For Ben: " In the beginning, visiting him was a little bit awkward because I was not really sure how I should act."
I think this is a really interesting line because you are very honest about how you were feeling. I think a lot of times people do not want to admit that it was weird seeing someone they were so close with in a completely different state. You also seem to really capture this point when you say:
"Not to say that they weren't, but there is no way that they could have been as happy as they looked knowing that their old friend was going to die soon."
You just really seemed to approach the whole situation realistically and I think it showed in your writing. I liked this post a lot, good job!
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From Linday (Sister):
I think you get to an interesting dichotomy here in your internal processing and that is how class plays a role in our relationships to aging people, and particularly those in our families.
You say, "it seems impossible that such a beautiful place can exist in which the old can reside while we complain about our health care system."
You really draw the reader down the halls with you as you peek in the intricate rooms and consider what life and your relation to illness and age would have been had grandma lived with us.
From Bjorn (Exchange Student): I really liked your environmental descriptions which made it very easy to "be" in the situation described.
Quotes like : "Tired and honestly not in the mood to visit my grandmother, we pulled up to the castle-like estate in which she resides. It seems impossible that such a beautiful place can exist in which the old can reside while we complain about our health care system."
not only gives you a picture of what your reading, but also an insight in the social problems america has to deal with, and its especially interesting for me as a foreigner to get an insight about the american health care system since the way they do it where im from is very different.
bjorn.
From Devin: I really liked the honest way you expressed your feelings about visiting your grandmother in the nursing home. The fact that she wasn’t there because she had scheduled an appointment at the same time as your visit says a lot about how the old are just not living
in the same world, and that this fact makes dealing with them take a lot of effort. It was interesting hearing about what a complicated maze the place is considering it is housing people whose minds aren’t at their peak and about your father’s comments on the pill box being complicated too. Both were good insights on how we don’t seem to design things for the elderly with them in mind. I also liked your line about your grandmother having a boyfriend and there not being any pictures of him among all the pictures of her family. I think the idea was that she would not have thought that it would have been proper to have his picture there. It was also funny that you only found three pictures of yourself, and I think it is just human nature to look for pictures of ourselves in that situation. The best part I thought was your description of how you just wanted to get out of the atmosphere of age and illness and thoughts of dying, even saying that you did not want to touch anything there. I understand completely. You just didn’t want any of that atmosphere to infect you or even rub off on you in any way. Your comments on sitting with her when she was opening her presents were insightful too. But why was she so ignorant when she said she was surprised things weren’t made in China when most things are now? Maybe the presents were expensive ones, and her comments were insulting. Anyway the line about her being left with people “who smirk after her comments and dread going to visit her” made me hope that this is not what is in store for all of us as we get up there in age. It probably is though. Great job.
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