Sweet childish days

This plot of orchard-ground is ours;
My trees they are, my Sister's flowers;
Here rest your wings when they are weary;
Here lodge as in a sanctuary!
Come often to us, fear no wrong;
Sit near us on the bough!
We'll talk of sunshine and of song,
And summer days, when we were young;
Sweet childish days, that were as long
As twenty days are now.

From To a Butterfly, by William Wordsworth

The other day, sitting in the lovely public rooms of a local senior residence, waiting to whisk a grannie client off to lunch, on a bright sparkly day made more precious by the forecast of today's cold gloom, I spotted an older friend settled in by the dancing flames of the "Club Room" fireplace, talking with a lovely smile on her face to the woman seated across from her - a home health care aid.  

In an instant, I was awash with a fresh awareness that no matter how much that other, younger woman might take delight in the older woman's  presence, enjoy their talks, she has no connection with her, no sense of her as she was before arriving at Rydal Park.  

Oh, to do a "Vulcan Mind Meld," so that I could know my grannie clients'  memories of childhood, young adulthood, the long stretch from then to now, all the momentous & mundane moments over that span!  

Praise be for a life that at least encouraged me to ramble.  A lot of the people I've come to know through my grannie clients come from other places, other states.  In most cases, I have some connection with where they were born or grew up or lived at some time.  

Like most of my grannie clients, the particular older friend I was taking out grew up in the same town that I did, so I at least  have some sense of the people she talks about from her youth & older age.  It makes her smile that I not only know that JAM stands for Jane Anne Macy, best of friends throughout those sweet childish days & beyond, but that I personally knew them from my own childhood through present day, that Jane's son was a good friend of my brother's, that Macy's daughter has a special place in my own heart.  But see JAM as they were in elementary school, in high school, as young marrieds & new moms?  That sight is beyond me.

As my g.c. & I tootled to Bonnet Lane for lunch, it dawned on me that there IS a place where a grannie client can connect - however lightly, however briefly - with childhood friends!  

My hometown's senior residence was designed to be an apartment complex, not a life enrichment residence like where my older friend lives.  BUT it does have a catered dinner twice a week, and non-residents can attend.  

Let that sink in ~ there is an opportunity for a beloved older friend to connect with friends from her own sweet childish days.  And I haven't been taking it.  That has GOT to change!  

Too late for tonight to take my older friend, as my guest, to dinner at our hometown senior residence.  Next Tuesday!   At least three of her high school classmates live there, at least two cousins around her age, no idea how many schoolmates  & longtime friends.  

Make it happen, because this stanza from To a Butterfly could have been about still-with-us friends from Anne's own "sweet childish days": 

Stay near me - do not take thy flight!
A little longer stay in sight!
Much converse do I find in thee,
Historian of my infancy!
Float near me; do not yet depart!
Dead times revive in thee:
Thou bring'st, gay creature as thou art!
A solemn image to my heart,
My father's family!