Aunt Nezihe, my century-old neighbor, used to say "when people get old, they live with a series of apparatus." Then she would list these apparatus like a poem that took a place in her memory, glasses, walking stick and radio… You know, radio had an important place in the lives of the elderly at that time. Elderly individuals would turn on the radio hourly, follow political and social events, make comments on their own, and participate in life.
Aunt Nezihe lived her life in a way that every old person could envy, and she used her time efficiently. But her children would find a reason to criticize her, and they would be offended. Every time the grandson came, he would reproach and say, “The news you are listening to makes you feel more depressed, I will throw that radio out one day”. This conversation between the grandchild and the grandmother reveals the difference in interest between the two generations and neither the grandmother could understand the grandchild nor the grandchild. The grandmother was sensitive enough to feel the pain of a person whose heart was hurting across continents, and she sent prayers to a whole world and saw this as a human responsibility. The grandson, who was interested in entertainment programs and could not see the painful side of life, had difficulty in understanding the sensitivities and sensitivities of the grandmother. Grandma was a sycamore, but she could not reach her grandchild growing in her shadow, and could not affect her perspective.
Aunt Nezihe lived alone in a three-room house and three apparatuses that made her life easier were very important to her. Cane, glasses and radio. She would go out leaning on her walking stick in the early hours of the morning, buy her bread from the local grocery store and have her breakfast before sunrise. She followed the news meticulously and put on her glasses, read, commented and prayed the newspaper she took from her door every morning. Aunt Nezihe was an old woman whos always prays...
Aunt Nezihe used to say that as you get older, your glasses, the medicines you routinely use, your walking stick and the newspaper with which you connect with the world become tools that make your life easier. She was so integrated with these tools that she regarded each of them as a part of her body and never complained of deprivation. At that time, the elderly saw their helplessness and the tools that would make their lives easier as a blessing and praised it. Surrender and prayer would make them feel good and shield against depressive problems.
When Aunt Nezihe passed away, her glasses, walking stick and radio, which she saw as a part of her life, were abandoned by her grandchildren among the garbage heaps. For them, these were tools their grandmothers had become obsessed with and should have been discarded long ago. The grandchildren had never understood her anyway, and it was not possible for them to understand her after that. These tools functioned while Aunt Nezihe was alive and made her life easier, now the task was over, the road was exhausted…