The Nursing Home

 

Thinking back to 1994 and Loveland, Colorado.

I was working at Sierra Vista Nursing Home as

a van driver. It was my main job to take residents

to doctor’s appointments and on the occasional

day trip to scenic places in the area. It was an

interim job for me, somewhere between, “I know

where I’ve been, but haven’t a clue as to where

I’m going.”

At 47-years old you’d think a guy would be settled

into a job, a career or retired early. Not me in my

wandering, artsy, errant and nomadic way. I took

my artist’s life with me wherever I would go. Since

divorcing from my first wife some ten years earlier,

I have had myriad jobs and lived in a dozen places

in four different cities from Missouri to New Mexico

to Colorado.

A job for me was to pay the rent, put food on the

table and be able to have some energy left for my

art, writing and photography. Driving old folks

around town would be a new inspirational experi-

ence for me. And it was that indeed. One thing of

real value I discovered in my 6-month tenure on

the job was that at any age, whether old or disabled

needing care, a nursing home was no place to be.

The loneliness and despair, the hopelessness was

intolerable to bare. It certainly was not the optimal

and preferable way to pass the last of your days.

I am now retired at 73 and have severe arthritic dis-

abilities. I live alone in a studio apartment in Kansas

City with my small dog. I’m doing my best to manage

the day-to-day on my own. My kids come once every

week or so to do my shopping and cleaning. I have

no transportation and go nowhere.

The thought of a nursing home would be akin to a

death warrant for me. I have photographs I had taken

of several residence I attended to in Loveland back in

1994. The empty, glazed-over eyes, the atrophied limbs

and pallid, paper-thin skin, the failing memories and mind.

Oh, the hopelessness and loss of purpose and worth. All

have passed away now I am sure. But I have these deep

and saddening images of them in their last lonely days

lingering alone the wilderness of waste.

Take it from me, I am now old and I know, a nursing home

is certainly no way to go.

                                 -30-

Chris Hanch 9-1-2020