Christmas Eve in a Nursing Home

Frank sat in his wheelchair in the nursing home lobby. He only wished he could get up and walk over to that Christmas tree and straighten up the angel on top. “Poor thing, looks like she has a starboard list instead of being a heavenly creature,” he uttered, unsure if he had spoken or just thought it.
If he could, he’d walk right over to that lower limb and string those lights a little better, but that couldn’t happen, no more. His knees were bad, and after the stroke, he couldn’t move his right arm any longer. He couldn’t live in his home any longer. It was where he and May passed nearly six decades of the happiest years of his life.
May, his bride of 58 years had passed away last August. Since she left him alone down here, there was no one to take care of him or that big old house where they raised their family, three sons and a daughter. You know how it goes; old parents are too much for growing families anymore.
This would be Frank’s first Christmas in 84 years not being in a home where he was surrounded by loved one and his beloved Emerson radio with a wooden cabinet that brought him the news of the world for so long he forgot when But then, that’s what happens when time creeps away. Its tubes finally quit, and he didn’t know where to get them or it repaired, so he sold it along with the rest of the house in one of those “estate sales.” It was heartbreaking, but Frank knew his time alone was over. The time had come to admit he could no longer do for himself, and go where old folks go when the family was spread all over creation.
Frank felt alone, a bit melancholy, yet this was the most cheerful, quiet place to sit and watch the colorful lights on the Christmas tree flash on and off. They brought back such happy memories.
“Mr. Campbell, do you want some apple juice or some peanuts?” asked Millie, one of the more cheerful nurse aides in this place. “No, but I’ll take an egg nog, if you can get one,” he replied in a gruff voice.
“I’ll see what I can do,” replied Millie. Frank knew full well he wouldn’t get an egg nog, or even a piece of fruit cake, like May used to bake, those were forbidden to people in his delicate medical condition. Everything had to be healthy, or it wouldn’t enter a senior’s body, at least that’s what the head dietician told him.
“Christmas Eve, and all they want to give an old sailor is apple juice and peanuts,” thought Frank. What’s the world coming to? he wondered.
Then, as in the twinkling of an eye, Frank wasn’t in that sterile nursing home lobby. He was in the living room of their old house. May was knitting, and there were the four kids, Matt, Jason, and Steve working on a boat model, and little Katie, playing with her dolls in that dollhouse he built for her eighth Christmas.
The old Emerson radio was blaring out the music of the 1950s, and May was saying something about, “Only a month ‘til Christmas. When are you ever going to get us a decent tree to decorate?” “I’ll get to it, don’t you worry,” Frank replied.
Then again, there was the whole family, decorating that magnificent Christmas tree. Frank could smell cookies baking, and all the children were scurrying around, some with tree ornaments, others with trim for around the rooms. Frank had to wonder when the time would come when the children were upstairs asleep, and he would go out to the shed, in the back corner, where all those presents were hidden, and bring them in to the living room and pile them around the tree.
It had long been Frank and May’s Christmas Eve tradition to celebrate the completion of the evening gift placing and decorating with a glass of egg nog and a kiss under the mistletoe. Then and there, that’s what they did, one more time in that big, old living room of their home. The egg nog, the kiss, the mistletoe, knowing the children were sound asleep, yet knowing they would be bounding down the stairs by 5 a.m. to see if Santa had arrived, they were all now just fond memories.
“Mr. Campbell! Mr. Campbell! Are you all right? I’ve been talking to you for at least five minutes. Here, I got you an egg nog,” said Millie.
Frank shook his head. “You got what? A what? Oh, Millie, thank you,” he smiled. He took the mug in his shaky “good” hand and lifted it slowly to his lips.
Millie kissed Frank lightly on his cheek, and said, “Merry Christmas, Mr. Campbell.” With that, she was gone, off to tend to other patients.
Frank just drank in the scene of that Christmas tree, sipped the egg nog, and, although a tear rolled from his eye, one of those old smiles slowly spread across his weathered face. Why, it was a small miracle. The angel didn’t have a starboard list anymore, and the lights on the tree, they were just beautiful.
Could it have been? Was that May and all the children he saw just outside the window? Who would ever know? Who would ever believe an old man could see such stuff on Christmas Eve in a place like this?
Frank lifted his mug of egg nog and softly uttered, “Merry Christmas, May, Katie, Steve, Matt and Jason, I love you all, wherever you are tonight.” That’s the way it was in the nursing home Christmas Eve.