Ramblin’ Prose

You never know when you start down a road exactly where it’s going to take you, or the unexpected things you’ll find along the way. Since I started planning my return to college, I’ve run into various hurdles and difficulties. I’ve also gotten some unanticipated gifts.

My current Waterloo is finding my immunization records, which will be required if I take more than one course at a time at UNCG. So…how many 48-year-olds out there know where their immunization records are? Anybody?

I keep pulling boxes out of the attic, and so far I’ve found my birth certificate, my passport (expired, sadly) and our marriage license (in which I am described as a spinster). I found the first story I ever wrote, in third grade, about a dinosaur named Vot.

Immunization records? Not a trace.

I called UNC Chapel Hill, but they only keep records for 10 years, and its been more than twice that since I graduated. My current doctor recommended contacting my pediatrician, and I just happened to know she was alive and well, thanks to my old friend David Newton, who wrote a story about Dr. Marie Roberts in the News & Observer last year.

My mom got the address for me, and I mailed her a letter last Thursday. It began, “I’m one of the many babies you delivered over the years in Durham…” I explained my situation and asked whether she still had the records. I also wrote, “In any case, it’s good to touch base with you again. I have vivid memories of sitting in your waiting room, and how you distracted me from the impending shot by getting me to talk about camping and going to the lake.”

A letter arrived from her today. At 90, she’s as sharp as ever, and knew exactly who I was, though I was one of some 400 babies she delivered over the years, and hundreds more that she treated. As it turns out, my uncle Larry goes to her church. (Where he’s apparently one of the few people ever willing to challenge Dr. Roberts on anything. He says that’s why she likes him.)

She wrote, “I often think of the babies I delivered, but unfortunately I have forgotten many of them — but not you or your sisters. I would be most happy to learn the whereabouts and something of the life of all of you.”

She was delighted to hear that I was headed for her alma mater (then known as Women’s College), where she graduated in 1937. She attended her 70th reunion here in April!

She no longer had the records, but she did have a suggestion for me — check with my old high school.

And I will. But you know, her letter meant a lot more to me than those records. And if I do have to get all those shots all over again, I’ll just remember what she taught me: Don’t squirm or tense up; that only makes it worse. And I’ll think about going to the lake, too, and the calendar that always hung over the bed in that examining room.

But before I do any of that, I’m going to write her a nice long letter.