Daffodils and my Aging Aunt
Daffodils and My Aging Aunt
At ninety-one and partially blind from
a fall – her fault– down the basement stairs
for ignoring the doctor’s warning – she
compared the experience to living in
a perpetual fog, people and things
reduced to shadows though grateful the fall
had not affected her hearing.
Her driver’s license suspended indefinitely
I would visit her once a week and take
her grocery shopping, then spend as few
hours as possible listening to her torrent
of repeated small talk, complaints mostly,
she rattled off like a noisy parrot.
Complaining that she had lived too long
she wondered if the Lord had somehow
forgotten her, and if so, she planned to
give him a coarse piece of her mind when
she found herself up there. Her body, she insisted,
was a daily nuisance making too many
demands on her time and patience, which she
always prefaced with foul language.
Listening to her stale, repeated weekly
regurgitations, I did my best to feign
an honest interest in what she had to say,
contributing an occasional nod, if only
to reassure her that my attention was
genuine and not perfunctory as it
sometimes was. She may have been old
yet her mind was still sharp enough to see
through something like that.
Relief came when her train of thought
broke off abruptly, and I welcomed the silence
that filled the small kitchen as she struggled
to retrieve (with a few expletives) the remainder
of her thought much like when the caboose
of a train detaches from its string of cars.
When two hours had passed, she’d offer me
more tea and a second helping of a
store-bought apple pie – her strategy to
keep me from leaving and she could continue
talking to kill her boredom, but increase mine.
Finally, I would have to break the news:
“Well, auntie, I must be going. It’s an
hour’s drive back home.” “So soon?” she’d say
but understood. And with a heartfelt thank
you she’d give me a warm hug.
Walking back to my car, I’d take one more
look at the bright yellow daffodils along
the path hugging the house.
Yellow, I recalled reading, was van Gogh’s
favorite color. It made him happy he
once wrote to his brother Theo. I doubt
she ever heard of van Gogh or ever gave
those daffodils a look, much less a smile –
not that it would have made a difference.
Copyright © Maurice Rigoler | Year Posted 2022
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