Tuesday, June 2, 2009

taking care of my grandmum...

it's been a while since i last went home... i've been busy with a lot of work and school... but i finally decided to visit... i found my little sister and my grandmum there... grandmum has been bed ridden for almost 6 months now since she had a minor accident when she slipped and cracked her pelvic bone... for a person in her 20's the healing process of a broken bone takes much faster but my grandmum is 89 years old and it took 3 months in intensive care and a major operation to fix the broken pelvis... the doctor said what they usually do is to patch the bone with titanium alloy and that's what they did...

i didn't realize how much reality those TV series about doctors were happening inl life until that time... my family have been through really rough times but this one beats them all... becuase it's my grandmum that we are talking about...

i saw her lying on her side...

dame: lola... i'm home...

gran: alex ¿está eso usted?

dame: si

gran: ¿puede usted conseguirme el agua?

dame: si

i saw her reaching for something and so i took her hand... it was still the soft hands that i could remember who pats me on the back when i was a little boy... they were still the hands that held my nape so i could go to a sound sleep... her voice still is the sound that comforts me in my childhood... it seems that she's still my beautiful old grandmum but seems to be so different now...

dame: abuela. aquí está el agua.

gran: garcias.

i went to the kitchen and prepared a food for the both of us and as i ate i also fed her slowly while i told her everything that happened to my life that she missed... i wanted it to feel like what it felt before... a time not that far back... when all of us would sit around the table and eat and talk about everything that happen in our lives... it was like i'm reading to her my blog everyday... and she remembers everything i tell her... from the stories about school to the petty fights i had with crazy classmates... her bed was totally different... she might not remember anything i said... but it felt exactly the same...

dame: lola. le daré un baño.

she smiled. i prepared a basin of hot water with alcohol and a sponge. i tried to remember how she did it when i was young. while i kept on running around the bathroom butt naked while she tried to catch me and keep me still. i tried to remember how she would softly rub my back and sud my hair with shampoo. i remembered how she did it and now it's time for me to give back the favor... not because she did a great job before... not because she can't do it herself... but because for the very same reason she gave me a bath everyday when i was little... she loved me and i love her...

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