Yesterday, I met Miss Eileen, my new client, for the first time. This is one of those situations where I am being primarily engaged by her son....but this lady is quite in comand of her faculties and it is out of her pocketbook I am to be paid. The son spoke like he would like me to work with his mother on a regular, maybe even daily basis. Miss Eileen spoke like she wasn't sure she was going to have me come back at all.

I don't think it was because I made a bad impression on Miss Eileen, although I can't be sure. I tried to be extremely gentle in suggesting how I could help her out...but this lady is from a different time. The idea of paying a person to do something she could possibly do herself, no matter how difficult or time consuming the task might be for her, is hard for her. And she's embarrassed. She feels the same way any one of us would if somebody had to cut up our meat for us at dinner. It's not different for her just because she's 90 years old.

Ladies of her generation are always impressive people. They did a lot. They WERE Rosie the Riveter, and keeping the home fires burning meant something to them. They also lived through the Great Depression. They were born into a world without social security, without "social programs". They were raised to look down at the ends of their arms for a helping hand, and brought up to not complain in adversity. Miss Eileen was raised on a dairy farm with 6 brothers and sisters...but only one sister is still living.

Often, when I meet people who are legally blind, I am surprised by how much they can still see or make sense of given the severity of their vision problems. In this case, the reverse was true, because I stepped into a home cleaner than mine is right now. I met a lady who, while wearing a robe and pajyma bottoms, was still wearing spotless clothing, whose hair was neatly brushed and kept, and who looked in my direction when I spoke. My first impression was that her vision could not be nearly as bad as her son had indicated.

I quickly had my impression corrected as we went into the kitchen together.

"I'd like you to help me make a cube steak" she said.

"Okay, that sounds fine. You'll have to tell me what to do, though, because I have never made cube steak before and I don't know how you like it."

"Well all right. Start by opening up that meat I have out on the counter."

"This meat here? By the drainer?" I asked, mystified.

"Yep. What's wrong?"

"Well, um." I said as diplomatically as possible, "this is a piece of ham."

"Oh DARN it!" she exclaimed angrily putting both hands over her face. "I HATE this! I can't see in this daggone freezer! This is aweful!"

So, I looked in the freezer and found the cube steak, which we thawed out in the microwave. Put the ham in the fridge. Miss Eileen successfully located an onion and a green pepper. There were two potatos and two carrots in the sink. I couldn't help but have the impression that it might have been her project for the day to locate those.

While Miss Eileen had a good idea where I was in relationship to her in the kitchen she kept accidentally bopping me in the head, thinking that she was reaching above me into cabinets. Finally she asked, "How tall ARE you any way?"

"I'm almost 6 feet tall" I admitted.

The steak recipe turned out to involve cutting the pieces into serving sizes, dredging them in flower, sauteeing with the onions and peppers then letting simmer with some tomatos from a can for about an hour.

"Okay, there's some left over flour." I observed.

"Oh, well, I put that back." she said. And she did, after it had been dredged in raw meat. There was a pause while she squared up her shoulders. I think she was waiting for me to say something.

So I said, "Waste not want not" once I got around the concern that this woman was going to ingest e-coli. Clearly, this is something she does all the time, though I'll have to ask her son how to best handle things like that.

She let me take the trash down the into the basement where it goes, but wouldn't let me sweep the floor, nor dry the dishes after dinner. It seemed to depress her mightily to sit there while I cleaned up, though I spoke cheerfully to her, and explained carefully which container the left overs were in.

Possibly, she'll reflect on it and decide that it wasn't so bad having me there. I hope so, because I really liked her, and have deep sympathy for her. It must be terrible to be alone, not able to read, look at a catalog, or even follow television. "If it wasn't for the radio I b'lieve I'd lose my mind." she remarked. If I am asked back I may try to find some big band music to take along as "dinner music" - that might be something different for her.

It was also sobering to realize that, though she has lived in her house for over 50 years -"I could clean it with my eyes closed when I was young, I'd done it so much, and now it's the same thing" - when she moved there she was only a little younger than I am now. I tend to think of myself as mature, even middle aged. But to her, I am the generation of her grandsons - a kid.

"It's Pearl Harbor Day" I remarked.

"I'm surprised you know about that." she said, not meanly. She really was surprised.

Tomorrow may, indeed, not be promised to any of us....but then, agian, it might. So I'll repeat some good advice another senior citizen once gave me.

"Make good memories while you are young, so that when you are old you will have happy times to reflect on."