I’m in the midst of a mild arthritis spell. The doctor told me that on a scale of 1-10, my arthritis limitations are minor you big baby they only rated a 2 on his lifestyle interference scale. OK, he didn’t say “big baby”.
His scale doesn’t prevent me from looking at the wider world moving easily, however.
I remember my wheelchair bound mother asking me to straighten a picture hanging on the wall and how she watched me get up and cross the room and then return back to my chair with a look of longing and, yes, envy.
Big Baby your day is coming she would say. Ok, she didn’t say “big baby”.
A subject not often discussed openly with caregivers is that in caring for their elderly parent or spouse they see their own futures in ways they could never have imagined.
Here is a quote from a book I am reading– “The Infinities” by John Banville. He is an Irish writer who rates 10 (on a scale of 1-10) of those deserving to have “Writer” on their passport.
OF THE THINGS we fashioned for them that they might be comforted, dawn is the one that works. When darkness sifts from the air like fine soft soot and light spreads slowly out of the east then all but the most wretched of humankind rally. It is a spectacle we immortals enjoy, this minor daily resurrection, often we we will gather at the ramparts of the clouds and gaze down upon them, our little ones, as they bestir themselves to welcome the new day. When a silence falls upon us then, the sad silence of our envy.
John Banville, “The Infinities”
©Pat Coakley 2010
PHOTOGRAPHY CANNOT BE USED WITHOUT WRITTEN PERMISSION
**Select photographs from this blog and my wider archive can be purchased at www.patcoakley.com
