That parent and child were always wrapped in sunshine

When she asked me, whom I hadn't seen in a while, "Are your children doing well?"
I replied, "Yes, thanks to you, they are doing more than well."

My home is on the 6th floor of a large apartment complex with 350 units, and her home is directly below mine on the 5th floor.
Even though we lived exactly one above the other, we rarely saw each other, and when we did happen to run into each other in the elevator or the entrance, this was the kind of exchange we would have.

Seeing her for the first time in a while yesterday,
I felt relieved, thinking, 'Ah, they are doing well.'

Has it already been seven years since her beloved son passed away?

He had an intractable disease called "muscular dystrophy," and the parent and child were always together wherever they went.
The way she always looked at him with eyes full of unconditional love seemed very divine to me.

Muscular dystrophy is an unavoidable force

Muscular dystrophy is caused by genetic mutations in the proteins that make up muscles, which leads to muscle weakness and various functional impairments, including motor dysfunction.

Symptoms such as inability to run, inability to jump, and frequent falling begin to appear by around age three, and motor ability declines after the age of five, with overall muscle strength weakening and eventually leading to all sorts of complications.

It can also develop into serious illnesses such as swallowing disorders, heart failure, diabetes, and benign or malignant tumors.

Strangely, it only affects boys, but it is not hereditary; it is a genetic abnormality caused by a sudden mutation, making it one of the most difficult intractable diseases, with no way to prevent it and no known curative treatment.

The balcony lockout incident

Since her son was about ten years older than my sons, we didn't have any connection, and although I had seen him, we never had the opportunity to talk, but a certain event led us to start speaking.

Twenty-one years ago in the spring, when I went out to the balcony to hang the laundry, I was locked out by my then one-and-a-half-year-old second son from the inside.

There is a large window on the balcony side in the next room as well, but that was also locked.

My four-year-old eldest son was at kindergarten, and of course, my husband wasn't home.
Since it was just me and my monkey-like second son, I had no choice but to gesture for him to unlock the door from the outside, but he didn't understand at all.

Before long, he started playing with his toys as if he didn't know me, and even though I knocked on the window several times and called out to him, he just mimicked me and knocked on the window back.

Just as I was at my wit's end, I heard a voice from below the balcony,
"What's wrong?"
When I looked down and explained the situation,
"Is the front door screen door closed?"
"Y-yes, it is!"

Oh! That's right.
It wasn't quite the season to have the front door screen door open since it was still chilly, but I remembered that I had just vacuumed earlier that day and had left the louver-style screen door open to ventilate the house.

"Wait a second!" she said, and once she went back inside, she soon came running from the direction of the front door with a hand mirror and unlocked the window from the inside.

To my surprise, she had inserted the handle of the hand mirror through the mail slot of the louver screen door and, feeling around, turned the lever to unlock it.

"Since it was a screen door, we managed, but if the door had been locked, you would have had to call a professional," she said with a gentle smile.

As I expressed my gratitude and thanked her from the bottom of my heart, I was also able to realize once again that she was the resident living directly below me.

I believe I had only gone to greet her when she first moved in, and over time I had forgotten both her name and her face; although I would see her occasionally, we never connected the names to the faces.
Of course, I also didn't know which apartment she lived in.

Starting from this day, she went from being a stranger to a "neighbor."

Symptoms that progressed every time we met

Since then, whenever I met her, we would exchange a few words, and while it was still early on in our acquaintance, she told me—perhaps sensing my hesitation to ask—
"My son has congenital muscular dystrophy. He was walking just fine when he was little."
she said.

There wasnot a shred of gloom in her demeanor; it was filled with a crisp, bright cheerfulness.

Even though we lived in the same apartment building, we could only meet occasionally, but I could see that her son's symptoms were steadily worsening.

At first he could sit normally, but then devices to support his lower back and neck were attached, followed by one for his head.
Then his limbs also came to be supported by braces, andeventually he reached a state where he could only move his eyes.

She converted their car into a wheelchair-accessible vehicle, handled all the transportation for his daily school, rehabilitation, and hospital visits, and went everywhere together with him.

The apartment building is U-shaped, with the parking lot in the center.
Whenever I opened my front door, the parking lot would spread out below, and I would often see her pushing the wheelchair of her son, who had grown into a large young man.

She pushed that wheelchair through rain, wind, heat, and cold.

The effort, which likely required her whole body due to the weight, should have been a grueling task, but for her, it was a veryhappy daily routineand aprecious time sharedwith her son.

The way she carried herself didn't look like she was just caring for a disabled son; regardless of whether he had a disability or not, it exuded an attitude ofsimply loving her child and being grateful for the opportunity to raise him.

Remembering this when hitting a wall in parenting

I had been worried that she might be feeling lonely living alone after losing her son, but after exchanging short conversations with her a few times since then, I found not a single trace of pessimism in her.

Perhaps, from the moment she was told the name of her son's illness, she hadmade it her mission and resolve to watch over him until the very end,and I think she felt a kind of"sense of accomplishment"from having raised him with heartfelt love and having spent as much time together as possible.

Even so, to have a clear consciousness but be unable to move one's body at all—could there be anything morecruelthan that?

Thinking of her son's feelings makes me feel helpless and breaks my heart.
And when I think of her feelings as a mother, I, with my narrow heart, fall into ultimate pessimism.

However,she was always smiling, with no arrogance about the difficult parenting she was doing; she was simply fulfilling the role of an ordinary mother.

Meeting her made me feel ashamed and small for worrying about things not going my way while raising my own child.

Trivial things don't matter.
I should be grateful that they were born healthy and whole.
And as long as they grow up healthy, that is enough.
I have come to think this way.

Since then, whenever I start to worry, I try to remember this parent and child to reset my perspective.

There must be some circumstances; I have never seen her husband, and I imagine that raising a child with a disability alone must have involved extraordinary hardships.

Nevertheless,there was not a single shadow on her.

The sight of both parent and child walking along, overflowing with smiles and talking to each other, looked to me as if they were wrapped in a softwarm-colored light.

That image always struck a chord in my heart and brought tears to my eyes.
I remember being unable to take my eyes off them for a while, saying to myself in my heart, 'Have a good day!'

Even now, when I think of them, my eyes grow misty and my heart feels warm.