Here’s a short update I wrote last week after spending the morning at a nursing home.

Georgiana, an elderly lady with Alzheimer’s or some sort of dementia told me “yo mama” jokes for an hour yesterday afternoon, only they weren’t jokes, she was serious.
  Humorous at first, I had to bite my tongue to keep from laughing and then I had to bite it to keep from crying.
  I realized, this isn’t funny, it’s sad, Georgiana at one point was probably a lady full of sprite.
  Now her mind had fled, I often found our conversation going in circles.
  She was purposeless, an existence, and it frustrated me – is this the culmination of life?
  But somehow in my sitting with her I felt like it gave her some meaning, some purpose.
  Eventually our conversation lagged and Georgiana’s eyes began to droop – I looked over at a tiny lady in a wheelchair sitting by the window, dabbing her chin with a tissue.
  I smiled at her and she smiled back and waved.

At that invitation I found new sitting companions for Georgiana and went over and sat down by my new friend.
  Her name is Bernise and we began talking about life.
  She has lived in New Orleans all her life and at this particular nursing home for four years – she hates it, she says they never get to go outside.
  After asking my name she asked me to write it down and had me write down my address as well.
  She asked if she could write me, I said I would love to get a letter from her.
  Then she asked me to get her a drink for her from the vending machine, handing me her little wallet and demanded I get something for myself as well.
  I sat with Bernise for about an hour – sitting and talking and drinking our sodas.
  I asked her if she knew Jesus and she said, Oh yes, I love him.
  So then we talked about the party we would have when we were both in heaven.
 

When I left shortly after that, I had already given away bits of my heart to both Bernise and Georgiana.
  It was good to be touched by them and hopefully touch them as well – it’s what life is all about, touching others, impacting lives for the kingdom.