Optimism Thought of the Week

For Sunday, August 14, 2016

What Our Elders Can Teach Us

By Glennel Hardy

On the weekends I have one of my favorite restaurants that I love to frequent called First Watch. Lately I have changed up what I order and always looking forward to trying something new.  One of the joys that I have of going to breakfast on the weekend is seeing my favorite senior couple at the restaurant.  While his wife has Alzheimer’s, without fail the husband is there patiently listening to every story, that she repeats.

I greet the husband with a handshake, and I always greet his wife with a hug, and a gentle kiss on the cheek.  At times when I approach her, and I am not wearing my Arizona State University  t-shirt she may not recall who I am, and he would yell out to her “ASU.”  She would then nod and give me the biggest hug, and would say that she received her doctorate from ASU.  She would then look into my eyes, and this excitement would overcome her, and she would then kiss me again, before her husband then says “knock it off you two,” playfully.

She resides in a world that both I and her husband may not fully understand, but in her world at that very moment everything is beautiful.  We should therefore challenge ourselves to find the beauty in every circumstance that we may come across.

 At this moment there is beauty that surrounds us, but at times we must look diligently in order to find it.