“The last of human freedoms-the ability to choose one’s attitude in a given set of circumstances” Viktor Frankl
Lou taught me so many different ways to live a content and happy life. Lou gave me the gift of patience, the gift of moving forward in life even when you think you can’t go on. He showed me the way of compassion, the art of listening, to really listen, to take the time to understand the other person. Most of all that life has meaning no matter what situation I may find myself in.
It was a cold and windy winter day as I drove up to Lou’s house. I was meeting Lou for the first time, he was just shy of his sixtieth birthday. He was discharged from the hospital the day before and had come home to live out his last days. I knocked on the door and his wife Betty answered, she welcomed me in to their home with a smile. She told me Lou was in the bedroom, and that he was excited to meet me. I knocked on Lou’s door and walked in, I found Lou in the bathroom shaving. Lou stood at about 5 feet 8 inches tall, and weighted no more than 90 lbs, the cancer was eating away at him. He was so pale and had dark rings around his eyes, he looked like a ghost.
Lou smiled at me and told me to have a sit on the chair by the bed. He asked me my name and I told him my name. He then asked me about my children and my family. He was so genuine, so real. This conversation about my family went on for an hour because it took Lou one hour to shave. As I continued talking to Lou, I watched him shave, how he would slowly take the razor and dip it into the water and slowly with a shaky hand bring it back up to his face so he could shave a small section of his chin, then he would slowly bring it back down again into the water. He was slow but he kept right on going, finishing the job he stared. As I looked around the room, I noticed his bed was made and I said to him “Lou I can make your bed every day so you don’t have to worry about doing it. ” Lou looked at me with a smile on his face and said ” Liz, thank you for that but for right now, anything I can do for myself I am going to do, if it takes me all day to shave, make my bed and get dressed, then I am going to do it. Life is about doing all that you can, until the time comes when you can’t do it anymore.”
Lou told me that day that he owned a barber shop in his town, how he loved his job, how he loved the people who came into his shop. He loved listening to people and hearing all about their lives, their children’s lives and what was going on with them. He said to me that he loved it when someone came in and just needed to cry about life for a time or just someone to laugh with them.
Even though Lou could not go to the shop anymore, they came to see him. Many times I would come to his home and it would be filled with friends. Lou would ask them about their lives, their families. When someone would ask him about his life, he would say it’s wonderful couldn’t get any better then this. Lou told me that there is a goodness in all people, they just want to be heard and recognized, cared about and loved. He told me this was his purpose in life to genuinely care and love. Cutting hair was the means to bring forth this purpose. Everyone in this small town knew Lou and loved him. He was the most genuine and honest man I have ever meet, he was full of heart and soul.
“To often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around” Leo Buscaglia
A couple of months later I was walking up to Lou’s house on a beautiful spring day, When I noticed the upper-level flower beds on the 2nd floor of their home, were full of flowers, I was thinking to myself that Betty must have planted them. But as I walked into their home, I found Lou sitting on the couch and Betty proceeds to tell me, that she went out yesterday and when she came home, she found Lou on the ladder planting the flowers in the window beds. I looked over at Lou, and he just smiled with a look of accomplishment. Lou was a small and weak man I just couldn’t imagine how he even got the ladder up. Betty was upset and told him he could have gotten hurt. Lou just smiled and said ” I wanted to do it and it needed to be done, but most important of all planting flowers is my favorite part of my life.
He then proceeded to tell me how he accomplished this task, ” I waited for Betty to leave, I knew she wouldn’t let me plant up there. After she left, I slowly got the ladder, it took me a while to set it up in front of the house. I then took the potting soil, put some in a pot and slowly climbed the ladder, then I put the soil into the flower bed. I slowly came down the ladder and took each flower one at a time up the ladder and planted them into the soil. Up and down, I went all afternoon planting the flowers in our window beds. I’m not going to stop doing what I love, it may take me all day to do something that use to take me 20 mins, but I am going to do it.” He laughed and said, ” it looks great Liz don’t you think.”
“All you need is the plan, the road map and the courage to press on to your destination.” Earl Nightingale.
The following Spring Lou was still with us, he had lost so much weight and was so weak, he even had days where he was not able to get out of bed. But when he did manage to get out of bed he did everything he could for himself. Lou must have needed to finish up some important things before he left this life and he was making sure his wife Betty was ready to let him go.
It’s now a year since Lou came home to live his last days but another spring had come around again. On this spring day I walked into Lou home, where Betty and Lou told me that they had sold their camper. They began to tell me how they would go camping in it every summer weekend, they loved go to a campground by the shore. They loved to hang out with friends and meet new people there. They were both sad that they had to sell it because they had so many happy memories in their camper. As Betty left the room Lou looked at me and said ” I know Betty is sad and upset but we had to sell it, I don’t want her to worry about the camper when I’m gone, it’s just too much work to maintain.”
Two days later I came by the house and Betty looked at Lou and says to him “tell her what you did the other night.” Lou was delighted to explain, this man who was weighing in under 60 pounds, who sat there so pale and weak, began to tell me ” I waited for Betty to fall asleep, once I knew she was asleep for the night, I slowly got up and dressed. I knew I had to move the cinder block that was in front of the camper. I didn’t want Betty to think she had to move it. I’m the one who is responsible for moving it.”
I have seen this cinder block and it is big and heavy, my eyes felt like they just popped out of their sockets. I remember saying to myself “what?” but Lou just smiled and continued to say “I put on my jacket and climbed down the steps outside, I got a lawn chair and opened it so I could have a place to sit when I need it. I slowly moved the cinder block one inch at a time, then I would sit down and rest. Then I would get up and move the cinder block another inch, and then I would sit down again. By the end of the night the cinder block was moved to the side of the driveway.” A couple of years ago Lou would have been able to move that cinder block in less then 10 minutes. So I asked him ” Lou, how long did it take you to move it?” He said ” I went out at 11pm and I was done at 5am, six hours, I started to hurry knowing that Betty would be awake soon.” Lou was able to accomplish this task in six hours, till this day I still don’t know how he physically did this but with a slow and steady mind and body he did it.
“Adopt the pace of nature her secret is patience.” Ralph Waldo Emerson
A couple of weeks later I pulled up to Lou’s home on another beautiful spring day. The sun was shining and not a cloud in the sky, The temperature was ranging in the seventies. I walked around to the backyard and there I found Lou sitting in his wheelchair in his screened in porch, he had his winter jacket on, his circulation was so bad that he felt cold all the time. He smiles up at me, I smiled back, I saw on the table some planting pots that were put in front of him, a bag of soil and beautiful red geraniums waiting to be planted in their pots by Lou.
I sat there that day with Lou as he slowly picked up the soil with his weak hands and slow and steady he put soil into the pot. When the pot was filled with enough soil, he placed the geranium into the pot. He asked me about my family, what was new in my life, as he continued to work on his planting. In two hours Lou was able to plant two flowers in their own pots, Lou was overjoyed to be planting one last time.
As I left Lou that day I cried, tears of happiness, he made it to another spring and was able to plant flowers one more time. I cried because I knew he was leaving this world soon and I was going to miss him, I was going to miss his smile, his love, the joy he brought to everyone, his determination to do whatever he could do until he could not do it anymore. Lou died that week very peacefully. Lou continues to live in my heart, in my life, whenever I think of him I know life has meaning, and whatever situation I maybe in, I know that I can get through it with compassion, patience and perseverance.
” I have just three things to teach; simplicity, patience, compassion, These three are your greatest treasures.” Lao Tzu
Experiment:
Choose something you have thought about changing or doing. It can be big or small, something you may have been avoiding doing or starting. First just take 1 step, make it happen, then take 2nd step. Add more step when needed. Perseverance means to keep on going, it’s not about the pace it’s about being patient and giving it time Just remember to keep going, Enjoy the journey!