They had done everything together for 50 years. Anna and Sam prepared the lunch together, set the table and served the lunch together. Lunch was toasted cheese sandwiches, chayote soup, and a salad from their garden. Both of them used canes, and walked with much difficulty. Loretta was amazed that the two birdlike, frail people did all the work themselves. Downstairs, in the backyard was a large vegetable garden, many fruit trees, berries. Their apartment was filled with fine pottery and photographs, a wonderful library.
They had worked together every day at Teotihuacan and other sites. Anna had been an archaeologist and Sam an engineer. It was sunny and open, like an old house in Mexico, where they had lived most of their lives. She stopped being in a bad mood the minute she was inside their apartment. Hours later, exhausted, she would drive home to her house in Oakland, saying to herself that she couldn't keep on doing this. If you don't do it you feel guilty and if you do you feel like a wimp. The kind where you say to yourself, Gosh, it's the least I can do, they are so nice. She often felt helpless in situations like this. Lunch with them would mean going all the way back to Berkeley from the city, and not finishing everything in one day, as she had planned. She had taken three days off without pay because she had a lot of things that needed doing. It happened that she wasn't working for the next few days. Anna and Sam kept thanking Loretta for saving his life, and insisted that she go to lunch at their house the next day. They all sat around for a while until they were sure he was fine and could walk to their house, just down the block.
He had some medicine to take, for epilepsy, and they helped him dry off and dress. He didn't need resuscitation but he was disoriented and frightened. Loretta jumped in, shoes and all, pulled him to the steps and up out of the pool. The other two women were in the shallow end and didn't notice. He finally got in, was dog-paddling along with a big grin on his face when he had a seizure.
One day she stopped by as the two women were convincing the old guy to take a swim. Loretta would see Anna from time to time when she went to swim at her neighbor Elaine's pool. Loretta met Anna and Sam the day she saved Sam's life.Īnna and Sam were old.
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