Grandpa Moment(s)

Last Sunday, I had a few "Grandpa Moments"--all in a very short time. I need to preface this with a little description of our Sunday-morning routines.

On Saturday night I feed my sourdough starter, and the next morning I put some of it back in the fridge for the future and then bake something with the rest of it--bread, rolls, pizza, biscuits, waffles, whatever.

Then, cleaned up, we head off on our "rounds"--to the nearby Panera for breakfast, Sunday Times, laughing and talking.

Afterward, we make our two local grocery-story stops: Acme and Heinen's (neither store has all of what we want/need/crave).

Then, at home, we put stuff away, and both of us go to work until lunch. ... That's enough of a background.

Okay, last Sunday (the 15th) ... here are the "Grandpa Moments":

• Coming down the stairs, getting ready to head off to Panera, I realized, about halfway down, that I was still wearing my bedroom slippers. Not shoes. Which were back upstairs, nearly (but not quite) speechless with dismay (Where is he?!?!). An awkward mid-stairway turn and back to the bedroom for some remediation. (Where have you been?)
• In the car, talking animatedly with Joyce, I made a wrong turn and had to 
• pretend I'd done it on purpose;
• figure out a way to get where we were going without making it obvious that my body language, soaked in insouciance, was a lie.
• At Panera, I realized I'd left the Times back on our dining room table. I dropped Joyce off and drove home, occupying that soggy emotional terrain between humor and depression.

This kind of stuff is happening much more frequently these days of dotage (okay, advancing dotage). Right now it's still in the Cute & Amusing stage. Most of the time ...