Amelia

Outside of the Church lives a little old lady. She is shorter than me and I literally have to bend over to kiss her on the cheek. And every time we see her, she beckons us over to tell us something or show us something or just to give us a hug. She wears a white dress with an apron and always has a baseball cap covering her thin grey hair. She has one tooth and the biggest smile. And she loves to dance at every possible moment—she dances in a circle with her arms holding an invisible partner all while chuckling to herself. Her name is Amelia.

Amelia used to be in charge of cleaning the Church, but as the years began to take their toll, she is no longer capable of this job. But this doesn’t stop her. Last weekend, Amy and I made our way to the Church for a catechism meeting and as we were sitting in the rectory, Amelia came in with arms outstretched to give us both a hug. After our greeting, she strummed the guitar laying on the couch beside us and then went to greet and dance with countless statues or figures in the room. She greeted the statue of Mary, a camel sitting on Padre Daniel’s desk, and then went over to say hello and give a little dance for a Saint statue. And then she was off cleaning—emptying the trash into a trash can bigger than her and all while smiling and muttering some little songs or sayings in Spanish.

Now at this point, you are probably wondering as I did, if Amelia is completely together up there and yes I had my questions about this. She really is very old and I still don’t know where she lives or if she has any family here. But, then despite her kookiness, something about her won me over. Most of you know that I have a huge weakness for small, old ladies. My Nanny was a small, old lady who was my best friend growing up and is still one of my biggest role models for my life. And so because of Nanny, every time I see a small, wrinkled old lady I think about her and feel a responsibility to take care of them. Needless to say, Amelia is no different and I plan on spending a lot more time with her.

Well, going back to the questions of the kookiness, I was proved wrong last week. Tyler and I ventured up to the Church to hang a poster that we had made to present our group to the parishioners, but the Church was locked. We tried every door and no luck. And then Amelia popped out from somewhere—she has this amazing ability to turn up out of nowhere. Since she has one tooth and is very old and I don’t speak Spanish, it is very hard to understand what she says and so usually I just smile and nod. Well, it was obvious this day that that wasn’t going to work. I tried asking her if one of the Padres was there or if she had keys but she kept pointing past the Church and neither Tyler nor I could understand. After many apologies by me, she took me by the arm and Tyler and I nervously obliged. Arm in arm we walked down the street and as we arrived at the corner of the street, she knocked on the door and disappeared. Yes, literally disappeared leaving Tyler and I standing in front of a random house. In moments, a young child answered the door and I was relieved to find that she knew exactly what I was talking about when I asked for the keys. So our venture was successful and Amelia may act kooky, but is actually far from it.