My ideas about
old folks’ homes were shaped by television – a black-and-white television, a
Muntz, if memory serves me correctly. I don’t recall any shows revolving around
life in what are now euphemistically referred to as retirement communities, but
several commercials did. In those ads, three or four grizzled residents sat on
the veranda discussing constipation. Then one of them, the fellow with the
cheery countenance, would wax ecstatic over his latest bowel movement and,
flush with excitement, recommend that the others try the laxative responsible
for it.
Constipation is still a problem for those of
us of a certain age, and I talk to myself about it quite often. But this is the
21st century, and this isn’t your grandfather’s geezerhood. Thursday after
lunch I was talking to Al. Now, in the interest of full disclosure, Al does not
suffer from constipation, but he does on occasion describe his bowel movements
in great detail. “The damn thing must have been a foot long.” Al’s concern
Thursday, however, was writer’s block. He is writing the story of his life, and
when he runs into a problem he calls me. He does this because, “It’s all your
fault, Tom. You’re the one who got me started with all this.” It is my fault
because when he asked me to see if there was anything about him on the web, I
found a newspaper story, by Peter Arnett no less, about the Battle of Song Be.
“Damn it, Tom, that’s what did it.”
Anyway, as Al went on about the difficulty
of recalling all he’s been through in the last ninety years, his phone rang. It
was Beatrice, one of the managers at Covenant Woods. She had something for Al
and wanted to know if she could bring it up. Al told her he had several bags of
VHS tapes and DVDs in the trunk of the car that he wanted to give her, and he
suggested they meet in the parking lot.
The movies – there must have been fifty or
sixty of them – were given to Al by his friend Ken, the man who bought Al’s
house when Al moved into Covenant Woods. Ken is a retired colonel, who,
according to Al, worked for a time with the Joint Chiefs of Staff. In
retirement, Ken has become a hoarder. And his hoard of movies is being pushed
out by his hoard of elephant figures – “He must have a thousand of the damn
things. Everywhere you look in that house there’s an (effing) elephant,” – and
his hoard of jigsaw puzzles – “You know what Ken got in the mail today? A
package with ten puzzles in it. And he said he’s ordered twenty more. What the
hell is he going to do with all of them? I think he’s losing it.” Al hoped
Beatrice would be able to find a spot in the building where the movies would be
available to the residents.
In true lieutenant colonel fashion, Al told
me to come along, and we set off for the parking lot. Beatrice was holding a
bulging six-by-nine envelope, which she handed to Al and said, “There are eight
of them. But be careful; that’s some pretty good stuff. Don’t have more than
one at a time. When you eat it, it takes longer to hit you, but when it does,
you’ll know it.” Who needs laxatives when Alice B. Toklas brownies are
available? Not Al. At dinner that evening, he said, “Beatrice was right. I had
one this afternoon; it’s good shit.”
When I moved into Covenant Woods, nearly two
years ago, William and Evelyn were an item – an odd item, to be sure, but an
item despite the difference in their ages. William was fifty-nine, and Evelyn
ninety-two. Evelyn has since moved out of Covenant Woods, and there was talk
that William was planning to marry a woman he knows in Atlanta. Whether or not
that was his plan, I can’t say, but it is clear William now has a new squeeze.
The woman in question moved into Covenant
Woods not long ago, and appears to be a sixty-something. Appearances at Covenant
Woods can be deceiving. Erris appears to be an eighty-something, a low
eighty-something, something like eighty-one or eighty-two. She is 102.
But back to William’s love life. Evelyn was
a feisty old broad. She had opinions on everything, and she was more than
willing to share them. So willing, that even if you didn’t care to have the
opinions shared with you, she’d share them anyway. When Evelyn spoke, you
listened, or at least put on an Oscar worthy performance of rapt attention.
The current object of William’s affection is
not the scrappy, high-strung sort. Her countenance is beyond placid; it is more
like blankly unaware. There are times when she looks like something out of
Night of the Living Dead, although she’s never been spotted with entrails
hanging from her mouth.
Then again, perhaps looks are deceiving. A
day or two ago, as I was on my way to dinner, she passed me in the hall with
what looked to be a glass of wine in hand. “Hey, Tom” she said, smiling. “I’m
trying to track down that old William.” She knew my name, which means she is
more aware than I am, because I have no idea what her name is. And at dinner
last night, Isabelle, who lives next door to the woman whose name I do not
know, said she had heard William and her having a lovers’ quarrel earlier in
the day. She must not be as passive as I thought, either.
’Tis the season, and Bethany and Russ each
received a CD of scenes of Christmases past at the Beck house in
Geneva-on-the-Lake from their Uncle John, Debbie’s brother. Beth was taken
aback by the fashions of twenty years past.
“Mom was wearing this puffy red jacket or
something,” she said when we talked Friday. “It was so weird looking. I can’t
believe she wore that stuff.”
Russ, on the other hand, noticed my hair.
“Dad, you sure did have a lot more dark hair
back then,” he said while he, Karen and I were shopping Saturday morning.
“I thought you had a wig on,” Karen said.
This must be what is meant by what goes
around comes around. I used to make remarks about my mother’s gray hair. But
just a few ... now and then ... only once in a while ... maybe a couple times a year ... almost never ... really.
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