Jbones333

Your parents are getting older at 75 and they haven’t told you how scared they are. They are not dying, or becoming a problem, or of being the reason you’re stressed, the reason your money is tight, the reason your patience runs out. They watch you build your life and they quietly pray they are not in the way of it. That silence you mistake for peace, it isn’t always peace. Sometimes it’s a 70-year-old man swallowing his needs because he doesn’t want to be a burden to the child he suffered to raise, sometimes it’s a 68-year-old woman who once moved mountains for her family, now unable to move without help, smiling so you don’t worry. They have already grieved the version of themselves that was strong, they did that alone, quietly, at night. What they have left is you. Not your money, not your success, you. Your voice on the phone, your presence in the room, the way you look at them like they still matter, like they are not just a responsibility to manage but a person to love. One day there will be no one left to call you by the name they gave you, in the voice that first said it, no one who remembers who you were before the world got to you. That day is coming, you don’t know when. So before it arrives, go home, sit down, put the phone away, let them talk. The chair will empty, make sure you left nothing unsaid. Goodnight