Soft Landings for Orthopedic Disasters

It was raining out of a gentle sky, the way it does in Ireland, when Audrey Anne Marie Boyle and I reached the town of Macroom in County Cork. The soft gray sky, dappled with patches of blue, is just some Irish falderal to make you think you aren’t getting wet. You are. You’re as wet as if you were in Spokane on a mean February day. But the blameless sky seems to say, “There, there. Now, now. Would you fuss about a few drops like this?”

Not only was it raining, it was a Saturday afternoon and I was trying to find Macroom Carpet Co. We had seen their rugs on another trip and had bought a small one that had worn well. I wanted a couple of rugs for the front hall, which has a tile floor and is as dark as the inside of a derby hat.

After driving through the center of town, a matter of a half-minute, I rolled down the window and asked a young man and young woman shepherding a pram where the Macroom Mills were. He gave detail and clear directions, something you don’t always get in Ireland. An Irishman will never tell you he hasn’t the slightest idea where something is. He says, “Just follow your nose. You can’t miss it.”

He’s not being mischievous. He’s just glad for the chance to pass the time of day.

We followed the man’s directions and a half mile out of town, we came to a large stone pier with the words Macroom Mills centered in a lawn in front of a large building.

We drove up to a huge, yawning door and looked inside where two men were loading what looked like bales of hay into a large van.

“Is this the Macroom Mills?” I asked brightly.

“It is,” said one of the men with a smile.

“Uh, where are the carpets?”

After some more Alice-in-Wonderland conversation, the man said, “This is the Macroom Mills. We sell animal food.”

I said to Audrey Anne Marie, “If we had our ponies, we would have found the perfect spot.”

Finally I realized that what I wanted was the Macroom Carpet Mills.

“But it’s Saturday and of course they won’t be open,” I said.

“I know the owner,” said the hay-and-grain man. “Seamus Burke is his name. I’ll just give him a call.”

And with that, the dear man jumped down from the van and trotted off through the rain to a small office building. He was back in three minutes and said, “He’ll be glad to meet you there. Do you mind if he finishes his lunch?”

I told him to have Seamus finish his lunch, and a half hour later we were ushered into the Macroom Carpet Mills. Seamus showed us dozens of rugs and swatches and the looms where the rugs are woven.

In his office was a small patch of brilliant green with a top note as clear as the song of a dawn bird. “That’s the color I want,” I told him.

“We haven’t made that yet. It’s a new color. Some of us think it might be too green. We call it Sligo green.”

I told him it was just what I wanted and that I’d go home and measure the front hall. Seamus told me to call Siobhan Murphy, the office manager and give her the dimensions.

I did and the rugs came yesterday. They’re marvelous. I am strongly thinking of moving the couch and the lamp and the television set into the hall. That’s so we’ll have a place to sit and we won’t miss “The Cosby Show.”

Oh, and I’ll have to take the armchair so Patsy will have someplace to rest her cast. She broke her arm. That’s three times in three years for only two arms. I was in Balboa with the Maples when she slipped on the tile floor and broke her left arm. When Mary Ko drove her to the emergency room, Dr. John E. Lusche, the orthopedic surgeon, came in in a few minutes. Patsy takes all her broken arm business to Dr. Lusche. When he saw who his patient was, he said, “We’ve got to stop meeting like this.”

Patsy and I are thinking of having a medal struck for Mary Ko. She’s the friend who came up the hill and climbed up on the roof with the hose when we had the Flintridge fire in October. I was in Ireland.

An impartial observer might think that I sense disaster and leave home. That is absolutely not true. Enough really tacky stuff happens when I’m home to disprove that theory.

For Thanksgiving we were delighted to be invited to my cousin Dr. Bill Bradley’s house. It seemed the better part of wisdom to stay close to the hills of Linda Vista and close to our respective orthopedic surgeons. It takes Drs. Richard C. Diehl and George L. Mulfinger to keep me upright and Patsy gets edgy if she’s out of calling distance to Dr. Lusche.

I don’t think she’ll break any more bones if she’ll just stay in the hall. Those new green rugs will cushion her fall and lift her spirits at the same time.

I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving and try not to get your cast wet.