TAKE IT FROM THE TOP

1. Pay attention to who or what is right in front of you (unless what is right in front of you is a laptop or a mobile device).

Mr. Top will take more time studying a portion of waffle, then lifting it to his mouth (with great difficulty), then chewing and swallowing it than most of us spend looking into the eyes of and listening to those we live with. This is not because he has a waffle fetish, or a feeble mind. It is because his life has been reduced by age and physical challenges to a very few and small things. I have known people, as you probably have also, who under similar circumstances decided that life was no longer worth living, and let go. Not this fellow. I think Mr. Top probably always enjoyed studying the last bit of waffle on his plate, yet he once had other concerns as well: a wife, a daughter, and, for the briefest of moments, a granddaughter (both mother and child died in childbirth when he was already old--he became a father later in life); he also belonged to clubs, had hobbies, traveled, and associated with many loving friends. He could not have known that a bit of waffle would one day be a major companion; but cultivating the ability to notice, study and enjoy the simplest things has proven to be both enriching and lifesaving. He even studies his pills, one by one. Eight every morning.

Life, for him has been reduced to these ostensibly unimportant things; yet, for him, these few things are a window into the whole of life, the rest of the universe. They are the stuff of his life, and because he values his life, he values them.

To see a world in a grain of sand
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour.

         --from William Blake's poem "Auguries of Innocence"

Many of his younger caregivers are obsessed with their mobile devices. I am too. My business keeps me on the laptop for hours at a time. But what we see on these devices is far from what is in front of us.

2. Say my name.

Mr. White had to demand to be called Heisenberg, which, of course, was not his name (Breaking Bad reference, for non fans). If Mr. Top has met you once, you probably won't have to ask him to say your name. He both remembers it and will say it to you. I have been places with him where he has amazed me by calling someone, an assistant, an orderly, a waitress, by name and saying, "It's nice to see you." And, for him, it is indeed very nice to see them. For them, well, it is often apparent that by noticing who is right in front of him, he has helped to make someone's day. He has forgotten a good deal about his own life, but if you have told him something about yours, he remembers it. In detail.

And you will remember him, not because he demanded that you know his name, but because he remembered yours; not because be demanded respect, but because he gave it. And because Mr. Top is a hard name to forget.

3. "Oh, how nice. Thank you."

The health care workers who work with Mr. Top love him. This is partly because he is sincerely and constantly courteous. You can put the most commonplace lunch or dinner in front of him and he will often say those very words, and mean them. If you cut a large bit of waffle in half to make it easier for him to stab with his fork and put in his mouth, he will thank you. He will then study the two halves and consume them. Then he will study the crumbs, and consume them. He will thank you if you warm his coffee for the sixth or seventh time.

If, during the summer, you take him to the bathroom and he notices the air conditioning fan is running (you can hear it in the bathroom) he'll explode with anger. "Shut that damn thing off!" If you accidentally change the channel on the television, you may incur his wrath. I don't know why--a longstanding habit, I guess. When he explodes, the sparks dissipate instantly, and there is no shrapnel. It wasn't personal. When you turn off the fan he will thank you. When he is safely out of earshot, you will turn it back on (this is, after all, St. Louis); and if you forget to turn it off before he passes it again, he will explode again in precisely the same way.

4. Laugh, sing, and forget yourself.

Mr. Top is ready to laugh, and he is ready to tell you a joke for which the punch line, or the setup, is a distant memory which he can't quite access. But he'll laugh at it anyway, and you will, too. There was the one about Franklin D. Roosevelt and something about digging him up to run for president again. I got the idea, anyway. He can be witty, but he especially appreciates your witticisms. He'll make you feel both funny and clever, though he doesn't seem to care whether you think he is funny or clever.

If he thinks of a song, he'll sing it, anytime and anywhere--all the better if you know the song and sing along. His father was like that, and his brother, my father, was like that in spades. It made me cringe at times. I'd give anything for another opportunity to cringe at such a joyful thing. I wouldn't. I'd sing along. Years ago, my father sang unashamedly and at the top of his lungs "You are the sunshine of my life . . ." as my wife, my son, and I boarded a jet bound for Taiwan for an extended stay. If his brother and father had been there, it would have been a trio. I hope to be a member of a quartet in heaven.

5. Even a profoundly diminished, limited life is worth living.

Mr. Top has to be washed, put to bed, and gotten up in the morning, by others. He literally can't even wipe his own ass. His right arm is all but useless, and he was very right-handed. His legs left him long ago. He feeds himself, very, very slowly, with his left hand. A small, ordinary lunch often lasts for hours. He spends his days watching, sports and crime shows on television. I'd probably rather die than spend my days like that; but he'd rather live to enjoy whatever small pleasures are left to him, like a trip to the barbershop to see his old and long-time barber John, whose handlebar mustache Mr. Top loves and looks forward to seeing as much as he does John. John ribs him about being rich and kids him about being written into his will. Mr. Top laughs and says "No." in a charming way that makes you feel like he said "Sure." He enjoys, but does not expect, visits from extraordinary friends, like Harry and Nina, who come almost every Sunday to sit with him for a few hours, or watch a ballgame; or Bert who comes from across the street to eat ice cream and joke with him. Susie, who has worked the overnight shift for his health care company for about two years now, is his favorite "visitor." She is gracious, kind, and attentive. Around seventy herself, she moves slowly, and notices small things, like he does. She both looks and sounds like she could be Morgan Freeman's sister (not an insult. She is quite lovely). He always seems happier to see her than anyone else.

I wish I had more examples of Mr. Top's activities, but that about covers it. I believe the appropriate cliche is "The secret to happiness is not doing what you love, but loving what you do." He does very little, and the little he does is tediously commonplace and simple. But he is happy.

I've known him for a long time. Over the years I have seen him be argumentative, petty, greedy, and insensitive. These things have not defined him. They were, perhaps, among the first leaves to fall in the autumn of his years. What remains is patient, loving, kind, and gentle . . . good fruit.                       

Joy and woe are woven fine,
A clothing for the soul divine.
Under every grief and pine
Runs a joy with silken twine . . .

He who respects the infant's faith
Triumphs over hell and death.
The child's toys and the old man's reasons
Are the fruits of the two seasons.

I won't deny that Mr. Top was gifted with good thread, a nice disposition, and a certain innocence. We are not all thus gifted, and every disposition has its place and purpose. Nevertheless, no matter how we are threaded, it never hurts to try on another approach to life, or practice a new virtue. I am blessed to be attending this aging seminar. While he studies the waffle, I study him. It is sometimes said of someone displaying excellence that they are "putting on a clinic." Mr. Top is putting on the end-of-life clinic.