Medical Help on the Road

Our red-shirted group of Alfa owners gathered for this group shot on the last day of our rally.

One of the challenges for wandering folks is to get medical services along the way. I need to have my blood tested for my oncologist each month and Friday was our day to do this. 

There’s a national company called Quest that has been doing my tests and I have an AP that helps me find local outlets. Sure enough, Fredericksburg, Texas, had a Quest operation at the local hospital.

We left our coach before dawn and the hospital volunteers welcomed us. When we got to the registration desk, though, life began to get challenging. The woman said she didn’t “have a code” for our procedure, even though I carry a prescription for what is needed from my oncologist. She called in a supervisor who came to the front desk and leaned in towards me.

“We won’t be able to help you because we don’t have a code,” she said. Her voice was high and it was as though she was talking to someone with diminished capacity. I told her I understood what she was saying, but couldn’t she get a code if it was so important. “No,” she said. “You don’t have the right insurance.” Again, she was speaking to me loudly, forming each word as though I were 98 instead of 78.

Where do I go to get this taken care of? Go to Bernie, she said. Now I was really confused. But she really was saying we should drive south for 50 minutes to the town of Boerne, Texas, where there was an actual Quest Diagnostics lab. They would take care of our needs.

It was a pleasant ride through the Texas hill country. And then we got off at the Boerne exit, there was Quest. I was taken in hand by Lupe, a technician who said she’d have to call my oncologist to get “the code”. She did and I was called in to have my blood drawn. I faxed results to Bradenton, Florida, in a couple of days and that allows my doctor to adjust the dosage for the various meds I’m on. 

When the results were sent to me electronically, I faxed them to my three doctors. My oncologist's assistant called back with word that my potassium levels are too low, even though I take straight potassium each morning. The Revlomid  I take is fighting my ability to make potassium. He suggested I add two bananas a day to my potassium regimen. And so we did. 

We’ve been in Fredericksburg for the rally of Alfa Motorhome owners. There are 100 motorhomes here – a quite amazing sight. It is reminiscent of the salmon runs we used to see in Alaska. The fish would battle each other to swim upstream and deposit their eggs and sperm before dying. All these Alfas look alike, though the owners have done various things to make each home individual with flashy paint jobs.

We attend seminars that are relevant to our lifestyle… subjects like analyzing engine oil, getting better wi-fi connections, installing upgrades to our coaches. Plus it’s fun to meet up with other Alfa owners from all over the U.S. and Canada.

Now we have headed north to Waco, Texas. We’re parked at a Corps of Engineers park on a lake and we are hunkering down for a spell of nasty weather. There’s a disturbance to our west that seems to be heading our way. Tornadic winds are in the forecast, along with large hail. We decided to lay low in the park instead of pushing farther north to a planned overnight stop at a casino in southern Oklahoma. Stay tuned for developments.

On Our Way to Fredericksburg, Texas

This memory quilt is displayed inside the Care Center with messages from the Escapee members.

A closeup shows the messages on the quilt. The numbers represent the Escapee membership numbers. 

All of you who do not roam this land probably know little about the Escapees organization. It’s a group that supports wanderers in the RV world. 

We live in an Escapee resort in Wauchula, Florida. And we arrived at the Escapees main resort in Livingston, Texas, with two goals in mind. 1. We wanted to see the resort and meet the people. It is huge and, I believe, unique. In addition to hundreds of RV sites for permanent and visiting travelers, there are deeded lots with homes and motorhome ports. These are similar to carports…but much taller, of course.

And 2, we also wanted to tour the Care area of the resort. This is a unique service for people like us. In the event a traveler is incapacitated maybe with a broken hip, knee replacement surgery, Alzheimer’s, a myriad of other problems, if you can get your motorhome to the resort, they’ll find a space for you and provide support, including meals, nursing care and other services for a remarkably low cost. We had breakfast in the Care dining area and visited with some of those who need the care. And I was touched emotionally by all of the caring people who volunteer to make lives better.

While we sat eating our breakfast, a diminutive woman in her eighties approached us and asked if she could have a hug. Everyone at the table was happy to oblige.

We were able to reach out and help a couple who had just arrived at the resort. When they disconnected their car from behind their motorhome they found its battery was dead. We were able to give them a jump start. On our last day there, they must have seen us readying our rig for departure. They came over to thank us again for our help. The woman asked if she could pray with us. And, while I’m not a big fan of public displays of prayer, we agreed. We were touched by her caring about our safety on the roads as we left the park.

Cassandra and Jo work on her wedding dress in the coach.

While at Escapees, our eldest granddaughter, Cassandra, had flown to Houston with Mark, her fiancé, so she could meet with Jo. Cassandra and Mark are getting married in August and she wants to wear the wedding dress Jo had made for her mom 26 years ago. She brought it down from the north. We picked her up and, as soon as we got back to our motorhome, Cassandra stepped into the dress, and Jo got to work modernizing it.

She worked essentially non-stop for two days nipping and tucking, adjusting and redesigning the dress. This involved the removal of dated puffy sleeves,

Cassandra naps during the dress rebuild.

changing the neckline and adjusting seams here and there. It was a herculean effort. And, quite amazingly to me, Jo had discovered she had a piece of her own wedding dress which she has created back in 1962 for our wedding. She figured out how to incorporate that memento into Cassandra’s wedding dress.

Now we have moved on to the west of Houston. We are on our way to Fredericksburg, Texas, in the beautiful hill country of the state. We are surrounded by a million blue bonnet flowers along the highways, a legacy of Ladybird Johnson, the former first lady. She took it on as her role to beautify her home state by encouraging the sprinkling of seeds along the highways and byways with wild flowers. Her work has paid off for the land is a carpet of reds, pinks and blues and is a treat to drive through.

We have pulled into a Corps of Engineers park in Brenham, Texas. Yegua Creek Park has a campground that overlooks Summerville Lake and we are parked on the shore of the lake with very few other folks who are braving the cool weather. The beauty of Corps of Engineers campgrounds is that people our age get to camp for half price - $14 a night. 

We stay here for three nights before pushing on to Fredericksburg, our destination for the first leg of our tour. We will be attending a rally for owners of Alfa motorhomes. There’ll be seminars and social get-togethers among dozens of like-minded Alfa owners. All of us band together because the Alfa no longer is manufactured in the U.S. But we all love our unique vehicles because of the outstanding design of the rig.

Fredericksburg also will be my first test of having my blood checked so that my oncologist and nephrologist can keep an eye on the state of my kidneys as well as my creatinine levels. I’ll have to find a lab that will do the necessary blood draws and analysis and then the results will be sent back to Florida to my doctors. 

This will be a monthly procedure for the duration of our journey. Fredericksburg also is to be the first test to see how I am managing in terms of physical strength. So far, so good, I feel. I have never been good about pacing myself. But I am relearning how to live life, as well as drinking a gallon of water every day. That’s hard, by the way. Just try it!