106 Chapter 5
During lunch, the dining room is packed with patients and staff. Usually, the staff sit with each
other, and their jobs can be clearly discerned by the color of their uniforms. The patients dine with
each other, and many require assistance cutting their food and moving it to their lips; some need
help and monitoring when they swallow. Although nursing home food is usually notoriously bad,
here, the meals are healthy and surprisingly tasty. And thanks to occupational therapy, you can
use utensils with large, fat handles and can feed yourself chopped and soft meals. After lunch, most
residents return to their rooms or the tele vi sion area or simply wander the halls. You usually return
to the empty dining room and sit at a table at the rear. You enjoy watching the kitchen staff coming
and going, the weather changes through the large win dows, and private time for yourself. Privacy
is hard to find in a nursing home. It was during one of these solitary times that you rescued a
woman from certain frostbite and received acclaim for doing it. You were the home’s hero for a day.
It is mid- February, and the snow has been falling for several days. The snowdrifts are high, and
the wind is howling. You watch the snow swirl around the walls of the building. The warmth of
the dining room is in stark contrast to the arctic outdoors, giving you a pleasant sense of security
and comfort.
Nineteen- year- old Margaret Hunter is in her second week of employment at the nursing
home. She took the job as a dishwasher to pay her share of the rent in the new apartment she
and her two high school friends have just rented. Money is tight, and to help make ends meet,
she has also deci ded to quit smoking. However, she never realized how difficult it would be. One
of her jobs in the kitchen is to scrub surfaces until they are clean. As she works, she feels the
intense nicotine urge. She has cut down to five or six cigarettes a day and thinks that now is the
time for her after noon fix. Smoking is prohibited in the fa cil i ty, so she must stand outside with
other smoking outcasts or use her car on inclement days. Today, however, time is short, and she
decides to stand just outside the large door and smoke brief ly to calm her nerves. She walks past
one of the familiar patients and waves to him. His name is Leroy, and he seems pleasant and
friendly. She suspects that he has had a stroke and knows that he cannot talk. As she opens the
large self- locking glass door, a blast of cold air enters the room. Margaret stands just outside
with her foot holding the door open a crack, lights the cigarette, and puffs away. Then she slips
on the ice, and the door closes behind her. The only other entrance is at the front of the massive
building, past several fences and through the parking lot. Margaret shakes the door and knocks
several times on the win dow. The only person in the dining room is Leroy, and she won ders if he
has the ability to help. After all, he has brain damage and even drools. Margaret stands outside
in the freezing cold with only her uniform to protect her.
You watch Margaret leave the dining room, open the door, light the cigarette, and begin smok-
ing. Although you have no inner speech to verbally structure your thoughts, you understand and
appreciate her situation. You, too, smoked for many years. You suspect that she must be cold and
getting colder when you see and hear the door slam closed. Margaret begins knocking on the door
and beckons to you to open it.
Although your massive stroke has destroyed your speaking, reading, writing, and verbal
understanding, it has not rendered you intellectually disabled or senile. You still pro cess informa-
tion visually and can appreciate circumstances and solve prob lems.