In sickness and in health
My footsteps, hard and even, echo through the hallway, announcing my arrival, as I climb the white marble stairs to the third floor where my grandmother lives. The stairs have been polished to the point of being slippery and I imagine the sting I’d feel if I fell on them. I wonder how my grandmother manages to check her mailbox each day without falling.
I knock and wait, imaging my grandmother's feet shuffling over creaks and carpet as she approaches the door. I wonder if she’s heard me and am about to knock again when I hear the unlatching of locks and latches. She never uses the door’s lookout hole so I wonder what good all those locks and latches do when she just opens the door, anyway. I can’t wait to see her face.
Directly across the hall from my grandmother’s apartment used to live my grandmother's friend, Vera, who went home one night from my grandmother's apartment saying she was tired and thought she'd turn in early. She died that very night in her sleep. That was four years ago. It was my grandmother who discovered Vera's body the next morning after she hadn't arrived for morning tea. I hope my grandmother will tell me the story at some point during today's visit as she does during almost all of our visits. She tells it as if I’ve never heard it before and each time I hear it I’m as fascinated by the story as I am by her face when she tells it - somewhere between shock and divulging a secret. She always ends with "her toes were so cold". I don't care that I've already heard it a hundred times, I want to hear it again just to see my grandmother's expression when she says that. I feel more like a friend than a granddaughter at that moment and I’m proud she’s decided to divulge her secret to me.
I never tell my grandmother that it wasn't the fact that poor Vera died suddenly in her sleep that I think is so tragic but that she spent the five years prior to her death acting as the primary care giver to her feeble husband who was 20 years her senior. In fact, it seems to me she spent most of her adult life taking care of him in one way or another: first as his secretary, then as his wife and stepmother to his children and finally, as his sole care provider after a stroke that took away his ability walk and severely diminished his ability to talk. Within two weeks of Vera's death one of his daughter's moved him into a nursing home.
The last time I visited my grandmother I did tell her that I secretly blamed Vera’s family for her death, for not moving her husband into a nursing home sooner. What she told me surprised me and taught me an important lesson about marriage. It turns out that Vera had refused to have him moved into a nursing home and, against her step-children’s wishes, chose to take care of him herself rather than hire a visiting nurse. Vera’s step-children actually helped her as much as they could but she did the daily work of washing him, changing his bed pan, dressing and undressing him, patiently listening to him as he tried to communicate his thoughts , repeating her own so he’d understand, and probably the most important, holding his hand. That’s the one thing that amazes my grandmother the most: when she visited Vera and her husband at their apartment she’d watch Vera take a seat by her husband and take his hand in hers and they’d sit there like that the entire visit. Vera spent the last five years of her life doing exactly what she wanted to be doing - loving her husband.
I figure my grandmother will talk about her beloved Tom, my grandfather, who died three years ago. She still hasn't forgiven herself for putting him into a nursing home when she could no longer care for him herself. Maybe she compares herself to Vera and regrets not keeping him at home but the truth is she couldn’t keep him home any longer. I’m sure she understands this on some level.
She’ll probably repeat the story to me about the premonition she felt the day my grandfather went out for a walk to buy stamps on an unusually foggy day and how she had warned him that if he went out in the fog something awful would happen. The 20-yr.-old girl whose car hit him was appropriately distraught over the incident and stayed with him until the ambulance arrived. She even called periodically to see how he was doing, which lasted for about a year. I can’t blame her for moving on.
My grandfather's body was never the same after the accident. A brittle diabetic, his bones just never healed completely, the broken hip and femur never again able to support his weight without aid. I remember how he'd walk for hours supporting himself with two white-knuckled hands that gripped the wheeled walker. Into the kitchen and then back toward the foyer, one agonizing step after another, he’d walk this circuit in silence, his face grimacing with determination.
Whatever benefit it was to his legs was cancelled by the damage to both hands, which went completely numb, their nerves permanently damaged from practically carrying him through each painful step. My grandmother would shake her head in pity as she watched him travel back and forth and reminded him every now and then that she had warned him not to go out that day. I thought I detected an 'I told you so' sort of tone in her voice but it could have just been the continual shock of seeing him so debilitated. Maybe she said it like that because she was still trying to accept that the accident had happened at all, as if she was replaying the day in her mind. I never heard my grandfather respond. He just kept on walking. When he died I was glad to know he'd finally be free from the pain.
I imagine that today my grandmother will again cry when she talks about putting him into a nursing home. I will remind her how he hardly realized he was there because she so dutifully visited him every day, arriving in time for breakfast and leaving after 8pm at night. She’ll probably end the story the same way she always does, telling me that the heart and soul of marriage is the promise each person makes to the other. "In sickness and in health" she’ll tell me, adding, "when I married Tom I made him that promise."
And she kept it, just like Vera.
My footsteps, hard and even, echo through the hallway, announcing my arrival, as I climb the white marble stairs to the third floor where my grandmother lives. The stairs have been polished to the point of being slippery and I imagine the sting I’d feel if I fell on them. I wonder how my grandmother manages to check her mailbox each day without falling.
I knock and wait, imaging my grandmother's feet shuffling over creaks and carpet as she approaches the door. I wonder if she’s heard me and am about to knock again when I hear the unlatching of locks and latches. She never uses the door’s lookout hole so I wonder what good all those locks and latches do when she just opens the door, anyway. I can’t wait to see her face.
Directly across the hall from my grandmother’s apartment used to live my grandmother's friend, Vera, who went home one night from my grandmother's apartment saying she was tired and thought she'd turn in early. She died that very night in her sleep. That was four years ago. It was my grandmother who discovered Vera's body the next morning after she hadn't arrived for morning tea. I hope my grandmother will tell me the story at some point during today's visit as she does during almost all of our visits. She tells it as if I’ve never heard it before and each time I hear it I’m as fascinated by the story as I am by her face when she tells it - somewhere between shock and divulging a secret. She always ends with "her toes were so cold". I don't care that I've already heard it a hundred times, I want to hear it again just to see my grandmother's expression when she says that. I feel more like a friend than a granddaughter at that moment and I’m proud she’s decided to divulge her secret to me.
I never tell my grandmother that it wasn't the fact that poor Vera died suddenly in her sleep that I think is so tragic but that she spent the five years prior to her death acting as the primary care giver to her feeble husband who was 20 years her senior. In fact, it seems to me she spent most of her adult life taking care of him in one way or another: first as his secretary, then as his wife and stepmother to his children and finally, as his sole care provider after a stroke that took away his ability walk and severely diminished his ability to talk. Within two weeks of Vera's death one of his daughter's moved him into a nursing home.
The last time I visited my grandmother I did tell her that I secretly blamed Vera’s family for her death, for not moving her husband into a nursing home sooner. What she told me surprised me and taught me an important lesson about marriage. It turns out that Vera had refused to have him moved into a nursing home and, against her step-children’s wishes, chose to take care of him herself rather than hire a visiting nurse. Vera’s step-children actually helped her as much as they could but she did the daily work of washing him, changing his bed pan, dressing and undressing him, patiently listening to him as he tried to communicate his thoughts , repeating her own so he’d understand, and probably the most important, holding his hand. That’s the one thing that amazes my grandmother the most: when she visited Vera and her husband at their apartment she’d watch Vera take a seat by her husband and take his hand in hers and they’d sit there like that the entire visit. Vera spent the last five years of her life doing exactly what she wanted to be doing - loving her husband.
I figure my grandmother will talk about her beloved Tom, my grandfather, who died three years ago. She still hasn't forgiven herself for putting him into a nursing home when she could no longer care for him herself. Maybe she compares herself to Vera and regrets not keeping him at home but the truth is she couldn’t keep him home any longer. I’m sure she understands this on some level.
She’ll probably repeat the story to me about the premonition she felt the day my grandfather went out for a walk to buy stamps on an unusually foggy day and how she had warned him that if he went out in the fog something awful would happen. The 20-yr.-old girl whose car hit him was appropriately distraught over the incident and stayed with him until the ambulance arrived. She even called periodically to see how he was doing, which lasted for about a year. I can’t blame her for moving on.
My grandfather's body was never the same after the accident. A brittle diabetic, his bones just never healed completely, the broken hip and femur never again able to support his weight without aid. I remember how he'd walk for hours supporting himself with two white-knuckled hands that gripped the wheeled walker. Into the kitchen and then back toward the foyer, one agonizing step after another, he’d walk this circuit in silence, his face grimacing with determination.
Whatever benefit it was to his legs was cancelled by the damage to both hands, which went completely numb, their nerves permanently damaged from practically carrying him through each painful step. My grandmother would shake her head in pity as she watched him travel back and forth and reminded him every now and then that she had warned him not to go out that day. I thought I detected an 'I told you so' sort of tone in her voice but it could have just been the continual shock of seeing him so debilitated. Maybe she said it like that because she was still trying to accept that the accident had happened at all, as if she was replaying the day in her mind. I never heard my grandfather respond. He just kept on walking. When he died I was glad to know he'd finally be free from the pain.
I imagine that today my grandmother will again cry when she talks about putting him into a nursing home. I will remind her how he hardly realized he was there because she so dutifully visited him every day, arriving in time for breakfast and leaving after 8pm at night. She’ll probably end the story the same way she always does, telling me that the heart and soul of marriage is the promise each person makes to the other. "In sickness and in health" she’ll tell me, adding, "when I married Tom I made him that promise."
And she kept it, just like Vera.
posted by Pamela Hamilton at 1:48 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home