Of Blue Hairs and Honeysuckle

On any family visit, my responsibilities are twofold. First and foremost, I am the Prodigal Son returning from "The North," speaking with an accent and expressing opinions not based upon the bible. Secondly, I am conductor of The Blue Hair Express. My mother is 90 and my Aunt Kitty is 97. Though orphaned since the influenza epidemic and inseparable for 90 years, they have yet to figure out a way to get along for more than 5 minutes at a time. Conversing with both in the car revealed their limited geriatric world couched in terms of the familiar. On my last visit, wanting to move at a pace that outstripped their limited mobility mph, I suggested we take a drive through the neighborhood. Passing a house where I used to visit and play with a friend, I said, "There's the old Killian house."

My mother said, "She died last year." (Meaning my friend's mother.)
Aunt Kitty said, "Who died?"
Mother said, "Jean Killian."
"She died last week?"
"No, Kitty, she died last year."
"I didn't know that."
"Well, Kitty, you went to the funeral."
After a pause, my aunt said "I didn't go to any funeral last week."

And so the weekend went, whether traveling in The Blue Hair Express or sitting in a living room the world was small and getting smaller. Defined by diminished physical capacity, intrusions by others to accomplish daily tasks, the loss of all friends, it was confining and restrictive for me. The days were humid, the pace glacial and the nights welcome. In the evening, when the scent of honeysuckle blew through the open windows on night breezes, the pace was more in sync with the world of the Blue Hairs. People sat, relaxed in the heat, and told stories with that distinctive southern rise and fall in cadence. There is a natural harmony with the night as old age progresses. Edging closer to bedtime, slowing down evermore as that hour approaches. Their daylight is the well remembered past, when children played and bodies were strong.

My niece was also there with her newborn daughter. Cradling it, hovering like the first time mother she is. It is incomprehensible to me that a child would be born in this world. The future of that generation is bleak beyond words. When Marx said capitalism would destroy itself, he couldn't have imagined it would destroy the entire planet. His dream was too big to encompass the punitive and cowardly spectre of total destruction. The property we now fight for is oil, the bodies of women, the ideas of long dead gods. That generation will fight over water, air, and who knows what bodies, living or dead. It seems to me the flow of things is day into night with those approaching their final hours finding refuge and pleasure in the memories of their days. That cannot be the future.