Sal was first introduced to you in a blog entitled “99 and Still Going Strong.” As 100 draws near, he continues to amaze us all, but in particular his very devoted caregiver, Meredith. Here’s what she reported to us recently:

I wanted to share my most recent adventure with Sal. He was very agitated that his valet was broken. This is a favorite piece of his furniture that holds his clothes by his bed and allows him to have more room for moving around in his wheel chair. He asked if I would take him to Ackerman and Sons to have them fix it even though he thought they would have to keep it for some time, and that it would be expensive to repair. I loaded it in the Caddy and off we went. We found the place, and they assisted us the minute we arrived. It was repaired in five minutes, and they loaded it back into the car. They said that it was Senior Discount Day and that the cost was “Free.” Sal was so touched that when he got in the car, he got very teary and said that this was the best day ever. Even though this seemed like such a small thing to do, it made an unbelievable difference in his freedom and ability to be on his own. I have to say that I thought it was just a simple errand with mission accomplished, but he talked about this on and off for the next four hours. He said that it is nice to meet people like this along life’s journey but then if he hadn’t had me to make it possible, it wouldn’t have happened. He felt that I was his lucky charm. This was so powerful to me. I can see that in daily living, it is the small stuff that counts for these seniors and we must always remember this.

Then, when we returned home and got the mail, the pope’s blessing was there. He gave me the honor of opening it because I had facilitated him receiving it. We looked over this ornate certificate honoring Sal for his 100 years. He again was overcome with emotion and said he can’t wait to frame it. He said he was so glad that I cared about his religious background.

So later this week we are going back to Ackerman and Sons to give them something from Sal (I think he wants to get them a bottle of wine) and then to the framing shop. He just pats my arm and says, “You are the blessing in my life.”

And I found him through Barton Home Care - what a blessing for me too!

Meredith
Caregiver Extraordinaire for Barton Home Care

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 27th, 2007 at 12:59 pm and is filed under People. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.