Going Home

I’m squashed between Dorothea and Jan as the van begins the daily ride home. Both ladies are in their eighties, one from New York and the other from Germany. There are seven other seniors in the van, all members of the local center for the memory-impaired. I am the escort who makes sure everyone arrives home safely.

Two minutes into the ride, Jan turns to me, puzzled, “Do you know whose pocketbook I’m holding?” she asks.

“That’s mine,” I explain, smiling at the old-fashioned word for purse. “You said you’d hold it for me because I have some paintings on my lap.”

“Oh,” she nods.

We drive a bit further and Jan asks me, “Do you know whose pocketbook this is?” I turn to her and see my reflection in the big sunglasses she wears every day.

Again, I tell her it’s mine. She glances at it and then out the window. On my right side, Dorothea is studying the painting she holds, the one she put the finishing touches to an hour ago.

“I wonder who painted this.” she says.

I nudge her arm. “You did, Dorothea. You made it during art class.”

“Really?” she chuckles. “It’s a good thing I don’t paint for a living. I’d starve to death!”

We both laugh and then comes a voice from behind us. Zev, an elderly gentleman from South Africa, is asking ninety-year-old Pearl if she knows what day it is.

“I don’t even know what year it is,” Pearl jokes and Zev chuckles along. But still, he’s worried. He worries every day on his way home.

“Well,” he admits, “I can’t remember where I live.” He pauses. “I’m not even sure whose home they’re taking me to.”

“Zev, I know where you live,” I turn around and assure him. “You live in Beit Shemesh with Greta. I’m taking you there now.”

This calms Zev even though he doesn’t remember me either. But I’m nice and I seem to know him, so that’s enough.

We drive along some more, the sun beats in through the windows and I’m grateful the air-conditioner works.

Jan says, “I wonder whose pocketbook this is. Do you know?”

“It’s mine,” I say, gently taking it from her because I don’t want to answer the question anymore. “Thank you for holding it.”

Dorothea is studying the picture in her lap. “Who painted this?” she asks. I look down at her picture. It’s full of pastel strokes and oddly shaped designs. But there seems to be a pattern.

“You painted it, Dorothea.”

“Well, Picasso I’m not,” she concludes. “Here, you can have it, if you like it so much.” She thrusts it at me impatiently, but I don’t take it.

“You can give it to Rina” I tell her, “She’ll hang it on the refrigerator.”

As soon as the words are out of my mouth, I feel bad. What am I thinking? Dorothea’s picture will be put right next to the drawings of her grand kids? How is that supposed to make her daughter, Rina, feel? I could cry sometimes when I see the stuff the seniors make at the center. The projects are so childish and they’re so carefully done. It breaks my heart to see them coloring like children.

Dorothea is watching me, puzzled. “Aren’t you Rina?”

“No,” I tell her. “I’m Yehudit and we’ve known each other for a long time.”

“That’s right,” she says. “I remember when we were in school together in Germany.”

I don’t respond to this because the thought seems to make her happy and usually any mention of Germany makes her upset.

Jan tugs impatiently at my arm. “Are you taking me back to the U. S. of A.?” she demands. “Because that’s where I live. That’s my home.”

“But you know where my home is, right?” calls out Zev from the backseat. “I mean which home I’m going to today?”

“I don’t know where that man lives,” Dorothea tells me, “but I would like to know who painted this picture I’ve got.”

I close my eyes. We drive for a few more minutes and then pull up in front of Zev’s apartment. I help him off the van and he turns to me. “How much do I owe you?” he asks.

“It’s okay, Zev,” I tell him. “You’ve already paid.”

He ponders this for a minute. “You’re sure?”

“Absolutely.”

I haul out his walker from the back of the van and he starts slowly towards his wife Greta, who waits in the parking lot for him every afternoon. “Here’s the Big Shot!” she announces.

“I’m not a Big Shot,” he shoots back. “God is the only Big Shot around here.”

I smile, give Greta a hug and climb back into the van. Jan is next and I tell her so.

She sits primly, with her hands folded, staring straight ahead. “Good!” she says. “I want to go home.” she says, “Back to the U.S.A!”

“No one’s forcing you to be here,” Dorothea says tartly. “Why don’t you leave if you don’t like it? Toronto is not for everyone.”

“But the U.S.A. my home,” Jan repeats. “That’s where I belong.”

“Where are you from in the states,” I ask, trying to diffuse the mood.

She hesitates a moment and finally confesses, “I don’t remember.”

We pull up to her Jan’s apartment in Ramat Beit Shemesh, where she has lived for several months. Her daughter waves to us cheerfully and helps her off the van. “Did you have a good time at the club?”’ she asks.

Jan is concentrating on stepping onto the curb. “I think so.” she answers. I remind her how much she enjoyed yoga class. She takes my word for it.

Now it’s time to drop off Dorothea. I notice that she’s fallen silent and has crumpled her painting. I smile at her and she whispers fearfully, “Tell me, is HE still around?”

I stop smiling.  I don’t need to ask to whom she is referring. “HE’s gone for good,” I say quietly. “HE’S not ever coming back.”

She is anxious as the van stops to let her out. I unbuckle her seat belt and she looks up at me, “Is it safe to come out?”

“Yes,” I tell her, “You’re safe here, sweetie. You’re home, now.”  Her son takes her arm and I hand him her scrunched up painting.

“What a nice picture!” he says cheerfully.

“Well, don’t look at me,” Dorothea laughs. “I didn’t make it!”

We drop off the last of the members and then I jump  down from the van, telling the driver toda v’shalom! Walking quickly through the park and into my neighborhood, I feel so young, barely into middle age. Look how easily I stride along, steps firm and even. And I know exactly where I’m going, my memory is in mint condition. Thank you Hashem for however long this lasts!

I take out my phone and call my husband.

“Hi,” he says, “where are you?”  

”Just finished working,” I tell him. “And I’m on the way home.”