Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Betty's Still Beautiful

This is Betty.


"She's gone around the track 92 times," Dad said.
"He's so nice," Betty said, leaning her head into his chest.
"Keep it coming," Dad said, laughing.


Claire and I followed her grandfather down the hall to see the drawing he'd done of a hummingbird in a recent art class. It hung, in a black frame on the wall, surrounded by other hummingbirds done by the residents of Mrs. Bush's Personal Care Home; an artist's gallery of hummingbirds.


On our stroll back, we saw Betty again.
"Come into my room for a minute, " she said, "I want to show you something."
We followed Betty into her room.
"Use your walker, Betty!" a woman said, passing by.
Betty left her walker at the door.


Betty picked up two pencil drawings of a shapely woman in a bathing suit.
"I did these when I was sixteen," she said.
"They're very good!" I said, "Claire's an artist, Betty. She'll have to bring her sketchbook next time to show you."
Claire blushed. She gets embarrassed whenever I say she's an artist.
"I like to draw, Mom." she says, "I just don't think I'm an artist yet."
"My hands shake too much now,"Betty said, laying her drawings back on the desk, "so I can't draw anymore."


Betty did not look sad. I felt a little sad.


"Here," Betty said, "This is what I used to look like."
She held up a photograph of an olive-skinned brunette, white teeth smiling at the camera.
"Stunning!" I said.
"I had so many boyfriends," she chuckled, "I finally had to kick them all to the curb. Too many."


In the car ride home, Claire and I chatted about our time.
"That Betty is really something," I said. "Gosh. She was so beautiful."
"Betty's still beautiful," Claire said.





1 comment:

  1. Oh, how I love Claire's comment, She's "still beautiful" and Claire is an ARTIST!

    ReplyDelete