One summer I did a camp with my church called “Summer Stretch.” Every Wednesday we would get together to do a community service project in the morning then go out and do something fun after lunch. The service projects we did were different every week. We did many things from making bagged meals at Feed My Starving Children to cleaning community areas, like parks. One day we went out to nursing homes around town and did different activities with elderly people. I was a little scared because I thought all the people in the home would be cranky and closed off but I quickly learned that I was very wrong. In the nursing home I went to, there were different levels for people based on the amount of care they required. I was sent to the very top floor to make crafts with memory care patients, this meant that they were on the level requiring the most care needed.

Once we were told what floor we were on we started up the big wooden staircase hidden from view in the back. I wondered why it was closed off in the very back because of how big and nice it was. But, I soon realized why; it was closed off by doors on every floor so that people wouldn’t wander off. The door at the very top of the staircase was locked which concerned and confused me because that was where I was going. When we got up there we had to wait for one of the nurses to come and unlock the big door at the top of the stairs for us. She then told us that they had the doors to hide the staircase because some of the patients would try to leave so they had to have a way to make sure they don’t wander off. This was especially necessary on the top floor because if the memory care patients were to wander off they might not know how to get back and in very severe cases they might not even remember what they were doing causing them to possibly take a tumble down the stairs. But, we were there to have some fun with them so having them wander off without knowing where they were going was the least of our worries.

After we were let in we headed to the cafeteria type commons area where we saw the crafts and elderly people waiting for us. There were tables all around the room that they usually used to eat their meals which we could tell because on the side wall there was a kitchenette type counter. My sister and I headed to a table in the back corner by a window with a little old lady who had long fingernails that could probably use a little bit of trimming and a rather tall bun-like hairstyle resting on top of her head like a bird’s nest in a tree. She seemed very happy which surprised me because I thought the place just seemed like a big dungeon, but we soon realized why she was so happy.

The little old lady was so happy because she was excited to see so many young kids which she wasn’t used to. We sat down and introduced ourselves then started on our ‘assignment.’ We were there to glue tissue paper to another piece of paper which seemed very boring.  However, to these people, it made all the difference in the world for us to be there doing a silly little craft with them. But, once we got started and realized how much she enjoyed it, it showed me what it really meant. While we were making the kites we were just talking and making friendly conversation with the noise of everyone else doing just the same in the background. After a while the old woman started to talk about things in her childhood which surprised me because I assumed she didn’t remember anything from her childhood. That was when I soon realized what it was really like for the elderly. Until that day I thought that elderly people were like robots who just sat in comfy recliner chairs all day and watched TV, but they don’t.

Watching how much she enjoyed just sitting at a table gluing tissue paper to another piece of paper while her hands got more and more sticky making it harder and harder to stick the tissue paper to the kite outline showed me something new. It showed me that the smallest things make the biggest difference. At first, I thought that really only applied to older people but looking back on it later I realized that the tiniest things can make a huge difference to anyone. I’m very grateful to have gotten the opportunity to experience this and without Summer Stretch that wouldn’t have been possible. Before that day I had seen older people at church, at the grocery store on senior citizen day, and around my grandparents and kind of thought they were just there but they aren’t. After we were done making our crafts she asked us if she could keep the kites my sister and I had made so she could remember us which really showed me how sweet she was.