Claudia
During the fall and into a deep and difficult winter, I spent most of my time surrounded by the youthfully challenged. By that I mean, the elderly. Old people.
I worked at a nursing home.
Fixing soap dispensers. Emptying garbage cans. Cleaning, mostly. I would spend my mornings pushing a squeaky, well-worn cleaning cart around the U shaped floors, tidying up resident's rooms. The toilets were usually pretty well-worn by the time that I got to them too. I wasn't exactly passionate about the actual job description. But I was interested in the people. Many of them clung loosely to the days as they slipped through their fingers, drifting in and out and in and out of consciousness. I wished that I could give them more than cold fluorescent light and pale yellow paint to pass the time. It made me sad to know that this was the end. Living just to say that you're alive- if you can even speak at all- never really seemed like much of a life to me. But there were some who were lively and active. Sweet, and tired. I felt tired too, that winter.
Lydia was an Italian woman who probably recited more prayers in an afternoon than most people do in a lifetime. She was short, with curly, dirty blonde hair. In her wheelchair, she would push herself along with her slender, bony fingers. Bright, cherry red nails adorned her fingertips, which were always outstretched, beckoning me closer so that she could ask if I had a wife. Or at least a girlfriend. And she would sing,
"When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, that's-!"
"Amore!", I would sing back before Lydia would take my hands and smooch the backs of them before we carried on, until next time.
There was Ernie, too. A 90-something year old man with kind eyes, and an English lilt in his voice. Sometimes I would find him cutting strawberries in his bathroom, as Ernie refused to eat whatever they were serving in the dining room. In his own words, it was usually shit. I never disagreed. Ernie was more independent than most. Walking into his room, you'd see a 50-inch flatscreen mounted to the wall in front of his bed. He did that. A mini fridge, always stocked. He bought the groceries. A record player hooked up to a surround sound system. He loved records, and would always put one on for you if you were willing to stay and chat. He would tell me about his time in the army, and his wife, who had passed. He always grew softer when he talked about her.
And then there was Claudia. A Russian woman who wore a frown beneath both eyes, glassed over with disinterest unless you could win her over. Unless she decided that you were worth her time. So I did. Not exactly by choice. I remember the very first day that I met her, I introduced myself, and she immediately declared that I was going to be her grandson. Turns out, we have the same name, her grandson and I. And the same blonde hair. And the same blue eyes. Except, other Jeremy managed a Wal-Mart, and I was a college dropout. For months, Claudia and I formed a bit of a rapport. I would come to see her every day around lunch time, when I came around to collect the empty cardboard boxes from the nurses. She would say,
"Jeremy, where's your shapka? Where's your glasses? No money? No honey? No nothing? Ooo hoo hoo, poor boy!"
I would laugh, and tell her that I couldn't afford my own shapka yet, but I did like hers. Claudia was rarely seen without her signature blue bucket hat. She also didn't go a day without talking about a nurse's fat zhopa or kiska, and would always let me know that Putin and Stalin had killed her entire family, and mine too. For a while, I was supposed to marry her 5-year-old granddaughter. She would tell me that her entire family was waiting in her room for us. I guess even Putin didn't want to ruin a good wedding.
"Enough clothes, enough money, enough honey, enough food, enough beds for EVERYONE."
The plans must have fallen through at some point, though, as I never did get married to- or even meet- her granddaughter. It's pretty hard to get family together. I get it.
This went on all year. Then I quit. But I would visit, when life wasn't busy.
On one cool, spring day, the kind that was just warm enough to finally shed my thick winter jacket, I came to see Claudia. I wanted to be sharp today. I played the conversation over in my head. I wanted to make her laugh. I took the elevator up to the 4th floor, confident in my arsenal of jokes, and made my way down the hall toward the dining room. I saw Claudia wheeling herself slowly toward her seat. She was quiet. I called her name as I came closer, but I might as well have been a ghost. She barely lifted her chin. I came closer as she slowed to a stop, and kneeled down low beside her wheelchair. She looked at me, and her gaze was heavy.
"I'm going to die, Jeremy."
"What? Don't say that, Claudia. What do you mean?"
A nurse that I knew, Anna, overheard us and told me that Claudia had been a little bit sick lately.
"It's the Spring, Claudia. It's probably just allergies. Maybe a cold."
"It's going to kill me."
"It's not, Claudia. You're going to live forever. You're the smartest, richest woman in the world."
That's what she always said.
"Take me to my room."
"Okay."
So we went.
"Put me in bed. I want to sleep."
She seemed tired. I got Anna.
"Jeremy will come to visit tomorrow, Claudia. You can rest now. Okay?"
"Okay."
And she went to sleep.
