Connected Hearts

Some of us, even when surrounded with the best of family and friends, feel like we shoulder many of our thoughts and problems alone. We don't always share the quiet hurts, the disappointed heart, the fear of failure, or our concerns for the future with others. Instead, we keep them tucked away. But once in a while, we have a moment that connects us to someone so significantly that even for just a second, we feel like we are seen and understood.

A few months ago, I became a hospice volunteer, something I had thought about for almost a year. While a lot of people worried that being with patients who would inevitably pass away would be too hard for me, I knew it would be a perfect fit. Instead of trying to help people recover, which is actually the harder task, my sole purpose was simply to make their last few months as pleasant as possible.

One of the women I see doesn't remember me from week to week when I come, but she still welcomes me into her house with incredible warmth. For her, I am sure, it is a nice break in an otherwise long, repetitive day. When she is feeling well, we sit in her living room and she retells me the same heartfelt stories about her life that she told me the week before (I wonder what stories of my own will readily come to mind when I am her age). Other days, when she is struggling, I sit next to her bed making small conversation or reading to her. Sometimes we don't even talk at all. Yesterday was one of those days. As she laid on her side in bed, holding a glass of milk I brought her that I knew she wouldn't be able to finish, I absentmindedly rubbed her leg and wondered if I was really making a difference to someone who wouldn't even remember in a few hours that I was ever there. I felt sad for her; I also felt alone in my own thoughts. As I got ready to leave, I asked her as always if I could come back to visit her next week. But instead of her usual affirming response, she looked at me and said quietly with her far-away accent, "You know, I think you understand me a little bit." In hearing that, I felt my heart make room for a woman that I barely knew. And for that minute, of which only one of us would remember for very long, the two of us were connected.