Second sister and I regularly visited all the aged homes in the area.
We’d give each person a flower and spend a little time with each.
Even some of the old men would be touched by receiving a flower…ever tears in ther eyes.
We were bright and friendly and cared.
The first time day we brought a big bunch of chrysanthemums.
When we came to a thin lady who was curled in a fetal position, the staff said not to bother giving her a flower, she was deaf, blind, and all she did each day was pick her nose…
Nevertheless I put a flower in her hand.
She brought it to her nose and said, “Chrysanthemum”
It’s not the easiest word to say but she said it clearly.
It was a remender to never forget that people who cannot communicate or have lost all interest in doing so, are there, are conscious, and need love.
THe nursing home near where I used to live…I’d go every week, and go into the morning room and go from chair to chair, giving time to each.
One lady had a terrible reputation. The staff said she would spit at them and scratch them, and didn’t like anyone.
For some strange reason I was exempt. I remember her trusting enough to confide, “It is so lonely when you are old and have your mother and father are dead”.
What that clearly said, is “I need real love from people of my own who love me because they love me, not because they have to care for me” No matter how old, this is our human need.
One morning I came in, and had spoken to a few before I got to her…kind of high chair because each chair had a tray. She grabbed hold of one arm with one hand, and looked at me. She had a couple of piketlet/pancakes on her plate, one half eaten. She began to choke so I immediately hooked as much of the pancake out as I could as she looked up into my face. It was like a mother might with her child, but in a short instant her face turned black and she was gone, the staff later said she’d been in the throes of a heart attack. I alerted the staff and they quickly carried her out in the chair.
I wasn’t upset or horrified, just happy I could be the missing mother in her last instants of life on earth, and for her that she had with her the only person she liked left in the world. Anna was her name.
Sometimes, when we put ourselves in a position where we are there simply to help, simply to be there for people, or a particular person, God might choose to give that person (or people) something He has been longing to give His love to, His comfort to, in whatever bleakness that person may be living through.
So I thank God for those ccasions that He’s let me be there as His love for someone.