We enter the bank to get some cookies (available on Fridays) and one of the tellers calls out “Hi, Cindy!” Next we are at the post office to get the mail; Cindy standing in the middle of the room with me at our box, turning the key. Someone else from town enters and warmly greets Cindy. My back turned does not matter because chances are Cindy is the person’s sole focus anyways. Sometimes on our walks a passerby starts to focus on Cindy from afar, says “Hi, Cindy!” with a bright smile as they near, then goes on by without having looked at me. Sigh. I have no one to blame for this neglect (just kidding) but myself or, more specifically, my blog.
Living in a small town, in the house I was raised in, everyone was going to know Cindy has Alzheimer’s sooner rather than later. Indeed, this contributed to why we had no reservations about making Cindy’s affliction known on the blog. Small town folk do OK knowing each others business. We thought some good would come from blogging about Cindy and did not perceive the drawbacks that many people in mass society might.
Yet even people in small villages do not always know how to react to someone with Alzheimer’s. We tend to shy away from the unknown. I hope this blog demystifies Alzheimer’s. At the least I hope this blog demystifies Cindy, revealing her to be infused with the same warmth and kindness as always. The warm attention she gets on our walks suggest this to be true, while the warm smiles people get back from Cindy are their own reward.
There are not many people we don’t know in the village, mainly folks who recently moved in. Now when we encounter an unfamiliar person on our walk Cindy takes the initiative and greets them with warm familiarity. Sometimes they are caught off guard, yet cannot help but give a nice smile back. At one time in our lives this might have been Cindy reaching out. We had a tradition of inviting new people in our neighborhood to dinner. Now I suspect that Cindy thinks she must know people even when she doesn’t and greeting your neighbor is just what everyone does in our village.
I often blog with the potential caregiver in mind. This post is for anyone. Do not shy away from people with Alzheimer’s. Granted, they are not all like Cindy; some never can be. Yet here’s the thing. We tend to become how people perceive us. We tend to give what we get. Treating someone with warmth and kindness, even if they have Alzheimer’s, increases the chance that they become or remain warm and kind despite such an affliction.
Believing that everyone around you is neighborly is a pretty good way to live, whether or not afflicted with Alzheimer’s. So if you see Cindy on the street, in the post office or bank, or even in our own home, do not shy away. Greet her warmly, give her a smile, give her a hug. You are having a greater impact than you realize. Then do the same for anyone with Alzheimer’s.
