Many years ago I had a next door neighbor who lived in the apartment next to mine in Beverly Hills. She was an elderly woman (a.k.a Rosie) who never had any visitors. She had no children, no pets and as far as I could tell, very few friends. She was a quiet woman with grey eyes and a faint smile.
One day as I was coming home from work I saw Rosie stumble on a loose rock as she walked back to her apartment from getting her mail. Falling to the ground, she found herself lodged between a thick bush and our rickety front door, unable to get up. Rushing over, I asked her if she was okay. Her mail splayed everywhere, she stared up at me, her eyes tearing up. “Can you move?” I asked. She shook her head slowly. Quickly, I grabbed my phone and called 911.
A few minutes later an ambulance picked her up and took her to the hospital. I asked her if she wanted me to ride with her, insisting that I would love to keep her company. With tired wet eyes, she said,”..it’s not necessary.”
A few days later as I was emptying my trash in the dumpster behind our apartment, I noticed some large trash bags spilling over with photographs. Curious and a bit disturbed that someone could throw out this many pictures, I removed the bags out of the dumpster and brought them into my apartment. All of the photographs were of Rosie – from the time she was a little girl, to a photo of her on her wedding day to a recent photo of her staring wistfully into the camera.
I knocked on her door and Rosie answered timidly. “How are you feeling?” I asked holding the picture of her in my hands. “I found this in the trash.” Embarrassed, she shrugged her shoulders and said in a soft voice, “It’s okay. I don’t need all that anymore. I don’t have room for all that.”
About a week later, a heavy-set young woman with dark eyes came to pick up Rosie. She carried a few small boxes to her Honda Accord as I watched her escort Rosie out of her apartment. Running outside I called to my elderly neighbor, asking her where she was going. Staring at me through the translucent mirror, the car spun off as I watched her image fade away into nothingness.
In my novel, The Gossamer Thread there is an elderly woman (similar to Rosie) who never shares her past with anyone. After she dies, her granddaughter discovers many secrets about her grandmother, which she had kept hidden her whole life. Wishing there were some way that she could turn back time and speak to her grandmother, the granddaughter begins to recognize how she, herself has ignored her own soul. With this new insight, her life begins to shift and change.
What memories will you leave behind? Are they memories of love, children, pets, work, nature, home? Are they memories of loneliness, angst, pain, suffering, anger? Will these memories be cradled and embraced by many or will they end up like my neighbors, in a trash dumpster? What is it that you are creating and establishing in your life?
The way that you live each and every day is a template for the memories that you will one day leave behind. What did you do today that you will want to remember?