And so I did.
The place, stripped to a skeleton staff and now loosely populated by the permanent residents– most of whom were confined to wheelchairs of varying complication– was pretty empty. The days, now shapeless and free of plot, offered little and so I wandered hallway after hallway. Seeming more memory than music, the theme song to MASH drifted from one room I passed,
while another was antiseptic and empty but for Trump/Pence banners taped defiantly to the wall, and then through a doorway, I caught a glimpse of a nurse changing a patient’s tracheotomy tube– so intimate and tender as to be virtually erotic. Downstairs, scattered like islands, I came upon people who sat anchored and voiceless in wheelchairs, each one stationed near a window, watching.
There was a church service later in the morning that took place in the same space that hosted Bingo, Pub Night and all our other events. It was Catholic, which occasioned a few religious props being removed from a box and placed on a cafeteria table, and somehow this act was achingly beautiful.
A strong, elderly woman dressed all in black walked in, made the sign of the cross, and then nodded warmly to all who made eye contact. She went directly to a middle-aged woman who was frozen and strapped into a wheelchair, and touched her with a tenderness that exceeded language. Gently, she pulled a favourite sweater over her head, and then smiling, began to brush her hair—a mother’s imperishable, radiant love, holier than a saint.
An impossibly old woman was reclined, almost prone, in a wheelchair. Blankets and knitted things covered virtually every inch of her body, and her skin was so very thin, her body so frail, that it seemed as if a soft gust might be enough to push her through the veil. A couple of hospital staff tended to her, telling her that her brother would be there any moment now. Her eyes flickered open at his mention, and as if surfacing through water she said, “Oh, I hope so,” and then she fell back down and in to sleep.
Ten minutes later a tall, elderly man, clearly ill himself, entered and sat stoically beside her. With a bible open on his lap he mumble-prayed along with the priest. He never touched her, nor did he say anything to her while she slept through the service, but it was clear that he was her brother. He was her tie to this world, the one now disintegrating around her into a living mist. Drifting in and out, all of time swirling around her, what version of her brother might she have hoped to summon, what memory returning in dream, what ghost to see her home?
As of this writing, I am on day 7 of a 6 week stint at a pulmonary rehabilitation facility.
Last night was an event known as “Coffee House.” It took place in a generic, over-lit cafeteria style room that was made all the more depressing by the tiny gestures of decorative cheer added by the well-intentioned staff.
An inspirational message taped to the wall.
A balloon tied to a folding chair.
Somewhere a Dollar Store streamer that wouldn’t stay in place, hanging limp as if injured.
All of us gathered there were quiet, standing around as awkward and vulnerable as children at a school dance. Those who were most profoundly ill, those for whom recovery was out of reach and who lived permanently in the residence, had been pushed up near a three-piece band that was getting ready to perform. These people sat in complicated, tongue-controlled wheelchairs, and at a casual glance appeared fused into the metal of their containers– their mouths open, faces rigid and untranslatable. The rest of us, those attached to oxygen tanks and those not, just looked lost and a little sad, like we’d long given up hope of being asked to dance. You felt what was missing rather than what was there—and it seemed as if in each breath we exhaled a shallow puff of loss, all then gathering together like a weather system to form a heavy, oppressive cloud that enveloped us.
It was heartbreaking.
The band, a kind of folk outfit that was comprised of a woman who looked like a community organizer on tambourine, a bongo player in a Toronto Blue Jays cap, and an electric keyboardist who tried to project energy by wearing a Hawaiian shirt, began to play. At first the music seemed like it was designed to be little more than sound, just a “something” to help fill the emptiness of the situation, but then the woman began to sing I’ll Fly Away. Her voice was beautiful and true, and everybody in the coffee house fell into it.
When the shadows of this life have gone
I’ll fly away
Like a bird from these prison walls I’ll fly
I’ll fly away
And that voice, that song, it seemed to come out of us, too. And for a few moments we were all living beyond our mortal cages, we were all soaring– everything effortless, everything weightless, everything beautiful.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4MNM0OO_iVI
And trailing behind us were two women, one young, the other middle-aged. They were in conversation and occasionally, when the dog idled, some of their words would come into focus.
“It was like everything I thought was real wasn’t, and I was sure I was crazy.”
“Well, they said I would have remained hospitalized but for that one thing.”
“I will never forget the look on his face when I opened the door and saw what was happening.”
“I can’t’ describe to you how sad I’ve been.”
The older woman, attentive and silent, was a witness. She was looking right into the still shocked eyes of her companion, determined to walk with her and listen for as long as it took– the movement bringing the story to the surface and freeing it, if only for a moment.
Further along a little boy held a pile of leaves and twigs in his hands, declaring to his father– who sat on a bench in front of a coffee shop– ” Making a nest is hard!” The father became a necessary expert, “Yes, it is, but birds are very good at it!” His wife, beautifully sunlit and scarved, rolled her eyes and smiled, “Your father’s nickname in college was The Birdman, did you know that, Alistair? He was famous for his nests!”
A middle-aged, maximally bearded man wearing a sweatshirt with something accidental on it, jogged along. He had an easy gait and appeared naturally athletic, but as he loped closer to us and then past, I could see that his smile was wild and uncontrollable and he was muttering to himself. His clothes filthy, he clutched a beaten five dollar bill in his long, thin fingers, and ran straight to the liquor store.
On our way home the dog bounced through the leaves, and an elderly woman in a wheelchair, still wearing a poppy on her blazers, smiled at us, “She looks so happy!” she said. I shouted back that it was a beautiful day, and the woman nodded crisply, “I will grant you that,” she said, before gearing her chair forward and buzzing across the street.
* (Photo of leaves courtesy of Debra Lary)
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