Friday, October 3, 2008

A Persistent Ghost


During the course of my long nursing home career, I met a lot of characters. Among them was an octogenarian named Kathryn. She had wild white hair and even wilder eyes. She was belligerent, uncooperative and totally unlovable. Her one redeeming quality was that she had an invisible lover named Dan. She would do absolutely nothing without him. Today she'd be hauled into a psychiatrist's office a couple of times a week in an attempt to convince her that Dan didn't exist. Back then the staff just humored her. The dining room girls set a place for him, the cook dished him a plate, the nurses aides tucked him into Kathryn's bed every night. Eventually, someone delved further into her history and discovered that she had been engaged to a young man named Dan who was killed in the war. According to Kathryn, Dan never left her side and who are we to judge? Maybe he didn't!

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