The day I stopped, 

For months now I saw her sitting outside in her wheelchair, next to a big green tree,  on my way to work or when I just went out for a walk to get some fresh air. Her face, full with wrinkles never up but always bend down letting her eyes rest on the grey stones of the pavement and her long grey curls wrapped around her shoulders like a blanket.. Always alone and her old hands gently placed on her lap. That day I stopped walking and knelt down beside her. At first she turned her face away from me as if she was a tad shy but when I softly tapped her leg she lifted her head and looked deeply into my eyes. I swear that I could read whole stories in her grey hues before she even spoke one word. I told her my name and asked her what she wanted to do today. I could read the confusion on her face but with soft words she told me she wanted to dance just one more time, under the tree we were right now. I did not ask why but I stood up and lifted the elderly woman into my arms, carefully I made sure her feet where standing on mine and started to dance in a slow way. 

Within a few seconds the sad look on her face turned into a smile and her eyes started to sparkle like a million stars. I softly started to sing while I turned the pavement into a ballroom floor. The soft breeze kissing our hair and I could hear the joy in her laughter. A few steps to the right, back to to left and in turning around before I dipped her just enough to make her smile from ear to ear before I lifted her up again. We did not care that people stopped to look at us both but I felt that she loved to see them all smile. We swirled on the wind, on the sunshine and on the laughter coming from her lips. For a brief moment I forgot everything around us and she was the universe in my arms. 

We danced until my arms were no longer able to hold her in a safe way. I placed her back into her chair and knelt down next to her again. Her smile staid on her face like a freshly painted canvas but a single tear slowly trailed over her cheek. She took my hand in hers and told me that she danced here with her husband a week before he died 18 years ago. 

Three days later when I went out for a walk she was not sitting under the tree but I spotted a nurse from the retirement home and simple asked where the sweet woman was. She told me that the woman died three days ago in her sleep with a smile on her face. 

Img credid : Google search ( Dutch, eenzame ouderen.) 

I am a fiction writer so my entry/story is fiction and it did not happen.
Why do I enter with this story if it's not real? Because I like to take any change I get to remind people of the many lonely elderly souls on this planet!