Twice, today, I've been reminded, right before my eyes about life's fragility and poignancy.
In separate circumstances, I had the opportunity to watch couples who have been married for a remarkable period of time. These two couples have probably never met each other. There would be no reason for their paths to cross.
Yet they share some characteristics in common. Characteristics that are at once beautiful yet poignant.
In both cases, the wife has advancing dementia and is having physical difficulty moving about. The husbands are careful and gentle with their wives, as if they are handling a fragile dandelion whose flower could blow away in the wind at any second. The women move ever so slowly in a halting gait. With their husbands at an elbow, they stop frequently to speak to strangers or gaze at a budding bush or emerging flower. While their voices speak to people, their eyes tell a different story.......seeing as if in vignettes from long ago.
One of the couples just adopted a ten-year rescue dog from a local shelter. As he explained to us yesterday, "I hope Georgie might help my wife with her dementia." Georgie has been rescued with the hope that he might 'rescue' a human. Who knows what comfort stroking Georgie's fur may bring to the woman?
Some day any one of us may be in either set of the shoes I've just described.......as the caregiver or the care receiver. Only God knows which role we may be called upon to play. I just hope that if I am the care receiver, I have a Georgie of my own to sink my finger tips into - just one more time.
Max, I miss you.
Ancora imparo
