Stevie

She is old but not as old as she looks. Or acts. There are signs of obvious physical problems. There is a two inch 'indentation' on her skull, under the hairline and near the temple. She has trouble walking and she is bent in several directions. But it is her mental state that is most noticeable. It is noticeable from down the hall, across the room or at the dining table. She has no self-confidence. She constantly apologizes for her behavior when it is certainly no worse and maybe even better than the average. She almost uses an apology as a way of greeting or conversationally like the weather. Nearly always, the first thing out of her mouth is an apology.

The other night, I was writing on the computer and the phone range. It was Stevie. She wanted to know if I was busy. I am the driver here and my hours do not normally extend into the evening. I assured her that I was doing nothing of importance. I had to drag it out of her: her television wasn't working. Could I come up and help her? I live below her, so her request was not much.

I looked at the television. I followed the cable to the outlet and that looked fine. The indicator light on the plug was on. Should be good. So I hit the 'power' button. The TV came to life. Problem solved. Stevie went into full apology storm. "Not a problem; glad to help." She would have none of it. According to her, the real problem was medical: "Normally, I am not like this."

I finally clawed the door open. Went downstairs and was back on the computer when the phone rang again. Stevie's TV was out.

"It's getting late. Have some tea and go to sleep and if the TV isn't working tomorrow, call me and I'll come up and fix it." This seemed like a good idea to Stevie and she adreed that was the very thing to do.

The next day, she approached squaking out apologies. Apparently, giving the TV a rest was exactly the thing and it now worked. A dozen layers of apoogies were laid about and I finally got away by assuring her that my mother had the same problems with her TV. Tiny in the measure of lies, but it worked and Stevie brightened considerably until the weight of her failure simply over-took her and she sat on a bench--retirement centers have lots of benches sprinkled in the lobby, the halls and generally anywhere where old people might have a cause to need a seat for a moment or longer--weary to the end-of-time and puzzled as to why she had such a hard time coping.

I told her what I tell nearly everyone here: "Stop being so hard on yourself. Relax. No one is expecting much and you've earned a rest. Relax."

I must give this speech a dozen times a day.