This story of Harl Barnett’s devotion and care for his beloved wife speaks to my belief and probably many of our beliefs that there are certain people destined to be with one another throughout all eternity.
Ann Landers aptly explained that “Love is a friendship that has caught fire. It is quiet understanding, mutual confidence, sharing and forgiving. It is loyalty through good and bad times. It settles for less than perfection and makes allowances for human weaknesses.
Love is content with the present, it hopes for the future and it doesn’t brood over the past. It’s the day-in and day-out chronicles of irritations, problems, compromises, small disappointments, big victories and common goals.
If you have love in your life, it can make up for a great many things you lack. If you don’t have it, no matter what else there is, it not enough.”
This is a love story, yet it is also a story of heartbreak and an enigma wrapped in a mystery told in the words of a man smitten and devoted to truly the “love of his life.”
Even after all these years, there is a paranormal aspect to this relationship that defies conventional explanations.
Harl and I both hope the reader of these chronicles will help a caregiver understand what lies ahead in the hell associated with Alzheimer’s and the challenges to be faced. Look for the italicized To Caregivers: throughout for tips and explanations.
These chronicles are not for the faint of heart rather they are for the Caregiver faced with what is about to be a journey into the depths of the unknown with each day revealing a new behavior that challenges them, their family and the hopeless victim of this terrible disease. --- L. Darryl Armstrong Ph.D.
