Maria

She didn't get along with most people and it was rare to see her smile. But get her onto the right topic and her entire face lit up. A flush of colour would penetrate her lips and even the medication that left her skin so withered could not prevent the instant moisturising of her cheeks.

I met Maria when I was 18 during the nine months I spent volunteering at Alloa Nursing Home. She was seated upright on her bed when I first came into her room. She wore her usual stoic look that day and demanded that she be moved to another room. When I sat down next to her, Maria told me that she was tired of being in a room where people kept dying. There were two beds in her room for Maria could not afford a private suite, and the last three people who were placed with her died frighteningly at night. Due to her health condition, she was not permitted to have any salt or sweetener, but the appalling blandness of her food paled in comparison to living in what had become a morgue. After more pleading, the doctors and nurses agreed to move Maria into a room of her own, albeit no bigger than a prison cell. We decided to have our chats in the spacious lounge room instead.

Each day I would visit, Maria would be ready and waiting. Sometimes she waited by the glass panels that overlooked the street where I would walk from the train station up to the Home. Maria told me about her trip by sea from Malta to Australia, and her life as a newly-married debutante. She lived the high life in those days - parties, evening gowns, glamorous coiffures, and the exclusive attention of a very handsome and wealthy man. Not having any other relative in Australia, Maria relied totally upon her husband to survive. She never considered pursuing employment or an education, so when the love of her life died, Maria's life went to the grave with him. For fifteen years, she struggled alone, without a single friend. Her late husband's family took no notice of her once he was gone, and she had no children to grow up and care for her.

The highlight of Maria's days was my visit. I would bring her make-up and exotic scarves to make her feel like a saucy young thing again. I would play the piano with her to help her bring to life the songs played before then only in her memories. But most of all, I would listen - to the times when she was alive - and in those thirty minutes or three hours that she would talk, I would see Maria resurrect from her grave - for a fleeting moment.

Many of us are like Maria. Our physical bodies sleep and wake in cyclical motion throughout each day, yet we still only live in the past. Our thoughts and emotions get stuck and we can't seem to move on - until the day we begin to see that we are not really alone, and that embracing each new day does not mean letting go of whatever meant the world to us before.

Maria has passed on now, but I feel blessed to have seen her smile, and one glorious day to have even heard her laugh.