by Tracie Adams
I hadn’t noticed that I was holding my breath in anxious anticipation of what awaited me in room 110 until I finally took a deep breath, collecting my thoughts along with the two heavy bags I was juggling as I entered the lobby of the nursing home. The receptionist stopped eating her turkey sub long enough to check my hospice badge and direct me down an expansive hallway where I passed half a dozen dementia patients parked in wheelchairs on my way to the third door on the left. Balancing the Yeti tumbler filled with coffee in my left hand, I paused before entering the room, shifting my bags from one shoulder to the other. I had no idea what awaited me on the other side of that door.
The first thing that hit me was the smell, an acrid combination of urine, feces, institutional food, and cleaning solutions. My sneakers made a squeaking noise on the linoleum floor as I walked slowly across the dimly lit room to my patient’s bed. As a hospice volunteer in situations like these, it wasn’t unusual to know very little about the person whose death was imminent in a setting where no friends or family were there to give support. I was there to make sure that this person, Robert, who I guessed to be a 60ish year old African American man, did not die in that room alone.
After settling my things in the chair where I would make camp, I timidly approached him, speaking softly to introduce myself and let him know I would be spending the day and evening with him. Even in this state of unconsciousness, there was a kindness evident about him, a welcoming tenderness that immediately put me at ease and drew me to him. As I surveyed his large frame, lying rigid under the ivory sheet, my eyes were drawn to the one decorative item hanging on the otherwise barren walls. It was a bulletin board decorated with construction paper cutouts themed for the month of May, a flyer in red, white and blue announcing a Memorial Day event held there for family and friends. Beside the flyer was a certificate, printed by the nursing home staff, which read: “Honoring our veterans, thank you for your service.” On the certificate was handwritten Robert’s full name and the branch of the military in which he had served— the U.S. Army. Tracing his name with my index finger, I felt a deep pang of sadness for the loneliness I was now sharing with this soldier who was dying here in this room all alone.
My thoughts were interrupted by the creaking door as it swung open to reveal a fellow worker from hospice, a social worker who had come to deal with a fragile matter concerning my patient. She only had time for a brief introduction before we were interrupted by the whirlwind appearance of a disheveled, disoriented woman who entered the room immediately engaging the social worker in argumentative banter about filing death certificates and claiming benefits, and then refusing to cooperate as her voice rose to a fever pitch before she stormed out.
When I learned that the volatile woman had been Robert’s aunt, his only known relative, I couldn’t form any words in response. She hadn’t even looked at him. Clearly, she was mentally unstable and appeared to be intoxicated. When the social worker left, I was glad for the privacy. I reached for Robert’s hand, and I prayed a prayer of peace over him. All day I continued to pray for him and I read to him from the Psalms beautiful calming words of truth
He never moved once. And he never opened his eyes. He never looked at me, but I could not look away from him, not even for a moment. Though I never saw his eyes, I tried so hard to see through them. I wanted to understand him, to know the snapshots of days gone by that surely must have been rolling like a silent film behind those closed lids as his final hours here on earth ebbed away.
Images of younger you chasing a dog, running through a sprinkler and stopping to drink from the hose, throwing a ball with that neighborhood kid who turned out to be a bad influence in high school. You should have listened to your mama because she always told you he was trouble. Your mama—that faded black and white of the two of you standing proudly at attention, you in uniform, beside that old blue pickup truck you bought for $500 and took Cherise to the prom in. Mama was smiling in that photo. You were heading off to boot camp and she was proud. It was a rare thing to see mama smile. It made part of you glad, but your soul was weary deep down because you knew you were running away with your secrets from this life, and that’s why you weren’t smiling in that photo.
The air conditioning was cold on my legs, so I reached into my bag for the blanket I always brought with me, wrapping myself in its comfort while I thought long and hard about why I needed to invent a life for him, to construct something that resembled real human dignity. Was it my compassion that compelled me? Or was it seeing him lying there unknown and unloved that struck such a deep fear in my own soul that I might be walking amongst the living but be doomed to the same fate of never being truly seen, fully known, or completely loved by anyone?
I held tight to his hand, which was growing increasingly colder, reminding me that our time was short. Moving my chair as close as I could get to the bed, I read some scripture to reassure him and me both of God’s deep everlasting love and his great mercy in sending his Son to die as a sacrifice for our sins. He stopped breathing. I held my breath. I thought about his mama and how she wouldn’t want him to be alone. I started to check his wrist for a pulse, but then he started breathing again, and so did I.
For hours this pattern repeated. When he spiked a fever, I placed a cold washcloth across his hot forehead. That’s when I heard the familiar sound of the death rattle vibrating up from his chest into his throat as he labored for breath. Swabbing his cracked lips with a wet sponge, I looked hard into his face speaking softly words that I needed to believe he heard and understood in those last minutes of his life:
“Robert, it’s time to go home now. It’s ok, you’re not alone. When you’re ready, you can go with God. Your work here is all done. You have done well. I want to thank you for your service to our country. You made your mama proud. You made me proud. It has been an honor and privilege to know you and love you like this.”
Within the hour, the sun was setting and the filtered light was making a striped pattern on the wall as it came through the blinds. I sat thinking how there would be no flag draped casket, no trumpets or uniformed officers lined up, no eulogies spoken in honor of a life well lived and sacrifices made. My thoughts mingled together with the sounds of evening shift nurses dispensing medications to patients as they wandered and roamed, some loudly protesting about the show on the tv and taking turns babbling nonsense and hushing one another. A tray of pureed food crashed loudly to the floor followed by a string of curse words and wailing.
I had grown accustomed to the smells and jarring sounds of nursing home life and was just settling in for the evening, wrapped in the warmth of my blanket, when suddenly the sound of the clock ticking was so loud that I realized the room had become dead silent. Unwrapping myself from the cocoon of my warm blanket, I stood to glance at the clock and then back at his chest. It was not rising. At 8:42 the unknown soldier marched home.
Tracie Adams
Writer
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