Old Age

She is in the hospital. She is 82 years old.  Her son sits on a chair and observes.  An alarm from the IV machine keeps beeping. It’s an annoying sound.  Her son talks to her and asks her if she has eaten to which she answers affirmatively. They both stop talking. Soon she is sleeping again. The trembling and the shaking continues. At times, she lifts her hands makes pointing motions as if she is talking to someone. But she is not.  The son wonders what is happening inside her mind. Where is her mind going? Is she dreaming those times when she was young, times that he knows not for he is too young to have remembered her.  Is she in the meat market place talking to a customer? Is she dancing the night away? Does she dream all her nine children together with her, laughing and enjoying the time together? Her son can only wonder. The old woman who brought him to this world lays there. “Is it really her?” he thinks to himself. Old age. Wrinkled. Weak. Incoherent. Alone. Sadness feels his heart and wonders what his future will hold. “Is this what I can expect?” he asks to himself. “Is this how we end?”  he murmurs. An epiphany has occurred. Once upon a time, he was also young and thoughtless. He didn’t think about old age. Growing in reverse did not seem possible then, but now it makes sense. We enter the world as a child. We end our journey in this world as an old child. But the difference is evident. As a child we are loved and cherished by our loved ones. As an old person we are neglected by our loved ones and cared by strangers. Love them now. 

Love them now. Sooner than you think, you will take her place.