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Write An Older Person A Letter
We are being asked to stop visiting the elderly, and others, at care centers, but you can still help
Write a simple note and change a world
Once, I lived in a condo where the elderly man on the floor below me lost his wife to illness. I did not know this neighbor.
I recognized him from parking lot comings and goings.
There was a commotion, downstairs, I think, an ambulance and lots of activity when his wife died.
I was living alone at the time. This was long before I lost many a loved one of my own.
Yet, as I lay awake at night, I could not stop thinking about him. About his loneliness. His heartbreak.
I wrote him a hand written card of sympathy.
Days later, he showed up at my door to thank me in person. I leaned a ton of stuff about him. About his wife. About his life.
It turns out that he was very old, indeed. He had been at the shores of Normandy during World War Two. He had many hobbies, including furniture repair, traveling, and once upon a time, dancing. He had raised a daughter, and she lived far away.
His humanity unfolded before me. Once he began his story, he spoke as if we were old friends.