At certain times in our lives we are called upon unexpectedly to perform a task that might take us out of our daily routine, a task that might seem arduous yet necessary, a task we want to complete but we know will require time, energy, and patience, a virtue I pray for every day.

Early last week, I found myself confronted with such a task that was going to require all these ingredients: time, energy, and yes, my least favorite virtue, patience, and plenty of it.

The task presented to me was this: How to get my 77-year-old mother and my 82-year-old aunt to their 90-year-old sister’s memorial service completely across the state??? The solution: Road Trip!!!

Typically, road trips lead you somewhere special, full of fun and adventure. While this road trip’s purpose was more solemn, it still offered the possibility to include all-of-the-above, and perhaps then some, because I, being the least patient person in the family, would be transporting two Golden Girls to pay their last respects to their sister in a 24-hour jaunt across the state and back. It was the perfect recipe for fun and adventure!

The adventure began in a 4 hour and 52-minute (in current traffic conditions), 303-mile sojourn reminiscing with these two beautiful, gray-haired sisters about their childhood, learning things I didn’t know, hearing about people I could no longer picture, all having occurred in the same small town in which I grew up. I attempted to sit silently at the wheel, navigating perilously around tractor trailer trucks, gleaning as much history as I possibly could in a 4-hour, 52-minute, 303-mile car ride. This moment may never happen again.

They got down to business right away, swapping stories, trading memories, repeating questions that had already been answered, asking questions to which they already knew the answers, constantly saying, “What?” to one another in elevated decibels because they had trouble hearing each other, talking over one another because they couldn’t hear the answers, and all the while giving me a life lesson in patience. There was only one discussion about the temperature in the car, many compliments about how well I was driving, and some instructions on how to use one’s cell phone for texting, apps, and sharing pictures.

What I learned about their past was priceless: Who knew my mom had a pet chicken named Sandy, or even chickens at all, tended by the tenants who lived in the house out back that had no heat? Who knew their father traveled for work so extensively he was gone for a month at a time because gas was rationed during WWII? Or that they could ride their sleds all the way down Main Street because there wasn’t enough traffic to stop them from sledding down Main Street? They discussed extensively families who were solid in the community in the 1950s but who no longer have homesteads there and favorite classmates with names like Violet who they have lost track of over time. They admired their mother, my beloved grandmother, for maintaining a household of girls and for adding ‘a bucket a day’ of coal to keep the water in the house warm.

My favorite moment came when my aunt’s phone started ringing, a peculiar ring that was unfamiliar to her. She couldn’t make it stop, she couldn’t answer it, and in the back seat alone, she could not figure it out. Meanwhile, back in the co-pilot’s seat, my mother’s phone simultaneously began to ring its usual cheery tone; however, she could not locate her phone in the small space surrounding her. Temporary panic ensued as both sisters, who admitted their technological shortcomings in advance, searched in vain to silence their phones. My mother located her phone in her pocket and struggled to rescue it as she was strapped in by her seatbelt; I giggled and said, “You’re calling one another.” My patience survived the temporary distraction from monotonous interstate driving.

The fun continued with an early evening check-in to our hotel, a late dinner at a lively sports bar where conversation was limited because of the din, and an expedited shopping trip because one sister needed a black sweater and one sister needed a navy-blue sweater. Luckily for all involved, sales women included, the store was closing in 15 minutes, as we shouted from the store entrance what we were in search of: Black sweater! Navy sweater! Mission accomplished, and we were out of there! Evidently, the sisters needed the sweaters to complete their outfits for the memorial service the next day, but after purchasing them, neither sister could decide if they would actually wear the sweaters to the service…

More fun and games continued with my mom as the instigator. After one glass of Sangria, she was on a mission: to reconnect with all family members in town as if it were her last opportunity to connect with them for all eternity. She emphatically wanted to stop at her nephew’s hotel, unannounced and not taking no for an answer, to simply say hello. I dropped her off at the door, watching her 5’3” tiny frame boldly walk-up to the front desk, asking to dial his room. In less than a minute, she flagged my aunt and me inside; another mission accomplished. Much to my mother’s delight, her nephew and his wife were coming to the lobby to meet us!

What happened next and for the remainder of our 24-hour road trip was special, pure magic, the kind that only families can share, connected not only by memories but the simple joy of knowing you are forever linked by bloodlines, by three amazing women, sisters separated by six years each, who have insisted over a life time that you know each other because you are their kids, their legacy, and you are cousins, family, friends.

What I found out in the next 15-minutes about my cousin were the missing pieces of years spent in different parts of the state, then eventually in different states on opposite coasts. It was as if I met him for the first time, really knew him for the first time, and it was refreshing. My mother was beaming, as she kept repeating, “This might be the last time I ever see you.”

The special reunion continued into the next morning; the sisters showed up to the memorial service in their respective black and navy sweaters (whew), I reconnected with another cousin and met his new wife and very extended and blended family, the memorial service for my aunt was one of the most beautiful and moving I have ever attended, and my heart was full for these cousins once foreign to me but now family again. I walked away with not only new Facebook friends and the possibility to hear my cousin’s band play in LA, but we fulfilled my aunt’s wishes that one day we would somehow be connected.

It was especially heart-warming when the Golden Girls were introduced to four-and-five- year granddaughters as their Grandma’s ‘baby sisters.’ These little girls weren’t being fooled so easily as their eyes indicated doubt that these two gray-haired ladies could be anyone’s baby sisters.

At each new introduction during that 24-hour period, it was exclaimed to me over and over again, “Oh, you’re The Chauffer!” Yes, pulled out of retirement to reunite these sisters, I am once again The Chauffer. But I would have made the trip one way or another, without excuses, because I needed to be there as well.

After long good-byes and promises to stay in touch, the sisters and I started our journey home. For some reason the 303-mile trek home took us longer than the calculated time, possibly because we didn’t have the same excited anticipation that carried us there, but what we brought home was timeless, priceless, and precious. Being the Chauffer to these two Golden Girls is a task I would be ‘burdened’ with every single day of the week.