A visit to the future
7 Jan 2019.

I spent Christmas in a seniors' home. 

I know, I'm a little too young to be put away. But my mother, who lives in Timmins, sold her house in April and moved into the Georgian Residences. It's a retirement community, not a care facility per se, more of a Golden Girls set-up. Everyone here is old, but still feisty. They just like being catered to, and they while away the hours playing Bingo and Wii. The age range is vast. The youngest resident is in her early 60s, whereas the oldest just celebrated her 100th birthday. Interestingly, there are over 40 female residents, but only a half dozen males. 
When she moved in, my mother asked the administration if her son could stay in her room when he's in town, and they said yes, so now I'm obliged to do so. I decided to embrace it as an 'immersive experience' or something like that.

Mom suffers from dementia, and as a writer, her loopy logic is endlessly entertaining to me. For instance, she kept telling me that her best friend is 'a cute young guy' who eats lunch with her. The 'guy' turned out to be an 83 year old woman named Jackie with a short hair cut. Lunch with the two of them, and their other friend Anne, is a riot, in part because all three ladies sport bizarre hair colours. My mother is copper topped, Jackie is snow white, and Anne, the real eccentric of the bunch, dyes her hair a bright purple. It augments her glitter fingernail polish.

Life at the home is regimented. Everyone goes to bed early, and it's just as well because the days start early. On the first morning, as I struggled to find a comfortable position on my mom's couch, a woman barged into her room at 6am to help her bathe, then another arrived at 6:15am to take her blood pressure. Luckily, I'm someone who can sleep through a rock concert. The meals are classic 'old people' food - chicken soup and bland pasta and vegetables - but the conversation was cool. Anne asked me if I had a wife, so I told her I was gay. Anne was thrilled to be speaking to a homosexual, someone who could really appreciate her odd choice of hair colour. I asked her if any of the other residents were gay, but she didn't think so.

The days dragged, even though it was Christmas. Usually, after every meal, everyone has a nap, including me, then we eat again, then nap again. Life at the Georgian wasn't odious in the least, but it also isn't very challenging. After a few days, I started to notice my Zelig-like tendency to become like those around me, and I started using my mother's walker to get around the hallways.

Yes, the day will come when I will welcome the ease of living at some place like the Georgian. I'd love to live in a gay retirement home, if one ever comes into existence. But in the meantime, my brief stay here was a sobering reminder for me to live it up while I'm still ambulatory.