Exposure: Week Seven

A picture of a person you'd love to trade places with for a day.

My grandmother, Helen, was an amazing woman. She was highly intelligent and applied that intelligence in endless, practical ways -- I am convinced that she could do anything she wanted to do.

• She installed an upstairs bathroom in her home -- for the record: she was not the assistant!

• Using a sheet of plexiglass, she replaced the passenger window of my car in a matter of hours. The job was so perfectly done that I forgot it was broken for two months after returning home. The Mazda man was quite impressed. ;-) 

• While pregnant for my mother, she went into labor in the middle of the night; and when she arrived at the hospital, all of the doors were locked. Despite all of the knocking, no one answered. Challenge? She climbed a fire escape to get into the hospital!

Oh, yes, I could go on and on.

But, why trade places with her? Why not just enjoy each other from the vantage point of our own skins?

Well, I wouldn't want to trade places with her on just any given day, and I wouldn't just trade places. I would love to trade mind and body with her for one specific day:

On my last visit to see her, in her nineties, the "woman who could do anything" was returning to her recliner. I could tell that she had to think about every inch of the walk and about every degree that she turned to maneuver her tired frame into the comfort and support of that chair. She finally leaned back, looked up at me, and sighed,

 "No one should have to live this long."

In this hypothetical trade, let me live that day in her body, in the dusk of its life; and let her live in mine, one with the vigor and energy of a woman half her age.

⌛.................................................

 

A man's age is something impressive, it sums up his life: 
maturity reached slowly and against many obstacles,
illnesses cured, griefs and despairs overcome,
and unconscious risks taken;
maturity formed through so many desires, 
hopes, regrets, forgotten things, loves. 
A man's age represents a fine cargo of experiences and memories. 
~Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

A man is not old until regrets take the place of dreams. 
~John Barrymore

Whatever poet, orator, or sage may say of it, old age is still old age. 
~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

None are so old as those who have outlived enthusiasm. 
~Henry David Thoreau

There is still no cure for the common birthday. 
~John Glenn

~End Quote