Monday with Margie

Margie and I made a little double self-portrait in her hallway mirror when we came back from our coffee date. Our conversation today was close to the bone, tender.

Margie: I have become friends with my dying. I was going to say I’m walking with dying, but really it’s more that dying visits me. We’re having a relationship.

me: What’s that like?

Margie: Soft. Comforting. We’re at ease with one another.

me: So you’re not afraid?

Margie: Oh no. Not at all afraid. It’s difficult sticking around. (Chuckling.) There are things I couldn’t even imagine when I was only ninety. Like fingers. My fingers don’t work properly. 

me: Arthritis?

Margie: No, they just don’t work properly. I was wearing this wool shirt I have on today, and I was a little chilly, so I buttoned it all the way up. Then when I wanted to get ready for bed, it took me half an hour to get the top button undone. Who needs this, I thought?      …But then there are my children. How can I leave them? (Belly laughs.) My “children” are in their sixties. I know they can take care of themselves, they’ve made wonderful lives for themselves. They don’t need me, but they don’t want me to go. I like being here for them. I’m not on the stage with them. I’m certainly not the director, I’m not even in the orchestra seats. I’m in the balcony already. But here I am, up in the balcony, clapping for them. That’s what you do when you’re 93. You applaud everybody, you remember how hard it was and how confusing it was at times, how you failed at times but you kept working to do better. You give them all a lasting ovation for as long as you can, and they hear it, and it matters to them.