We turn not older with years, but newer every day.
~Emily Dickinson
After the torrential downpour we had yesterday, I woke up early this morning, to a break in the storm and a glint of soft sun peeking in through the white curtains. I drove for a bit, zig-zagging around fallen tree branches, sinkholes in the middle of some streets, water bubbling up through others, and rushing rivers of rainwater cascading through the gutters. The town I was in shimmered and the yellow trees glowed. I was glad to be out driving, heading over to the senior home where I am a ball-toss volunteer ~ helping a group of seniors get warmed up for the day.
The ball is actually a balloon, since most of the seniors have had a stroke or other medical ailment that has left them pretty fragile. The first time I was in the room, I felt incredibly sad at the sight of some of the seniors slumped over in their wheelchairs. But AO had said "HI" to me, smiling brightly and putting me at ease. So, when I returned this morning, I was happy to see them all.
A handsome man walked in with his daughter, Sara, who is maybe 12 years old. I thought they were there to visit a family member, but the man was simply dropping his daughter off to volunteer and he would return in an hour. I asked Sara if she was volunteering through her school ~ "No ~ I like volunteering with old people," she said with a smile. So, we tag-teamed, grabbed two balloons and got to work.
The volunteer coordinator, Melissa, turned on the CD player and Nat King Cole began crooning 'Unforgettable'. I didn't know whether to feel it was cruel or sweet to play that CD, which would end an hour later with the song 'Too Young'. Then Melissa explained to us that HW shrieks to get attention and RT will say she has to go to the bathroom even when she doesn't really have to go, so we should just go get Melissa when that happens. She gave us a little more information about each senior ~ packaging each one into a one-sentence personality, or identity tag. It's true that at first it's much easier to remember people as "shrieker" and "red sweater" and "sleeper" than their names ~ but I felt a little awkward, standing in the middle of the room where they could all hear us ~ until I noticed many of them were asleep, or simply not paying attention, anyway. I wondered if they would be annoyed with me interrupting them to throw a balloon around. I wondered if they get annoyed by the chipper voice the nurses use, as if they are speaking to children. I wondered if they were lonely. I wondered if I would get to know any of them, and come up with my own way of identifying them. It made me think of how I "package people" to remember them ...... but that's another blog post for another time.
I started talking first to MI, feeling it would be a little too forward of me to just walk up to her and toss a balloon in her face. Melissa opened the curtains and the streaks of sun gave way to sheets of rain. MI said something about the intense weather and I told her I had been driving in it yesterday ~ she asked what it was like, driving in such a storm ~ "We're so sheltered in here that we forget what the real world is like." And she laughed a little. I asked her if she would like to play "volley-balloon" and she smiled and said yes.
The balloon toss isn't just to kill time while Melissa prepares snacks and movie time. Arthritis and strokes have left some of the seniors with limp arms and hands ~ the balloon toss helps them try to reach up and use those arms, it helps them loosen up joints, and I guess it does help them pass the time. MI was pretty limber and she punched the balloon pretty fiercely a few times. When she missed she would say, "I'm sorry," and after a while, we actually enjoyed a conversation as we punched the balloon back and forth. She sang the lyrics to "Mona Lisa" and later she told Sara she was really good with the balloon.
I gave MI a break and walked over to AO, whom I had met a few weeks ago. She remembered me and smiled when she saw me, which warmed my heart. At first she favored her right arm, leaving her left hand resting on her chest, but after a while, in her excitement, she started using both arms and I felt incredibly useful today ~ she even used her legs a few time when the balloon went low, and we laughed and called it balloon soccer. By now, most of the seniors in the room had been watching, and started looking interested in the silly game.
I looked over at RS and asked her if she would like to play, too. She turned her head sideways, to give me a sly look, and she flashed a wry grin, then wriggled her fingers(!) She was hilarious. Sometimes she would fake me out and instead of punching the balloon back at me, she would just catch it and hold onto it, to watch me stumble around as I waited for the return volley. She'd peek her face out from behind the red balloon, and giggle. I immediately adored her.
Then, when HW shrieked to get my attention, RS frowned but gave me the nod to toss the balloon to HW next. HW was pretty low-functioning, physically. She was difficult to understand and I wondered if behind the huge glasses and the muddled speech she was totally lucid and thinking, "I'm not a toddler! You don't have to say 'Good job!' to me when I bat the damn balloon!" Her right hand functioned better than her left and she would give me the "ready" signal by throwing her right arm into the air ~ I would basically gently toss the balloon right into the palm of her hand and let her SLAM that thing right into me. Then, in her excitement, she started using her limp left hand ~ and she started raising her left arm as the "ready" signal ~ smiling each time I grunted "UUUUFFF!" when I caught her return volley. After a while, I went back to MI ~ MJ, who was in the wheelchair next to her and who hadn't said anything the entire time, quietly inched forward in her wheelchair, letting me know she wanted to be next. MJ had been sort of slumped in her wheelchair, looking down...until I tossed the balloon to her ~ her eyes lit up, she giggled, she smiled ~ but she never said a word.
By now I was working up a sweat ~ really. Because they have little control over their arms and the force they use, most of the shots they made were widely random, bullet-like shots ~ I had to dance side to side to catch many of the shots, and after a while I found myself dancing around to the beat of the music, singing along to some of the songs with them. I'm sure it was a funny sight, but we had a lot of fun. I know I'll never look at a red balloon the same way......
After, we signed the Volunteer Book and I noticed how many volunteers visit this senior center. I flipped through the pages and noticed the people who visit every week for the "Best Friends" activity, or to play Scrabble with the seniors ~ Melissa told me there are a couple of Scrabble-Shark seniors who play for blood.(!) Word in the halls is also that a new guy was a friend of Hemingway, and is actually a character in one of Hemingway's stories ~ so next time, I'm going to seek him out and see if he'll chat with me.
Later, after some aimless driving, I ended up at Caffe Trieste in Berkeley. I walked in just as another ocean of rain let loose from the sky ~ it was crowded and steamy and I wondered where in the world they fit the band when they have music there. I sat for a while and couldn't help but overhear the older woman next to me giving a brain-download to a younger woman, the new teacher who would take over her fifth-grade class, as they went over the class list: "This little guy is such a creative soul; this one here will raise her hand all day and interrupt and want to answer every question; this little one is borderline-autistic, but I wouldn't say it like that to the parents;" and so on. She was packaging each kid for easy identification for the new teacher ~ and I wondered if the i.d. makes the kid or the kid makes the i.d. ~ in other words, if the i.d. predisposes the teacher to fit the kid into a certain box, before the kid has even had a chance to explore every corner of the box and see if he in fact wants to be in that particular, or any, box.
And I was left wondering what box I'm supposed to fit in ~ what "new" I'm supposed to be tomorrow ~
Sadly the id makes the kid. I hate when teachers do that. Do you know that we get an info card on each kid filled out by the previous year's teacher? I never read those until after the end of the first couple of weeks. I feel as if I will be tainted and not see the kids for who they really are.
Posted by: Kelly | Saturday, January 05, 2008 at 09:24 PM