Our Trip to the Nursing Home

Today our little co-op went to the nursing home to visit and pass out Christmas cards. The look on the patients' faces will stay with me for a long time. Many of them took a while to recognize that there was a little person in front of them. But then a kid would put a card in their hand (or drop it in their lap) and say Merry Christmas. That empty look would leave some of their faces, and Grandpa or Grandma would emerge for a short while and they would smile and say "Well, bless your heart" or "Merry Christmas" or "You come back any time and see Nanny, okay?". A few of the patients would just smile.

One lady I won't forget for a long time. She was walking slowly down the hall with an aid beside her and two of the kids went running up to her and handed her their cards. We were all standing outside a room where an old woman who seemed to be pretty lucid was giving away free hugs to our littlest member (two). When the children came back to us, the walking lady followed. Tears were streaming down her nose, and she just stood among us crying like that. She asked for more cards, and the kids just kept giving them to her.

While we were waiting for the world's slowest elevator to carry us down a floor, the kids were singing "Jingle Bells". A very hunched-over woman with a walker sang the whole thing with us, rocking a little, and grinning.

Our trip ended with some boisterous tree-climbing in the front yard. A man in the lobby watched them the whole time.

I so truly wish them all a Merry Christmas, and pray that they have families that will visit them often. If not, I hope our loud, irreverent little kids helped just a little.

As an aside: Old people need little kids around, and little kids need to be there for them too, and all of us in the middle need to make sure that happens, whether our hearts can take it or not. (I mean, the kids were happy, the elderly patients seemed happy to have them, and here I am crying about it.)