Oblivious

Her body is ninety-three years old. Her mind is much younger now. I went to see her today, only she doesn't know it. Doesn't know I am her granddaughter, Doesn't even know her own name. I hate going out there; only go when the guilt forces me to. If that makes me a bad person then I will carry that title because it's true. Maybe somewhere I am hoping she will die during one of the long expanses between visits. It would be fitting, wouldn't it? Then I could feel guilt, or anger, something active. This passive waiting is killing us both, just not fast enough.

They said she was awake and had just finished dinner. In the time it took me to walk the length of her hall, she had fallen asleep again. There wasn't a lot of difference these days between her asleep and her awake. She didn't talk. At all. Occasionally, I could catch her eye and make a funny face and she would smile. That's the only way I knew there was any part of her still left in there. And then I'd resent it because it meant I'd have to come back. I had an obligation to that sliver until it was gone.

I crawled up on the bed with her, partly to be near her and partly to say "hey look at me! I'm not afraid of the senile old lady. " Touch was about the only sense she had left so I started rubbing her legs to let her know I was there. Her eyes fluttered open but otherwise she did not move. I could feel her bones, sharp now under her thin skin. All the way up to her crippled knees she was no bigger than my wrist. In this sense, too she was almost gone; quite literally a shell of who she used to be. "You're nothing but bones," I tell her. No response.

The Korean nurse entered then and carried a little plastic pill cup to her bedside. "Miss Gladys, it's time for your dessert," she said. She dipped a white plastic spoon into a white cup with "GLADYS" scrawled across it and drew out a spoonful of yogurt mixed with crushed pills. I watched her touch the end of the spoon to my grandmother's lips, inciting her to part them just enough to let the mixture in. My grandmother seemed rescindedto this; it was her routine now and it never occurred to her to question it. She had been in this place, in this bed for two years now. She had been in the same curled up position for the last 6 months, only moving when someone moved her. The nurse dipped that spoon into it's cup 3, 4, 5 times while I watched in amazement at how much she was getting out of one tiny cup. It was like watching clowns pile out of a Volkswagen Beetle only instead of being entertaining, it was sad. All she could do was lay there and be spoon-fed what they decided was good for her. Her only reward was the nurse's "good girl" after each swallow.

I knew she wanted to die. She had told me so. I wanted her to, too. I wanted that for her; for every poor sucker in this joint. I was sad for her, but more so I was sad for me, because I am just that selfish. I have no reason to assume watching her die would be any more painful than watching her live like this. If I were there in the very moment she passed, then I would know my God. Then I would see that compassion and love and mercy are a real, live thing. I wish it made sense. I can't see the reasons why. Why exist when you don't even want to? Why continue to stay physically alive when you have done everything you are able to do in this body? And what if she had made entirely different choices over the last ninety-three years? Would it make any difference now? And again, I am thinking of myself. Maybe she has purpose yet to serve; if only to give me someone else to feel sorry for occasionally.