Stay in Touch
“I go nowhere I do nothing,”
He often says, with a certain finality
Although he is happy it’s not over
It’s not over for me either
Not yet
I’m still breathing.
I can form a thought
I can still go places
I can still remember my date of birth
I can still remember the little pink jacket on
Mamma on the stretcher
When they brought her home from the hospital
The bassinet with the baby
Placed on the high boy
They said he was a boy
But there was no “High Boy”
Not for me I was three
Not for him I couldn’t see him
Nobody thought to lift me up
So I could see him
Maybe that’s why we’ve kept in touch so
closely
All our lives
That and all we went through
All we were taught to value and believe
The sheer joy of being boys, brothers
Young men
Fathers, grandfathers
Great grandfathers
Next big step
Ancestors!
When I was a young man, I spent a lot of time
with the old folks.
I was always fascinated with the way people
are
How we are
We were taught to revere the older folks
Show them respect and even deference
When I became a young preacher one of my
jobs was to go around and visit the old, the sick
and infirm, to offer comfort
Sit with them,
Listen to them,
Make them smile,
Pray with them.
Many have a great confidence in prayer, so I
would try to hand craft a prayer that would bring
comfort and support their hope that things will
get better with a little faith.
These thoughts and meditations seem to settle
and satisfy many people.
Others prefer being read to…in my preaching
days they loved to hear bible stories In later
years working with more secular seniors they love novels,
history and poetry
My younger brother and I
Still talk daily on the phone
Both in our early eighties
We usually talk at 4-4:20 in the afternoon
Nearly every day
Yes, it is harder to hear each other
Words slur a bit
But the enjoyment of our communication is still
“High Boy!”
