176 Another kind of wealth

“Once a citizen of the nursing home nation, you no longer operate on a money economy. At Fair Acres [nursing home] the rich are those who can get to the dining room under their own steam, use the toilet by themselves, and can still speak and be understood. My mother arrived there with little of that capital.

Nevertheless, her fellow residents envied her wealth of daily family visits. My father never flagged in his faithfulness. During the five years my mother lived at Fair Acres, he missed spending mornings with her only about a dozen times, most during illnesses of his own. I relieved him in the afternoon. My mother's cousin also visited her twice a week, and a busy sister-in-law often came on Thursdays.”

The Visit, by Virginia Stern Owens, Christianity Today, September 2004