dogs and raised it three months before giving it to the milkman. A lovely memory of lying in the grass with the calf's head on her shoulder. Of the frogs in the horse trough on the street, how she would pick them up and have a little chat, say hello, before putting them back.
All too soon she decided it was time to go. We helped her over to and down the step. As we made our way slowly across the balcony, "I'm not a race going lady but I do like to watch. That black caviar, what a fine beast."
Joan began talking to mum about fillies and mares, the derby and such. I was too busy enjoying the timing of her opening statement. An elegant comedienne.
As we walked to the pavement she told us of how she had been driving seventy years."Not one speeding fine and I used to put my foot down. I had a monaro in those days, never once was ticketed. Only a few years ago they caught me on The Pennant Hills Road. By this time I had a pulsar. I expect they get people all the time saying it wasn't them. So I wrote them a cheque and enclosed a letter. It read,
Dear speed camera, I've had this vehicle five years and thought I had broken it in. It must have got the bit in it's mouth and away from me though. I've kicked it's tyres for it, don't tell the NRMA... Well, they sent me my money back"
We wished her a lovely afternoon and laughed happily together in our goodbyes. A lady of 87 and a true pleasure to spend time with.
"I hope I'm as with it at 87," mum whispered as we watched Joan return home.
So do I mum, so do I.