The day began in motion. From the moment I left the house, I felt pulled into the countless tasks that accompany end-of-life care. Switching names on accounts. Paying bills. Requesting medical records. Handling the paperwork whose language feels cold and procedural compared to the reality it describes. I moved from office to office, errand to errand, until the morning blurred into a kind of administrative grief. A stop at the store for wipes and bandages felt strangely intimate, as though the act of buying them was part of saying goodbye. In the rush of it all, I forgot to eat. At one point, I even arrived for an appointment a full day early. It was a small but telling sign that the normal rhythms of life no longer apply. Hospice rearranges time. It erodes the structure that once made the day predictable.
By afternoon, my mother and I were caring for my grandmother. It was tender work—cleaning, shifting, comforting—and it required a gentleness that carries its own emotional weight. In her vulnerability, my grandmother kept apologizing. Each apology landed heavily. There is something profoundly painful about hearing someone say sorry simply for needing care. It reminded me how much of our identity is shaped around independence, and how difficult it must be to loosen that grip. I could see the exhaustion in my mother’s face as we worked. It was not the fatigue of physical labor but the emotional strain that comes from watching someone slowly slip away. When we finally helped her settle, my mother retired to the guest room and, I hope, fell into a deep, draining sleep.
Throughout the day, friends and family visited. Their presence was generous and heartfelt, but the attention overwhelmed her. She tried to receive each visitor with grace, yet her strength was dwindling. The house felt both full and fragile, brimming with stories and memories even as her energy faded. By evening, the visitors were gone, the rooms had quieted, and the soft rhythm of her breathing became the center of the house.
Now, as I sit on the couch in the family room, listening for each gentle inhale, I find myself returning to Sergio Cerchi’s Il Solitario. The young man in the painting, his hands pressed to his lips, appears suspended between action and collapse. Before him rises a house of cards. It is delicate, carefully assembled, and vulnerable to the slightest disruption. Today felt exactly like that. Hospice is its own house of cards, built day by day through medication schedules, tender care, shifting expectations, and the emotional labor that holds it all together. We place each card as steadily as we can, knowing the structure cannot stand forever.
In the painting, the boy wears a red sweater, the only vivid color in a muted world. Red, long associated with interior fire and emotional intensity, mirrors the vigilance I feel tonight. Even in stillness, something inside remains lit. Beneath the glass table, sculpted cherubs strain upward, supporting the fragile construction above. They remind me that beneath every act of caregiving lies an unseen foundation: the decades of love, memory, family history, and unspoken bonds that carry us through these moments.
As the house settles into nighttime quiet, I feel both the weight and the beauty of the work we are doing. Each day adds another layer to this fragile structure, and with every addition, I sense how near we are to its eventual collapse. Not a catastrophic fall, but a soft, inevitable release. The kind of collapse that marks the end of a life lived in contentment.
Tonight, the house of cards still stands. Tomorrow we will add new cards, steadying them with love, patience, and presence. And until the final piece gives way, we will remain here. We will remain watchful, tender, and aware of the delicate architecture we are holding together at impossible heights.