One of the things that struck me in Roberta was that she is part Native American. She told me (and still tells everyone within an earshot) that she grew up on a reservation in 1930s and her Grandfather taught her to shoot the bow and arrows and track the animals. Her mother was a Choctaw Indian and her father - German. Roberta has bright blue German eyes and blond (before it turned gray) hair. She was married to her first husband at 17, pregnant and living on Guam at 18. He was a pilot flying missions to Korea during the war. He was killed in action, and she returned to the mainland with three children. After that she went to college, got her psychology degree and started working in the court system. Later on, she raised not only her three children but also three grandchildren. She had profitable businesses and a huge house but gave it all up to become our church member.
Roberta needed another hip-replacement operation. The first one was just a patch up job. The long screws that the surgeon used to hold her hip joint together were catching on her muscle and the break didn't heal.
She is an iron lady. Despite horrific pain, she managed to get around and keep a good attitude. I tried to ply her with food and liquids, to avoid people saying that I was starving her.
One thing I should've been prepared for, but I wasn't. Its not clear, what the nurses at the hospital gave Roberta, but she went berserk. Her 6 foot something, at least 200 pounds doctor told me that she began to fight and bite and, when he tried to restrain her, she knocked him back like a toy. You can see it in her: a scrappy survivor, through and through.
Roberta tells a different story. She says, they brought her to a doctor's office and left in the waiting room, sitting between two black men. Somehow, she felt threatened. She grabbed a broom (in the waiting room of an office), jumped on the couch (with a newly replaced hip) and started to lay blows on the men. You tell me, which story you believe better!
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