My Grandmother failed to create words beyond ‘Ouch’ and ‘Baby’ for six months. She was nearing the end of Alzheimer’s. We walked into the green-cast room, a latent smell of urine despite her exceptional care, the fragile remnant of a woman wrapped in papery skin beneath thick flannel, that perpetual glaze over her wide eyes. The caregiver said, “El, look, you have visitors. Do you know who this is?” Her pupils flashed in my direction and then she said, clear as day in her classical voice: “Steven is his father. Hello, my love.” She winked, she smiled, and a second later she slipped back into the murky, smothering clay of her mind.
It was the most beautiful thing I ever saw.
