It’s a simple photo beside the Lieve River in Gent. Two boots … standing alone. Unseen is a nearby wine bottle, empty. Steps on the left, leading down to the water’s edge. A tunnel on the far shore. A boat. And no one to be seen.
As with much of life, I don’t know. There’s a story here. Many possible beginnings and endings. Joy? Sorrow? Neither? Ordinary? Extraordinary? Heart-warming? Heart-diminishing?
I’m getting better at being stopped by life. Often pausing, even in mid-step or mid-thought … and wondering.
I wrote a couple of days ago about accompanying my friend and her cat to a nearby care home. I made up names for the residents I especially enjoyed, but not for her. So … she becomes Valerie.
I like that name. Three syllables entice me. They flow.
Valerie and I went for coffee yesterday. I needed to talk about my experience, particularly being next to residents with dementia.
After our visit, I woke up the next morning sputtering out the words …
What was that?
What happened?
Yes, the twelve or so residents with dementia each sat in the lounge in apparent separation. But there was some energy flowing in the room.
I was loving people, most of whom had no words to give. I wanted to sit beside each and every one of them. In silence. Not physically touching unless they initiated that. Just being there. Together. Not alone.
The head occupational therapist told me after the visit that I wouldn’t be able to volunteer in the home because I don’t speak Dutch. The other OT, who visited residents with us, suggested I approach the volunteer manager in the sister building across the street, where older people who don’t require nursing care live. (Gosh, I didn’t find a name for her either. She was lovely. So she becomes Daphné.)
The morning after, I was clear: I didn’t want to volunteer with the higher functioning folks. I wanted to be in the dementia lounge.
I asked Valerie if she knew what level of Dutch was needed for people to volunteer at the care home.
“A2”
“I passed A2!”
It was sixteen months ago, but I have the paper that proves the level of competence that’s required.
Back then, I concluded “This is too hard.” And “I don’t want all this homework and exams to learn a skill that I don’t care about.” And “Most adults and teens in Gent speak English so why am I banging my head against the wall?”
Could it be?
That was then and this is now?
Am I about to scare up my notes from A1 and A2 and … study? Plus renew my friendship with the Babble language app?
My friend has a cat who makes a huge difference with many residents of a nearby care home. Yesterday I was invited to tag along.
A delightful occupational therapist toured us around. Her touch showed great love for the residents. She honoured them.
I’ll make up names here. The first room we entered was the home of Marina. She spoke some English so we could make meaning together. On her bedside table stood a portrait of a blonde 18-year-old woman wearing no doubt the latest hairstyle. In the chair nearby sat the same human being, now 79. The twinkle in the eye remained.
Marina was a stenographer, skilled in shorthand dictation for her boss. Sometimes she had six letters on the go at once. I could see her pride in the skill within a “secret language”. I told her that I also had a code that hardly anyone knew – braille. Marina and I met.
Down the hall, Dominique sat up in bed, enthralled with the kitty cat. She and I got talking – in French. My high school version couldn’t keep up with her rapid-fire enthusiasm, and most of her words floated away from my knowing. We smiled a lot. Dominique and I met.
Both of these women seemed cognitively intact, unlike the folks I met next.
In the hallway, the eyes of a woman met mine. I’ll call her Marie. She cooed over our cat, and her smile never wavered. We shared no language but there was a 90-year-old pixie in front of me.
At the end of my stay in the care home, Marie and I once more exchanged our grins. We met.
The lounge at the end of the hall was a meeting place for residents with dementia. There were maybe ten of them sitting on chairs and couches, really not meeting each other at all.
I sat down. Despite the apparent isolation, there was a sweet energy hanging in the air. I let it waft over me, not trying to figure it out.
Halfway across the room, a very thin man turned his head toward me. To me, he’s Jérome. Our eyes lingered. He stood there for a few more seconds and then started a slow walk … towards me. I pulled out a chair from the table and gestured for him to sit. He did. For maybe a minute, his head was facing away from me as we sat close. And then he turned my way.
His eyes on mine were soft and sad. His right hand came forward. I responded with mine. We shook … a steady pressure for at least ten seconds.
Jérome sat with me for a few minutes more, his eyes again looking the other way. And then he stood and walked out of the room.
Later, as I was leaving the care home floor, Jérome was walking near the elevator. Eyes, long handshake. Jérome and I met.
The kitty was the star of the show in the lounge. What a powerful little being. I saw a visiting man adjust the dress of a female resident whose dress had slipped a bit. There was love.
The rest of the folks sat in their aloneness, perhaps yearning for the next arrival of a loved one. I yearned too … to sit silently beside each of them.
My dear wife Jody and I loved the TV series Lost, about the survivors of a plane crash on a tropical island. Years later I’m watching it again. Would you believe there are 121 episodes? I’m on Number 5.
Number 3 is called “Tabula Rasa” … a clean slate. The video I’ve included begins with Kate sitting beside Jack. She wants to tell him about the bad things she’s done. He doesn’t want to hear it. “We’re all starting again.”
And the music of Joe Purdy’s “Wash Away” begins to swell …
I got troubles oh, but not today ‘Cause they’re gonna wash away They’re gonna wash away
And I got sins Lord, but not today ‘Cause they’re gonna wash away They’re gonna wash away
And I had friends oh, but not today ‘Cause they done washed away They done washed away
Lord, I’ve been cryin’ alone I’ve been cryin’ alone No more cryin’ alone No more cryin’ here
And slowly four pairs of human beings are revealed. Each person has been angry with the other.
Jin approaches his wife Sun, who’s sleeping under a section of wing. He kneels down and brushes the hair from her forehead.
Boone holds a pair of missing sunglasses in front of his sister Shannon’s eyes. She smiles at him as he walks away, also smiling.
Sayid from Iraq tosses an apple to Sawyer from America. He catches it and his gaze lingers towards the donor.
Young Walt looks up and sees his father Michael approaching with their dog Vincent, who had been missing since the crash.
Looking on is Locke, who found Vincent, and brought him to Michael so Dad could be the hero.
George W. Bush, the 43rd U.S. President … Michelle Obama, the wife of the 44th U.S. President. Together. Republican … Democrat. Human beings.
There are so many ways that we can be seen as different from each other. But we can see beyond all that.
Sometimes I feel alone, understood by very few. But when this photo was published on Facebook, I saw in the comments that my smile in response is also yours:
I wasn’t a fan of Bush’s political beliefs, but he is inherently a good person who just felt the best for America was a different route than what I thought. He loves his political rivals because they want the best for us too.
Kindness is never weak nor out of fashion. Kindness is the brightening of one soul from another. It rejects fear, materialism and hatred.
A kinder, gentler time
This just makes me happy.
We can love each other.
George W. Bush wasn’t one of our best presidents, but I hope history will forever remember him as a decent human being.
When the Obama’s moved into the White House for the first time, the Bush’s were so nice and made the transition so easy.
Beautiful photo. You don’t have to agree with everything in life. You can still be friends.
I love going to Basic-Fit … my gym. We exercisers take the elevator to the third floor, where an infinity of orange machines is revealed.
After I finished my workout yesterday, I saw that the elevator was broken. We were invited into a hallway and then outside, before descending a lot of steps.
And what appeared before me were coils of razor wire. It was the first time in my life that I’d seen that symbol of violence up close. In other moments I saw the wire way up high, on top of fences.
The evil of it all stopped me. I leaned close. I put my fingertip on the point of a blade … so sharp.
And I returned to a life I’ve never known … of prison camps and gas chambers. Razor wire was not in my reality but millions of my earthly companions, past and present, have felt the horror of the coils.
“Please … there has to be someone who truly sees me, the uniqueness that I am.”
“Please … come close, hold my hand. Let us walk together.”
“Please … say ‘yes’ to me as I say ‘yes’ to you.”
In the pages of Tricycle magazine, I found such a one: Curtis White. He rides a bike.
I was cycling down a steep hill on a road through Fort Townsend State Park, in Port Townsend, Washington, when I saw below me an older woman on the right side of the road with a dog on a leash and a man on the left side of the road walking unsteadily and drifting toward the middle of the road.I didn’t want to frighten him, so I slowed, and called out loudly, “Coming up!” hoping that he would move farther to the side of the road. Unfortunately, my shout only startled him. He stumbled forward, lost his balance, and then fell face first onto the road.
I stopped to make sure he was okay. His face was still on the road, and his arms reached out helplessly, uncontrollably.He could not stand up on his own, so I put my bike down and tried to raise him.
I assumed that he had had a stroke recently and was relearning how to walk. We needed to get him off the road as quickly as possible, but his wife was insisting that he get up on his own, saying, like some zealous personal trainer, “Come on! Get up! Use your arms!” That wasn’t happening. I said to her, “Take his arm and let’s get him up.” We slowly got him to his knees and then to his feet.
The extraordinary thing was that when he stood and I looked into his face – glasses askew, dirty, humiliated and in pain – I felt this profound sense of love for him, and I said, “You’re okay now, brother,” and I embraced him.
Stranger yet, I felt incredibly happy and grateful to him for this chance. It didn’t feel like my actions were a consequence of being a “good person” acting out of ethical duty. It felt more like the man and I had stood together, in communion, “lost in a shaft of sunlight”, in T. S. Eliot’s words:
For most of us There is only the unattended Moment The moment in and out of time The distraction fit Lost in a shaft of sunlight …
It was a moment of complete connection. Did he feel this connection? That isn’t possible for me to know in any objective sense, but there was something in the depths of his face. He was offered compassion and he took it in, drank it down, water to wine.
Who was he? Who was I? Didn’t matter.
***
Love comes quietly finally, drops about me, on me in the old ways
What did I know thinking myself able to go alone all the way
I love going to breakfast at The Cobbler in the Post Hotel. Yes, the food is excellent. Yes, the decor and the long views of Gent centrum are superb. Mostly though, I go for the people. I’ve had many fine conversations with several staff members.
One woman, Simoné, has agreed to my request. She will sing to me at my table on October 18, 2028. So she has lots of time to practice!
I sat down this morning and said hi to Nicolas, who was cooking for the hotel guests. I said hi to one of the servers – Francesca. She’s from Argentina, and pretty new to The Cobbler. We talked last week about Patagonia. I wonder if I’ll ever walk its shoreline.
Today there was a new server working with Francesca. Her face was vaguely familiar. I looked forward to saying something silly to her.
And here she comes, with my cappuccino …
“What’s your name?”
“Simoné.” (Head tilted, a strange smile)
(Silence)
And so I am humbled once more. It’s true that Simoné has changed her hairstyle but her face hasn’t gone anywhere. And this Bruce brain couldn’t corral the fact that this was indeed the woman who would be singing to me down the road.
“I’m sorry, Simoné”
“It’s okay”
Do no harm … either intentionally or unintentionally. Today I harmed. Now I forgive myself. And singing is in our future.
I’ve been sitting on a bench in Sint-Baafsplein, a square in Gent centrum. I love public places to sit where you don’t have to buy a beer or coffee.
Before me is Sint-Baafs, a cathedral built over a thousand years ago. On the left is NTGent, a performing arts theatre, its productions naturally presented in Dutch. No matter … it’s all home to me.
Folks are coming and going in Sint-Baafsplein, many entering the church, some seeking a nearby coffee shop or pub (known here as cafés). Tourists from across the world mingle with residents from across the world. Us.
A couple nearby are taking turns doing photos of each other, with Sint-Baafs in the background. I wave to them. The woman waves back. The man smiles and asks me to take their picture. Of course I will. More smiles … and then off they go. I return to sitting.
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