The Centurian

Tonight I went to dinner and sat with a nice group. On the way to the table, I spotted Henrietta. She is over a hundred years old and she dines in a wheelchair. But she doesn't look, act or talk like a hundred year old. She is clear as a bell, talks in a clear voice and is a lot of fun. Tonight, several of her tablemates were missing. She was alone. I asked her if she was alone and she offered that she didn't know if any of her people would show up or not. I said that I had already promised to have dinner at another table but I would come over and eat dessert with her.

I grabbed up my chocolate cake and headed over to Henrietta. One tablemate had shown up but she had left early and so she was sitting alone. I sat and we talked.

We had something in common: we both had had pneumonia as children. She had it when she was nine. She remembers that her mother and the doctor went into the other room to talk. They were whispering so that she couldn't hear but she heard the doctor say "If she wakes up, I think she'll pull through".

When I was a new born, at two months, I had pneumonia. The doctors gave me pennecilan and put me in an incubator. They told my father not to expect me to be alive in the morning.

After we were through eating but before we were through talking, Henrietta's caretaker came to wheel her back to her room. I offered to do it.

When we were through, I got behind the wheelchair and released the brakes. "Do you know how to work one of these?" Henrietta asked. "Hah! I wheeled more chairs than you have sat in when I was a cab driver. I'll show you how we handled these things!"

And away we went, briskly wheeling around tables, between the regular chairs, nearly running people over. Henrietta was loving it. So was everyone still left in the dining room.

I took her up to her apartment and got her in. She transferred to a wheeled walker. I left to walk the dog.

All in all, fun for everyone.