It’s a surprise, seeing my great grandmother here. I wasn't aware she was in a home, just aware that her Alzheimer's was getting worse. I hadn't seen my maw-mawl in months; I didn't expect to see her there, so different. The home is a nice place: a spacious dining room connects to a pool table and computers, the upstairs containing a personal salon, library, church, and other amenities non-disclosed. She leads us to her room, gait more a shuffle than a walk, limbs shaking slightly as she guides us through that place.
I want to avert my eyes. I don’t want to look away. Maw-mawls age is apparent now. I cannot say time has not been good to her, cannot say it hasn't kissed every new fold on her skin, leaving freckles like small constellations dotting the surface of her hands. I notice this as she takes my hand. She feels soft now, almost like overripe fruit, silky, delicate outside enclosing tender flesh within. Her hands shake but her grip surprises me. She has new glasses, lighter eyes now. I watch her eyes light up now, notice the lack of red dye in her hair. She gets excited when she asks me about school, tells me how much she misses me. She says she sorry that the home would not allow me to spend the night at her house for a few days, like i have at least once a year since i was three. We both laugh as we start crying.
I wasn't expecting to see her there, wasn't expecting to see her like this. The woman I had grown up with, all purple cardigans and gardenia bushes, left to the confines of a home due to her not being able to care for herself. Most of my memories involved her caring for other people. That was the day that i realized what age meant, when i took full notice of the unending march of life. The day i watched my maw-mawl sort out twenty different pill varieties by day; The day she walked us through on a walker, soft arms pressed against the cushioned metal. Time is an unstoppable progression. All humans, all living things, will eventually get old and pass away. The changes are inevitable, and nothing is constant.
Every person will eventually be faced with the truth of their own mortality. we could all live and die in an instant, and the only thing dictating if our lives were worth it are our own actions. That's what she taught me, that day in the nursing home, laughing as she told me stories about my dad as a boy. That afternoon when when we stayed up hours watching the tom and Jerry marathon, armed with a twenty four pack of root beer. The morning when i was six, when she plucked a gardenia flower from the bushes outside her house, pressing it close to my palms and telling me its secret. She taught me life was worth living, and the way to ensure that it would be was by spending time with the people that you loved. Doing the things that you loved. Rules were okay to bend sometimes, allowances to be made. Rules weren't something to live by. What you lived by, was what you loved.