Tuesdays at the Nursing Home- Family Tradition

His forearms are tanned, the kind of tan that's lifetime-lasting, the kind that comes of hard work done outside in all seasons. The tattoos are World War II vintage, faded navy blue and bleeding into the fine lines of his skin. He's 85, toothless and sitting ramrod straight in his high-backed wheelchair. He is my "just-one-more-please-if-you-could" before the holiday weekend sucks me out the door of the senior center. He's the new guy.

The social worker told me "He and his wife got into it and she says she's leaving him. She called up here cussing and yelling." Linda rolls her eyes. "Apparently it's not all her. We've had two aides quit cause he cussed them. He's given almost everybody a hard time. I haven't been on the receiving end yet but I'm sure it's coming." She gives me a "poor thing" smile and says. "He was really close to his daughter and she died of cancer a few months ago. She was his caregiver most of the time and he's having trouble adjusting I think."

I wheel him into a nearby office, slide my bag behind my chair and tell him, "No, really, I'm in no hurry. I wasn't going anywhere," because already his eyes are red-rimmed and he's twisting his hands nervously and...well, how could you leave him?

"They want to put me in a rest home," he says. "Me and my wife been together 86 years. We don't want to be separated."

I don't correct how many years they've been together because I'm sure it does feel like his entire life plus one.

"We fight and argue one day, make up the next. But they don't understand that here. My wife called 'em up and talked out of her head. She was just upset. We was fine the next day. It's always been like that.  She's tired. I bet she ain't slept a wink since my daughter died. She don't even try and sleep in the bed no more. She can't. She's on the couch in my son's room."

His son, it turns out is quadraplegic and living at home with John and his wife. "He was the kinda boy, if he was a driving down the road and seen an old person mowing, he'd stop his truck and go mow their lawn." John gives a short, disgusted snort. "I was mowing out near the road and the dang mower flipped over on top of me, still running, and people just rode on by. That's how folks is these days."

His eyes well up with tears as he tells me his son had a series of strokes that left him on life support. "When the doctors took him off of that tube, he just kept right on a breathin' and then he woke up. They wanted to put him in a nursing home but my wife said, "No you don't. Not my boy." And we brought him home. He's been there ever since. Thirty-seven years. That's why my wife sleeps on the couch. If he coughs he's gotta be suctioned right then or he'll die. She's the only one can do it now. When my daughter was living, she was helping but then she got sick."

He tells me about the pain she was in, the way she suffered but tried to keep going. "The doctors up at the hospital said the day she died they was a in there with her and the nurses and she was just a laughing and a cuttin' up with 'em and said they left for just a minute or two, walked back in and she was dead."

Tears are rolling down his cheeks. "Now it's just the three of us.  My wife gets short with me. Who could blame her? She's just tired." He leans toward me, his voice husky with tears and urgency. "Ma'am, please don't let them take me away. I can take care of myself. They send a boy to help me three mornings a week and I can take my own medicine. I told him, just roll me out the front door and I'll wait til the bus comes to get me. It won't be no more than a half hour. I can do that."

It takes me awhile but eventually I have all the pieces to realize there is an aide coming to bathe his son and help with his care three mornings a week, the same mornings John's new aide comes to get him ready to come to the senior center.  Their house is so small, John can't leave without going through the room where his son is. He doesn't want to compromise the small bit of privacy his son has left by rolling through the room with an aide in tow, so John wants his aide to roll him outside early and let him wait for the bus that comes to pick him up.

I imagine a house so small the only hallway is "four by five feet."

"He's a good boy," John says. "He lays in his bed and sings along with the radio. He knows all the old country songs. He's got a pretty voice. I mean, you can't understand the words but I know what he's sayin'." He is pleading with me to understand. "I can't leave my wife. We've never been apart except a few times when she left cause I was drinkin' and a runnin' around like men do before they settle down. But we love each other. She can't take care of that boy all by herself. If they'd a let me in that room over yonder," he says nodding toward the physical therapy suite, "I could get on that bicycle they have where they can strap your legs in so they stay put and I told that doctor woman I know I could get stronger. Maybe I could even walk one day. And my arm will get stronger, so see, I can take care of myself."

I tell him not to worry, that I understand his wife doesn't really want him gone and that I will talk to "them." He apologizes for being hard to understand but says "They're getting me some new teeth and the dentist said I'll be able to talk real good then. He says I'll look like normal."

I think about the tiny house and the woman struggling to keep from losing another child and the man fighting to keep his world from blowing apart and I tell him I understand every word he's said.