Visiting the Young at Heart

In college I was a member of APO, a coed service fraternity.  Semester requirements were $50 in dues and 20 hours of community service.  An elementary education major, I tended toward the service projects that involved kids: after-school tutoring, volunteering at the annual Halloween party held by the St. Louis Science Center, serving at shelters where children were also welcome.  Once, a friend talked me into serving with her at a nursing home.  I didn’t really care for it, although I can’t tell you exactly why.  I’d sung Christmas carols at nursing and retirement homes before, but at this non-Christmas event I remember not wanting to be there.  It just wasn’t for me.

However, this past year at Orange some of my most delightful visits have been with the older set.  I love hearing their stories as they reminisce about how they met their spouses or the activities they used to be involved in at the church.  At least the ones I’ve talked with aren’t sad that things aren’t how they used to be and no one’s mentioned “the good old days.”  They just share about days past and what the landscape used to look like and the major events that shaped their generation.  Rather than blame the world’s problems on the previous generation, I appreciate being reminded of why they made the choices they did.  I enjoy the intergenerational conversation.

Beyond being 15 years older and wiser and no longer quite so kid-oriented, I have a theory as to why I now enjoy these visits when I didn’t before.  I think it’s because these folks remind me of my grandparents, two of whom have passed on and the remaining two who live in Georgia and Pennsylvania.  My grandparents are forever in my memory as being in their 60s.  You know how kids don’t get to grow up in the minds of their elders?  Well, grandparents don’t get to become elderly and infirmed.  When I think of my grandparents, even the two still alive, I think of them as active and able to keep up with kids.  You know, how they were when I was a kid and spent weeks at a time with them in the summer. 

Maybe I took my grandparents for granted when I was in college, I don’t know.  But I love visiting with the folks in their 60s and older and I think it’s because they remind me of my grandparents.  I even give many of them a kiss on the cheek, just like I did with my grandmas and I do with my grandpas.