My Dry Side column last Sunday was supposed to be about the Hermiston Horse Sale – a three-day extravaganza that’s been going on for 45 years.

There are three big sales a year and a number of other smaller ventures in between. Last weekend was the enormous May sale, which I intended to cover in person.

It wasn’t to be.

First of all, when I made a contact about visiting with my long-time friend and founder Gary Miller during the sale, I learned he had just had surgery and would be home recuperating. That was a Thursday morning. At 3 p.m. that same day, I got an urgent call from Toledo, Wash., indicating my mother was being transported to Providence Hospital in Centralia with heart and breathing problems.

The call came from a neighbor who stops in regularly to check on her. Mom’s 94, so I handled a couple of quick things at the office, ran home and put together a few clothes, and then raced up the Gorge enroute to the hospital. While I have strongly supported the presence of 125 new officers to guard Oregon’s highways, I was glad they were otherwise preoccupied on Thursday afternoon. It’s a little easier once you cross the border and head up Interstate 5 at 75 mph because, at my age, that’s becoming a daring speed.

Ironically, it’s my mom’s heart that makes her so special to everyone around her, but when she needs it most, it seems to be failing her.

The specter of mortality is something that has been particularly present in my newspaper routines lately since I’ve written about the deaths of Walt Johnson, George Corey, Jacqueline Brown, and Ken Turner. I have an office next to Kathryn Brown, and I know she wrote a touching column a week ago describing the emotions we go through as we consider the possibility of saying goodbye to the generation that brought us into this world. It creates a sense of vulnerability we know someday will happen, but nothing prepares us for the prospect.

As I drove toward Centralia, I had no idea what to expect. Mom’s aortic valve is not working like it used to and after this latest visit to the hospital, the doctor used the word “congestive heart failure” for the first time. Several weeks ago she contracted pneumonia and became weaker – so weak we went to visit her last Tuesday to see what was going on. She seemed to be gaining strength. Apparently that wasn’t the case.

When I arrived at the emergency room at the hospital in Centralia, they were still trying to stabilize her heartbeat. About an hour and a half later, they moved her to a room upstairs. We visited for a couple more hours and then she decided I should go to her home in Toledo for the night and she should try to get some rest.

The next day I was back early, and it was fascinating to witness the constant parade of folks with assorted functions. I took the greatest interest in the individual who was dealing with her release and indicated I didn’t particularly want Mom going home to be by herself. Mom protested a bit, indicating she could get some help, but I sensed she was a little worried.

We decided she should take an intermediate step and make sure her heartbeat was stabilized and her strength was back before she went home. Eventually she agreed. I’ve known people who go into the hospital, get a fix, go home, and then repeat the cycle. It becomes something of a downward spiral. Here we’re trying for an investment of several weeks in a care center in hopes she will return home sans the prospect of a quick return to the emergency room. Hopefully it’s an investment that will pay off.

As she was being checked in to the hospital after her initial arrival, the nurse asked if she had any special preferences.

“I don’t know what you have to offer,” she said. “The last time I was in a hospital was when my daughter was born here in 1944.”

This is the same lady who boarded a horse during the family reunion last summer much to the amazement of her great-grandchildren. She’s also the same person that until a year ago walked three miles a day. She still attends exercise classes three days a week and drives to the grocery store.

Four years ago, my nephew stopped by and invited her on an outing to Silver Lake. Somewhere during the trip he asked if she wanted to put her feet into the water.

“How about if I dive off the bow?” she asked. “That would be a lot more fun.” On the same day, she joined the great-grandchildren riding a large inner-tube which was being pulled by the boat.

Her minister dropped by the hospital, as ministers do, to check in on parishioners. He asked if she wanted to pray.

“Yes,” she said, “but nothing that suggests an element of finality.” I suspect that meant something like the last rites, although we’re Protestants.

It appears we dodged the bullet this time, and within a month Mom most likely will be back on her farm on Salmon Creek Road.

I don’t have any illusions about seeing 94, but wherever my twilight years lead me, I hope I can make the journey with the same sense of excitement, dignity, enthusiasm, optimism and reality my mom has created as a foundation for how to enjoy one’s senior moments.

George Murdock is editor of the East Oregonian. He can be reached at 278-2671 or gmurdock@eastoregonian.com.