I
laughed as I pictured it. “Never
thought about that one, Edith.”
Edith
smiled back, “Well, it’s no picnic.”
It
was another of Edith’s million dollar comments.
Brightened the afternoon in a moment.
She was good at that.
Edith lived in my neighborhood.
I’d visited her occasionally; she was always a lively conversationalist. Diabetic, her legs amputated at the knee, she
told endless jokes and stories from her wheelchair: Her helpful son, the other no-good son, why
no one catalog-shops anymore, which canned pork and beans taste best… All of
these were points of discussion. Edith
had the silver hair of a nearly-seventy-year-old. Not thin, she was a lumpy, laughing lady whose
lucid eyes looked straight at you from behind large round glasses.
I
kept visiting Edith when her children moved her up to a retirement home. I sat in her room with her, next to the
window, in the sun. Hers wasn’t one of
those rooms with framed pictures of grandkids around. Only one of her late husband sat at her
bedside. When I visited, I mostly listened,
and she chatted. Do I ever watch those
“talky” shows on TV? They said not to
eat grapes. And do you know how it is to
get old and start losing your eyesight?
It stinks. And did I tell you
about the time…? The
day I sat in the cafeteria with her, I got an earful on
just how bad that food was.
Edith was not at
the retirement home long before she got sick.
On one visit she was not so talkative, and her answers to my questions
were short. I thought a walk in the budding
Spring outside might please her. I
pushed her wheelchair up and down the lolling sidewalk around the building. The breeze was not warm yet, but the slightly
greening grass, and the daffodil leaves crowning in the dirt, were enough to
gladden the heart; and it did, for both of us.
Days
passed, or weeks; I don’t remember. I
heard she was not doing so well. I planned
to drive up and pay her a visit, but my little boy was sick that week. The next week was a conference for the women
at church; I was in charge of that. Then
there was grocery shopping and house cleaning the week after that. Finally I went. It would be something I’d always be glad I
did – she died two days later.
Spring had fully
arrived by that time. Going up the walk, I saw trees dripping
with blossoms. Sunshine sank to my very
scalp. A bird skittered across the sidewalk. But the warm, breezy air changed abruptly as
I stepped into the rest home. Air cool
and medicinal made me feel unwelcome.
I walked down tiled
halls, beneath glaring fluorescent lights.
There were no windows. A man at
the end of the hall rocked back and forth in his wheelchair. A hunched woman followed me with her eyes,
then reached out a hand to me. I
squeezed it with a “Hello.”
Edith’s room was
at the end of the hall. No sound came as
I entered, and it was dark. Sunshine
tried pushing through the drawn curtains, but I could only barely make out the
lone figure in the chair. She sat in the
middle of the room, her head on her chest, asleep. I hesitated, wondering whether to wake her. But Edith always loved a visit, and would hate
to miss one.
“Edith?” I
whispered, close at her side. “Edith,
it’s Danette.”
She roused
immediately, but her eyes were foggy as she slowly raised her head to me.
“I thought I’d
drop in for a visit today,” I said, “How are you?”
After a pause, she
spoke, her tongue thick and words slow: “My groceries…No…Not here.” She looked at me with half-closed eyes. Confused, I asked again how she was. She mumbled something unintelligible. I asked if she was okay. Was she in pain? There was no response; her head began to drop
onto her chest again.
She couldn’t be
that sleepy, could she? Maybe it was
medication making her this way. But she
always liked visitors. She always had
things to tell me. She always loved
chatter.
I gently woke her
again, and asked how her son was. She
looked at me blankly. “Your son?” I
pursued, “Greg? Has he been to visit
you?”
“Can’t find it,”
she slurred, before she left again, seemingly sound asleep.
I’d never seen her
like this before. Obviously there would
be no funny stories today. So I tried to
share some stories with her. Of how I
made strawberry jam for the first time last week. And how my son caught one hundred and fifty
potato bugs in a jar. But Edith only
made it partway through the first story before her chin dropped onto her chest,
and her eyes closed.
I tried a couple
times more, asked if she wanted a walk outside, asked if she felt okay. No response.
Each time I talked to her, she looked up wearily, stared at my face for
just a moment, and then her head lolled and her eyes closed.
With a sigh I
watched her, understanding then that the laughing, story-telling Edith probably
would not be back. I hated to leave her
that way, with her hardly knowing I had been there. My eyes glanced emptily around the room,
searching for something I could do for her before I left. Then, a thought came.
“Edith?”
I said her name
twice before she was looking at me again.
“Edith, would you like me to sing something for you? Do you have a song you’d like to hear?”
Surprisingly, a
slight attentiveness sparked in her face.
A moment’s thinking, and she mumbled slowly, “Yes. I like…‘Put Your Shoulder to the Wheel.’”
So I began. I didn’t know the song perfectly; I’m pretty
sure I put words from the third verse into the second. But I saw quickly that it did not
matter. The music in the silent room had
an instant effect on my friend, and her eyes cleared for the first time.
“The
world has need of willing men
Who
wear the worker’s seal.
Come
help the good work move along;
Put
your shoulder to the wheel…”
I looked intently
in her eyes as I sang, and Edith looked back at me, lucid as ever. Spirit connected with spirit, and a warmth
flickered between us. Edith was vividly
attentive to the very last note. She
murmured, “Thank you,” her eyes closed, and she was far away again.
She was unaware of
my leaving that day, but I left satisfied.
I had brought a bright moment into her day, just as she had done for me many
times before.
Simple, the gifts
we human beings can give one another.
Simple but sweet. Helen Keller
said: “The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even
touched. They must be felt with the
heart.” I believe that. I’ve been a giver and a receiver, and I’m
grateful.
Copyright © 2014, Danette Christensen, Light is All Around Me.
Material may be shared or printed for non-commercial use, but must include this copyright notice.
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