Twenty Years & Still Going Strong

Tuesday was our 20th wedding anniversary, and I asked Bob what he wanted to do to celebrate. Last year, we skipped our anniversary as he was still recovering from his second foot surgery. The year before I took him to the Dali Museum. It's always hard to think of something to do for a celebration, as Bob can't eat (feeding tube) or dance! So the usual celebration stuff is just not possible.  Anyway...

This year, we have The Bobmobile and can go anywhere! Anytime! Which is really liberating, to say the least.

So Bob decided he wanted to go antiquing. Of course, he didn't actually say "antiquing", he said "shopping!" and I said, "shopping for what?" and he said, "you know!" and you know, I figured it out.

Antiquing was something we used to do frequently and haven't done since the stroke.

Bob at the Antique Mall

Mostly we haven't done this as it's hard to schedule a shopping trip with the transport service, I mean, you had to give them exact times for pickup and how does one really know how long you'll spend at an antique store? Then, we used to "shop hop", you know hit a bunch of shops in an afternoon, which is impossible to do with the transport. Also, so many antique shops/malls are just not wheelchair accessible, with stairs and small spaces...

But I called around and found an antique mall that opened up in 2011 (after Bob's stroke) and they told me on the phone that they were wheelchair accessible.

So we went. And indeed they were, they even had an elevator to the second floor!


Though some of the booths were crowded and I couldn't get his wheelchair in them.

But the place was huge with, I think they said, 99 dealers.

So there was plenty for Bob and I to look at. We spent three hours there!

We found and bought a vintage mailbox for our new house. Which we need as the new house has one of those slots in the wall for mail and, the last time we had such a slot, Boomer went absolutely freaking nuts trying to tear up both the mail and the mail carrier's fingers....

Then Bob found this:

An antique pedestal sink. And he wanted it. He called it "faucets" for "my bath". I was actually surprised he remembered that we do need a sink for the planned bathroom remodel, the one that will actually be wheelchair accessible and allow Bob to take a bath. But I said no, because I was worried about hooking up such an old thing. Though, truly, it's a very cool antique sink! Then the dealer showed up and while talking with her, she dropped the price from $495 to $125 and offered to store it for us. I still was uncertain about could we actually use it. so told her I'd think about it and when we got home, Bob kept saying "faucets! faucets!" So yesterday, when I talked with a contractor and showed him the picture of Bob and the sink, and the contractor said "no problem" hooking that up, that it would be "easy", so long story short, I called the antique mall and bought it over the phone.

So Bob has his "faucets", and when I told him I bought it, he said "Yay!"

And we had a really great anniversary! Though I was utterly exhausted by the end of the day. All that wheelchair pushing. Can't wait to get that power chair...