I knew her as Lyn, and I didn’t meet her until she was 85 years
old. She would occasionally accept a ride from me, especially after
she had taken a couple of falls and endured long recoveries.
I knew her as Lyn, and I didn’t meet her until she was 85 years old. She would occasionally accept a ride from me, especially after she had taken a couple of falls and endured long recoveries. Most of the time though, she insisted on walking, and would head off down the street accompanied by her cane and a lot of determination.
“I need to be walking,” she would say.
She would collect greeting cards and use them in craft projects. “I go down to the senior center,” she would say, “to work with the old people there.” But she would sometimes express her frustration. “They don’t seem interested in doing much,” she would complain. “How can I get them more involved?”
“Well,” she said with disgust one day as I gave her a lift home. “I’m finally old.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Up until a few days ago, I never saw myself as ‘old’ ” she told me. “This morning I was working with the seniors, I called for my ride and was waiting at Wheeler. When I saw it arrive, I tried to exit the building, but the guard stopped me at the door.
“Where do you think you’re going?” he asked.
“My ride is right outside waiting for me,” Lyn replied.
“Yeah, I’ve heard that one before,” the guard answered.
“Really,” Lyn insisted, “I need to get home; they’re expecting me.”
“I’ve heard it all before,” the guard said. “We’ve had problems with an Alzheimer’s patient trying to get out.”
“That’s how you know you’re getting old,” she laughed as she told me. “When they won’t let you out of Wheeler (Senior Center)!”
Lyn was a truth seeker who liked to say, “we are here to contribute, and to find out what our purpose is,” and she never stopped doing just that. In every photo of her, you can see the dynamic spark in her eyes, no matter what age. “Listen to the stories of others,” she said, “And you will always have friends.”
At her funeral last Friday evening, Valerie Hayes sang a song very appropriate to Lyn’s life called, “I’m Gonna Fly.” Lyn was flying in the face of convention when she served as a woman in the Coast Guard from 1942-1945. Lyn found a way to get everywhere she wanted to go in life, in spite of not having a driver’s license, including 2,000 miles to visit the young officer she was in love with during WW II.
It was Lyn’s way of flying when she taught preschool to migrant children for 15 years at Eliot, even though she didn’t speak Spanish. It was Lyn’s way of flying when she made others welcome in her home, regardless of race or beliefs. Her funeral was attended by black, white, Hispanic and Asian; by young, old, gay and straight; by teachers, police officers and WW II Veterans.
The doctors discount it as near-death delirium, but when Lyn was nearing the end of her almost 88 years here, she said she was packing her bags to take a trip and that she was trying to choose among the many different doors she could see. One of the doors had a light behind it.
“Something inside me has called me away. I don’t understand but I know I can’t stay. I’m lighter than air,” the soloist sang at Lyn’s service.
“Even if I am the only one who wants to fly, I’m gonna fly. No one knows where. But I’m gonna fly. I soar thru the air.”
Evalyn Elizabeth Helen Merrill is free now to soar on the most interesting journey of her life, so far.
