For those of you who have access to the digital television station ABC2, tonight at 8.30pm the documentary ‘Andrew Jenks: Room 335’ is being broadcast.
Here’s the promotional blurb from the ABC website:
Just like the other residents at the assisted living facility Harbor Place, Andrew Jenks played bingo, hung out in the courtyards contemplating ‘the golden years’, and even helped fellow neighbours change their oxygen tanks. However, unlike Tammy (age 95) or even Bill (age 80), he is only nineteen years old.
For a summer he moved into a senior residence in Florida, into room 335. For one summer he did all of the things that old people do. He wanted to find the answer to the question: how do they feel now that they face the end of their lives?
He laughed at their jokes about sex, played baseball with canes instead of bats, and raced through the hallways in his friend’s wheelchair. By the fourth week, three of his closest friends were hospitalised and his best chum, Bill, stopped talking to him. He coaxed his neighbour through a heart attack, saw the heartbreak of dementia, and witnessed the death of a friend.
By the end of the summer, he had formed unimaginable bonds with some of the greatest, and oldest, people that life has to offer. And had learned some lessons about himself in the process.
The ad was interesting, so I’m going to have a look-see tonight.
I suspect some may need a box of tissues at some points during the screening.
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