Granny Lowe and Me - a photo on Flickriver

Granny Lowe and Me

            
What a sweet, sweet lady Granny Lowe is. The name on her birth certificate is Mary but she has always been known as May. On this beautiful blue sky day in May it was May’s 91st birthday. She cannot believe she is this age she told me. She doesn’t quite know how it happened.
 
While we were at dinner she said “I wonder what my mother would think about me wearing a T-Shirt. I don’t think she ever owned a T-Shirt. She was a dressmaker you know “. May’s mother was one of 14 children, which is a number of children I simply could not comprehend having or being responsible for. 

May herself had only one child. We share the grief of his death deeply. She never fails to remind me how well she thinks I treated her son. She is such a stoic woman, yet caring and never demanding of anything. It is who she is and was when I met her 25+ years ago. I have never seen her cry, even on that painful day when I arrived at her home with the kids to tell her that he was dead. Despite how stoic she is, I hear in her voice her grief and it still amazes me that she survived that first winter and those that have followed.
 
Tonight she was clearly delighted that I had come to see her. She tore open the box of Turtles with a childish sparkle in her eye. She let me buy her dinner at Swiss Chalet despite saying that it was ridiculously expensive at $26, despite there being enough left over for at least tomorrow’s dinner rather than her standard fare of a ham or bologna sandwich or bowl of soup . She looked a lot overwhelmed when the restaurant staff loudly sang Happy Birthday to her. 

She humoured me graciously when I asked her if I could take a portrait of us together. I will always be grateful for the gift of unconditional motherly love, encouragement and support she has granted me, something I have never received from my own mother. It is a huge gift she has given.
 
I feel some conflict each time that I see her this last year or so. I know her body and mind are failing. She seems diminished in size, a little deafer, a little more disheveled and a little less clear-minded. Again tonight I suggested we could get somebody to come in and clean for her, but she refused. She doesn’t want strangers knowing she lives alone. 

When I ask her if she has been to the doctor lately she says no. There is nothing wrong with her. She is just old.
 
I know she will die in that house alone, but who am I to deny her the dignity and life that she desires. She spends her days and evenings puttering in the house alone, doing crossword puzzles, talking to herself (and replying) and checking the house temperature on the thermostat every half hour. She has her routine. It is the way she wants to finish out her life. 

I have decided that I will not deny her. Perhaps it is not the decision you would make as her Power of Attorney, but I will accept the burden of responsibility for it and hope that it is the right choice for the foreseeable future. 

©2012 Karen Brodie | All Rights Reserved

Taken on: May 11, 2012

Tags:

people

granny

May

old

self portrait

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D3S

Ontario

Canada

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Sets appears in: • Random 2011-2015

Groups appears in: • All People • PHOTOGRAPHERS OF CANADA more » • Guelph Photography Club • Canadian Female Photographers Group • Guelph Photographers Guild « less

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