When you’d become elderly, and everybody you knew from your younger years had, already, gone, you feel that loneliness coming on strong, and you’re, all alone by yourself, without people your age you can, share your experiences, talk about those, good ol’ days, with, translated…
“I shall not change the batteries, again”, the agile, and very aware elderly woman in her nineties told me, as she’d come back to the hospital to get the batteries of her pacemaker checked told me. “I’d lived, long enough!”, her eyes were, steady, “of our entire class, there’s only me, and another that’s still, living now.”
Before I could get a word in, she’d turned her gaze toward the distance, like she wasn’t, speaking to me anymore, but immersed in her own, world, “just allow the battery of my pacemaker to die on its own then, when the battery stopped work, I shall, just, go.”, her eyes were glowing, as she’d, imagined the day.
“But, if the battery run out, and, only the left side dies, not the right, or as the brain dies, the limbs are still, alive, it would be tragic, to be in that, vegetative, state!”, I’d attempted to, deter her from the idea. “What’s scarier is that your body’s returned, and can’t move, but your brains are still, quite, functional”.
She’d, flinched a little.
“Nobody knows what plan the heavens have for us.”
She’s now, in, deep thought.
“Besides, you’re, still agile and healthy, walking with your back straight, you are still quite young, biologically, it seems………”, I’d looked at her up and down, “people will mistake you for seventy-something.”
She’d smiled, courteously.
“When you ride the bus, there would be those who let up their seats to you?”
She’d nodded.
“I’m sorry, your time isn’t up yet, and I plan to, make money off of your until you’re, a hundred twenty years old, you still have thirty years of paying for my treatment, you can’t take that, away from me now!”
“Hahaha! Fine, just as well then, I’ll, let you make money off of me”, the patient followed my lead, ended the discussion, and maybe she’d, changed her mind, or maybe, she hadn’t.
And maybe, it’s how people she knew who are her age are, dying around her, making her feel this way.
This reminded me of, a patient from many years ago, in his nineties, still agile, and lucid of mind, he was an optimistic man, one day he’d come to see me for treatment, and it was like he’s, a totally, different, person then, slouched in his own corner, refusing to answer any of my, inquiries. I’d turned and asked his daughter what had happened in his life of late, “Last month, my father went back home to visit.”
“Isn’t that a good thing? How did he become like this now?”
“He’d found that all of the elders his age are, gone, that there was no one who knew him, back in his, hometown now.”
this is how life, goes…silhouette from online
I’d looked upon my patient with empathy, felt that the years finally, caught up to, him, he’d aged by thirty years, in this one trip back to his, hometown, to his, real, age now.
What chases us, sometimes, it’s not the body, but watching how those we knew of our own age, pass away, feeling that “I’m all alone”, that chill. When there’s no one we can share our own life’s experiences with, maybe, it was like that swordsman, watching his apprentices, play, looking very happy, but what was lost, was what belonged to one self, what we’d shared with those our age, that will, never, come back, again, the shared memories of our, common, pasts.
And so, this is what happens, when you’d, outlived everybody, but it’s not your time to go yet, and you’re just going to have to, weather through this last passage of your life, by yourself, without those who are your age by your side, but look on the bright side, at least, these individuals still had families who cared for them, so that should, make up for something???
The Ivory Tower of My Mind 