The Year of Yes

I’m not going to call the past 24 hours a clusterfuck.

That would be too easy. Nor will I run down a list of everything that is going/has gone wrong. Instead I’ll focus on a single moment from today. A moment that just contained everything beautiful, sad and absurd.

It was my grandmother’s lipstick. A pearly pink shade that matched her carefully-chosen outfit. It was incongruous with the scene that was playing out before me: her, sitting on a hospital gurney in the Norwood Hospital Emergency Room, quietly clutching her injured arm.

She had a fall earlier this morning. Not her first, but certainly not the worst. Perhaps because of her confusion or, as she claims, the lack of reading glasses needed to make out the names on her speed dial, I got the call to come.

That pink lipstick was a reminder that she didn’t see herself as a helpless old woman, and really didn’t want the paramedics, nurses, orderlies, and doctors to see her that way, either. She made a conscious choice, while waiting for the medical transport to arrive, to look her best. To be alert and capable.

I don’t want to make this a paean to my grandmother’s spirit, which is large and gentle and beautiful. I just wanted to share this moment. Me, the fretting granddaughter, but trying not to show it. Gram, seeming so small and fragile on that gurney, but projecting elegance, strength and humor. It shattered my heart. But it made me smile. Because here was a woman who was prepared and positive. All it took was a little lipstick.