Murray's Last Words
by Vija, a true story.
Murray sat on his bed and gazed through the window into space,
oblivious to his surroundings. Now and then his face would break
into a smile.
A caretaker walked into the room announcing her presence with a
very loud "Hello everybody"!
Murray along with the other three occupants of his room in the
Manor, were awakened from their dreamy state.
"What now?", asked Murray in a grouchy voice for being disturbed
from his travels into memory lane.
"I just came to see if you need any help with your Christmas
greeting cards". said the caregiver.
"Of course we do", all four guys answered in one voice.
Three of them, without much ado, handed their cards along with
the address lists to the careperson to sign the cards for them
and to address the envelopses.
"It is a long time since these fingers of mine have held a pencil
between them", said Murray looking at his hands with long boney
cigarette stained fingers that did not have much feeling in them.
He moved his frail body sideways giving the careperson room
to sit beside him on the bed. With an apologizing smile he said
to the friendly careperson: " I would like to have special words
added in all the cards to my friends."
"No problem", said the careperson. Pen in her hand, poised to
write, she looked at Murray and asked: "What is it that you want
me to write?"
A faraway look returned in Murray's eyes and with a voice intense
with tenderness, these words filled the room,
"After the inscription in the card please add:
Love is but a golden chain
That bends all hearts together
If you do not break this chain
We will be friends for ever."