Over the past year amidst artist projects I have been spending time with elders during this global pandemic. The elders that I have been seeing are primarily isolated in their own apartments, not able to see friends, family, or have visitors. They are taking meals in their rooms, and may have someone like me visit them once or twice a day for ten or fifteen minutes simply to give them some connection. It is a tremendous amount of isolation, and the emotional turmoil that I have seen is sometimes greater than my heart can take. The pain unbearable, the loneliness daunting, the empty days drifting into each other.
One of the things I can do is assist them in making phone calls to their loved ones. Once or twice a week their family members, or friends schedule a zoom or FaceTime call with them so they can actually see their beloved elder. For many of the people in their eighties and nineties zoom is not a pleasurable activity in the least, and they don’t understand why their family insists on seeing them on the strange screen and attempting to communicate that way instead of visiting them. You can explain about the virus but even if you do, it is quickly forgotten minutes later or not understood. Some family members have wisely picked up on their family members disenchantment with these phone calls...but have no other real option.
Some months ago I started to see some thing new. Family members still wanted to call, still wanted to see their loved one, but they didn’t want to force on them an unenjoyable conversation in the same way. They also were changing themselves because on the other side of the phone no matter their age or their work, they also were forced to be at home and quarantine. Space surrounded them, stillness, and being stuck in a house with yourself or your family for almost a year new habits and hobbies begin to emerge.
Photo by Dawndra Budd
The first time it happened I was completely shocked. A son called his mother, she was in her 90s and he was somewhere in his 70s, he barely said any words to her but he told her that he had picked up the guitar again even though he hadn’t played for years. He had worked on a set list for her and for nearly 45 minutes he played song after song singing his heart out to his mother. She sat completely engaged totally enamored and never for one second did she seem frustrated with the technology or confused. In some moments I even saw her mouthing along singing the words, and other times I could see there were some tears welling up in her eyes. She was feeling so much and appeared so connected, by simply watching her son play the guitar and loving listening to the music. I thought perhaps this was a wonderful one time event until a few days later a daughter called to speak with her mother and she had picked up her dusty cello. She played for nearly an hour and again her mother was completely transfixed. I started to see it more and more sons and daughters calling their elderly relatives and instead of forcing conversation on them they simply offered them some art. It was an instrument perhaps they played in high school but had tossed aside, maybe it was a singing career long gone, or a painting that they were working on that they wanted to share. It was the most beautiful thing. Sometimes I envisioned these parents were thrilled because they had spent years taxiing their children back-and-forth to these arduous artistic lessons, both painstakingly and financially draining, only for the art to be shoved aside at some point for a more lucrative career. Maybe it was rewarding to them that all their karmic good efforts were coming back to gift them generous performances in their latter years, and in their most vulnerable and isolated moments.
I don’t know the answers. I can’t even begin to say that I know why this worked so well. But, I do know there is something very special about authentic art. When you share your art, you share your heart. When you share your heart you are vulnerable, but you also offer tremendous tenderness and connection. This last year has been unbelievably hard for many, and I won’t pretend for a second that sometimes I was heartbroken to tears when I went home after visiting these elders. But, I will also say their were moments of such overwhelming depth and beauty that I will be forever changed. I now see the resilience of the human spirit, its creativity and its desire not just to survive but to thrive even in the most difficult of circumstances. Share your heart, share your art...it is the only way we will get through this all together.
