Cannot Wait to Get to Heaven - Fannie Flagg [102]
“She said something about it.”
“Why didn’t she tell me?”
“She didn’t want you to worry.”
“Where did they go?”
Macky chuckled. “Dollywood.”
“Dollywood! My God, that’s all the way to Tennessee. She’s gone all the way to Tennessee in a truck! And you let her go?”
At five o’clock that morning Luther and Bobbie Jo had picked her up in his eighteen-wheeler truck and they had hit the road headed for Tennessee. Bobbie Jo had always wanted to be a June bride, and Miss Elner had always wanted to go to Dollywood, so Luther thought it was a fine idea to be married in the little chapel on the grounds, and kill two birds with one stone.
The next day Bobbie Jo, a happy new bride wearing a tank top and shorts, stood holding her wedding certificate and her free corsage the folks at the chapel had given her, watched as Luther and Elner rode on Thunderhead, the largest roller coaster at the theme park. That night at a wedding dinner at the Cracker Barrel, Elner was beaming as she ate her liver and onions. “I’m so happy for the two of you, I just don’t know what to do.”
When the waiter came up and asked if they would be wanting to order dessert, the new bridegroom said, “Does a cat have a tail?” Bobbie Jo thought it was about the wittiest thing she had ever heard.
When Elner got back home a few days later, she called Norma, and as she expected Norma was upset.
“Aunt Elner, why would a woman your age want to get in a truck and go all the way to Tennessee?”
Aunt Elner said, “Norma, that’s just it. At my age how many more chances to get to Dollywood do I have? I just figured I’d better go while the going was good, don’t you think?”
Norma Puts Her Foot Down
4:32 PM
The next day as she drove over to Elner’s house, Norma was determined to put her foot down once and for all, but when she walked up onto the porch, before she could say a word, Aunt Elner hit her with a question.
“Hey, Norma, do you think that woman on that beeper commercial is an actress or a real person?”
“What woman?”
“The one that’s fallen and can’t get up.”
“Oh, that one. I’m sure she’s an actress.”
“She didn’t look like an actress to me, she could be a relative, don’t you think?”
“A relative? Whose relative?”
“Of the beeper people. She could be a family member, couldn’t she?”
“I suppose so, Aunt Elner, but speaking of that, I want to talk to you about something, and I want you to listen to what I have to say and not interrupt me.”
“Uh-oh,” thought Elner. From Norma’s tone she knew whatever she had to say was not something she wanted to hear.
Macky was in the kitchen chewing on the pimento cheese and celery sticks she had made to tide him over until dinner when Norma got back home from Elner’s.
He looked at her. “What did she say?”
Norma sighed and put her purse on the counter and washed her hands.
“Exactly what you said she would say. She won’t go.”
“You can’t force her, Norma. Everybody wants to be independent for as long as they can. I’m sure when the time comes—”
Norma interrupted him. “When the time comes? Macky, if you knock yourself out falling out of a tree and think you’ve just seen Ginger Rogers and orange and white polka-dotted squirrels and then you run off to Dollywood, I would say the time has come, wouldn’t you?”
“I know, but I think for her to have to go to a place like that would be terrible.”
“Well, I don’t know what’s so terrible about assisted living. Personally, I can’t wait to have somebody assist me. I’d go early if I could. I understand why people want to be movie stars, it must be nice to have people waiting on you hand and foot, catering to all your whims, is all I can say.”
“No, you wouldn’t. You’d hate not being in charge of everything.”
“I would not, and what would you know about it anyway? You’ve had assisted living all your life. First your mother, then me. You’ll sail on into it and not miss a beat. I’m telling you, Macky, I am one step away from checking myself into a room over there at Happy Acres for good, then you and Aunt Elner can be independent for as long