My 93 Year-old Roommate

    Rachel is a little over five feet tall.  She moves about with the flair of a former socialite, and her favorite item of accessory is the "Help!  I've fallen and I can't get up" button she wears around her neck.  Rachel celebrated her ninety-third birthday two weeks ago and reminds me every day that her memory is "not what it used to be."  

    I have been renting a room in Rachel's home for a few months, and I'm beginning to piece together the details of her intricate life.  

  "I built this house with my husband," she said.  "He owned a factory in Brooklyn, NY.  We built the house in the thirties."  I walk through the house and make sure not to touch much of anything.  The drapes, wallpaper, furniture, lighting fixtures, artwork on the walls, carpet, vases, and other rare delicacies have not been replaced since the house's initial construction.  

    A garden in the back yard has been fenced off for years.  Last weekend I ventured into the secret garden and was unable to look beyond the majesty of what once was.  Weeds, vines, and withered leafs cover stone walls, walkways, and a dried-up fountain.  An expansive screened-in porch is now guarded by a tree's extending root structure, protecting it from an invasion of modernization.  Rachel is in the house, in her chair, listening to the television while repeatedly reviewing bills that do not make sense. 

"I used to entertain a lot," she said.  "My garden used to be beautiful.  Oh, the time I spent there.  Now, I don't know what to make of it.  My memory is not what is used to be."

I asked Rachel about her life.  She told me that she married her boss.  "How else could I afford all this?" she once said.  Rachel grew up in Brownsville, NY., and her family was poor.  Her family lived in a four bedroom apartment, and while this may seem luxurious, the reality is much different.  Every member of her family lived in one room of the apartment, as the other rooms were rented out to make a little money.  

"When my husband and I started dating," she said, "He would call the drug store across the street.  A little boy would come and tell me I had a telephone call, and I would run to the store to take the call.  You see, we didn't have a phone in our home back then."  Rachel raised her hands to her head.  "I still remember the name of my street."  Rachel smiled, looked at me, and then lowered her gaze to the pile of papers in her lap.  "I don't understand these bills."

Yesterday evening I walked down the stairs and found Rachel in her chair.  "I've been going through my address book."  She was holding a small black book.  The pages were yellowed and the writing was a cursive reflection of what once was.  "I don't know who half these people are.  I'm sure most are dead."

"My husband built this house with the bricks of a factory he tore down in Unionville."  Rachel stopped to admire her home.  "I'll let the next owner worry about fixing it up."

Last night Rachel was in the kitchen.  She had opened a drawer and was picking through the spatulas, can openers, and apple peelers.  "I don't know where all of this came from.  This isn't my stuff.  Can you believe the amount of spatulas we have here?"  I looked at the cooking utensils in question; they looked as worn as the house.  "Why on Earth would I have four spatulas?"  Rachel counted the can openers and apple peelers in the same way she inventoried the spatulas.  "I don't know where it all comes from."  There was a small drop of moisture clinging to the end of her nose.  Perhaps a tear.  " I don't know where it all came from."