“And the most important meeting of her life was silently but rapidly approaching.”
As I read this words on my kindle, my mind goes back to January 5th, 2020. I have moved from my parent’s house to grandma, or should I use the word “ran away” with the wish of finding my own place and stay sane till I find it. Grandma’s house was a refuge, a haven, through all life’s troubles.
As a kid of divorced parents, I don’t have a place that I can genuinely call home. The home I knew never felt truly home either. It was my grandma’s little home, that was familiar, warm and accepting. Always felt like peaceful because I grew up there. My hard worker mum, went back to her work routine right after I was 3 months old, so grandma was the main caretaker, no wonder her home felt like my own home.
There we were reunited again, me 37, she 85. She is lying in her bed, in her own piss, with a white chalky face, she calls me to her room saying we need to talk.
I decided to move to her house on the new year of 2020, we were both over the moon with this decision and she was already wishing that I wouldn’t find my own place and stay with her forever. In the midst of this grand happiness, on the second day I moved, she tripped to the rug in her living room and fell so bad on her hip and broke it. Me in full panic, trying to wrap my head around with what was happening, couldn’t call an ambulance first, but called my mum to ask what to do. As my grandma’s fierce resisting not to call an ambulance, me and the doorman carried her to bed to rest. I couldn’t understand how hard her fall was till 5 am. She woke me up, in pain but with a very cold state, she summoned me to her room, to give the talk. The “I am dying, I love you, I hid my money there take it for whatever needs to be done, goodbye” talk. I sat down on the chair by her bed. Looking at her with a blank face and mind, I remembered what we learned in dealing with acute trauma class.
Her face was chalk white, her eyes were smaller than they usually were, her lips were dry, and seemed lifeless. I couldn’t grasp if it was really happening, she was dying, or if she was going through something. I got up, went to her bedside and said,
Okay, I hear you, I will take care of the money part, don’t worry, but tell me, what is really going on? Where do you feel the most pain?
and she said my whole body, mostly below down my belly. There I lifted the duvet and saw she was lying in her own big pile of piss in shame. After her fell, when she needed to pee, she couldn’t get out of the bed to go to the toilet and she peed in her pjs. It was a deep shame for a woman like her.
Before cleaning everything, I held her hand and looked deep into her eyes and said
Grandma, I fell in love recently, I am going to get marry and have kids, you cannot go anywhere without witnessing this, I want you right by my side. With these words hope struct her and I saw life instantly came back to her whole body and she asked
Does he respect you well, is he a good person? and I said
Yes.
Even though, there was no one in my life, not even a platonic crush.
Call the ambulance, she said.
Hope is what keep us alive, it is what bond us with life and our loved ones. Hope is the invisible network between hearts. 7 months later, I fell head over heels in love with a stranger who crossed my path while I was trying to decide whether I should move down to Bodrum and settle here.
He went back onto his already planned itinerary when he sensed that an emotional connection was happening mainly from my side. I have been writing letters, stories, to myself to comfort my grieving heart.
In the midst of all these moments of 2020, I moved down to Bodrumfor a fresh start. Found myself a home.
Now nesting and nurturing, I am getting ready for what is yet to come.
