...old folks home alone...

..the only thing worse than growing old is growing old alone..being in a old folks home does not help..you are alone among other inmates..as my brother Johan is,...alone and almost abandoned by family and friends, by his children...

..life has not been to kind to him..a series of bad decisions when he was younger, stronger, has left him without a home..his wife's death when he was 65 left him helpless...a son left for the open sea, seeking his fortune as an able bodied seaman...his two other known children are busy with their life...and Johan found himself in an old folks home..alone..

..born with a game leg, his health deteriorates..unable now to walk he spends most of his days in bed and on a wheelchair..when incontinent shows its head, as it usually does inthe aged, he became bitter..and frustrated with his incapabilities...

...I make time for him every Friday...arriving before Asr, helping him get on his wheelchair and wheeling him out to a shady tree...where I replenish his spending money of RM70.00 a week send by a caring cousin and check his phone for airtime balance...I listen to his rant..he wants death..he's bored at the home...but he did not ask for a wife...he has reconciled to the fact that no woman would want to marry him now...

...sometimes we talked about old times..and, as always, our conversation would petered into silence..there is not much to talk about...we grew up apart and have no memories of growing up together...he missed his late mother...his saviour when she was alive..

..Lord, its not for me to question what You had laid out for him...but please, o Allah...forgive him and grant him peace in the final embers of his life...