Wouldn’t it be nice if Christmas were a season in which our troubles all melted away in a cloud of sugar plum fairy dust? We could all join hands and sing that cheerful song which comes at the end of “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” – wearing the same contented smiles as those delightful residents of WhoVille.
Well, for as magical as the Christmas season is, it does not ward off misfortune – and if anything, the reversals we suffer this time of year feel even worse than those of the rest of the year because they are so at odds with the visions of sugar plums that we expect to have perpetually dancing in our heads.
I don’t think Kathy and I have ever been more mindful of Christmas Pain than we are this year, although I hasten to add that it’s not our own pain – we continue to feel absurdly blessed – but rather the pain of several very close friends that weighs heavily upon us. Specifically, we are thinking of a friend of ours took a bad fall in early December and has been in terrible pain ever since. Three other friends are contending with serious cancer. A member of my church choir who we also count as a good friend recently joined the throng of those who have lost their jobs. What must it feel like for them to hear perky carols like “Have a Holly Jolly Christmas” prancing from their radios?
And then there is our dear friend Henrietta Welch, who on Christmas Day turns 96. She is an extraordinary force of nature- a retired public school music teacher who seems to have taught three-fourths of the adults in this town (including Kathy’s dad.) She was actually a junior high instrumental director at a time when it was quite uncommon for a woman to hold such a position, and throughout her career she was one of those teachers who demanded and received the best her students could give, and was also one of those teachers who was a towering, intimidating force of authority despite her relatively small stature. And what a deep, lasting impression she made in the lives of the thousands of people who were her students. Again and again over the 21 years I have known her, I have witnessed former students coming up to her and recounting very specific things they remember learning from her- sometimes forty or fifty years after the fact- or telling stories of memorable moments from classes and concerts or even rehearsals.
She has been an absolute dynamo in retirement and still sharp as a tack – – – and so grateful that her health has been so robust. (I think of all the times when she would proudly state that she was such-and-such years old and not taking any medication at all.) She’s had a few bumps along the way but nothing terribly serious, and from any reversals she has managed to bounce back quite resolutely. But earlier this month, she took a fall in her apartment and broke her elbow – which ultimately required surgery and then what is being billed as a three-month stint in a rehabilitation nursing facility. For someone for whom their independence is as important to them as breath itself, this is a nasty blow to the solar plexus. She knows – and we know – that this is where she needs to be right now, but it’s still so hard for us to see her in a place like that- and we just shudder to think of how hard it must be for her to live in a place like that.
That place, by the way, is Ridgewood – and it’s where Kathy’s mom went after breaking her hip. We remembered hearing from a lot of people, including (ironically enough) Henrietta herself, that Ridgewood was an exceptionally fine facility with staff members who really care and are truly competent. And in the time my mother-in-law was there (a matter of months) we were pleased and impressed with the care that she received. So that was some comfort to us as we thought about Henrietta – our fun, feisty, tough-as-nails, fiercely independent friend – finding herself living in a nursing home. It was some comfort but not enough to dispel our sadness.
Then something rather remarkable occurred the other day – which happened to be the first time I came to visit Henrietta after she had been transferred from the hospital to Ridgewood. As I walked in, I didn’t see any reception desk and couldn’t remember how the place was laid out or how one was supposed to track down the room of a given patient. I only had to look confused for about ten seconds before a rehab technician came up to me and asked me if I needed help. Her great attentiveness was encouraging. (So often in a place like that you have to do everything but send up a flare and perform a baton-twirling routine to get some help.) And then, as she was walking me to the appropriate nurses’s station (she knew Henrietta’s room number by heart) I mentioned that I hadn’t been there since my mother-in-law had been there several years earlier. “Who was your mother-in-law?” “Jan Gall.” “I remember her. A school teacher?” “Why yes!” “She was wheelchair bound, contending with a couple of different problems.” (which was right.) “She went from here to Willow Green, I think.” (which was also right.) And when she asked if Jan was still alive and I replied that she had died, she said “I’m sorry. She was such a nice woman.”
I’m not sure I can adequately convey how much encourage- ment I found in this rather brief exchange. In fact, as soon as I was walking to the car i was already calling Kathy to share the story with her – and then calling Bob and Polly as well – because I knew that they would so appreciate knowing that Jan was remembered so kindly and fondly by this caregiver. And even more important for the moment, it gave me such reassurance that our friend Henrietta was being cared for in a place where people like this young woman are working.
And that’s what this season is really about. . . roses blooming in winter. . . bright stars in a dark sky . . . kindness to strangers . . . a world-changing Messiah born in a barn
. . . surprising gifts of grace when we need them most . . .
pictured above: Kathy and me with Henrietta. This picture was taken on the 19th of December (post-surgery) at Fountain Hills, where Henrietta lived before her recent mishap- and to where we trust she will return, and we hope ahead of schedule. The occasion was when Kathy and I sang a Christmas program for the residents there, and Henrietta’s great grandson Christopher helped get Henrietta there to enjoy the program, since she’s the one who helped arrange it.