“Do you see that picture there?” he asks me, his feeble finger pointing to two framed portraits on the wall near his window.

I turn and look at the photos—two aged photos of the same young, handsome man. The man’s thick, dark brown, blackish hair is slicked back. He wears a tan suit and an easy smile. The pictures are faded to a sepia hue because of decades of age. One is a close-up of his face, the other looks like it was done in a studio.

I say that I do see the photos, and I smile because he likes to point them out to me every time I visit.

A digital photo frame sits on his desk. Photos flicker through the frame one after another. He comments on some of the photos as they pass through the screen, describing the people, where the photo was taken. He points out certain ones with pride. When the photos repeat, he mentions the same comments again.

He’s not forgetful. I know that he knows he told me already who is in the photo. I know he knows he mentioned where it was taken. So why does he repeat himself?

He sits in his wheelchair. He leans to one side, unable to keep his body upright. His one hand is gnarled and tightened closed. His other hand, the one he holds out to shake yours, is just as stiff. His face is worn by the years he’s seen. A number of strokes makes it difficult for him to speak. When he tries to form words, I have to listen intently, leaning in close.

Some days he’s not even in his wheelchair. He lays in his bed. I hate to wake him up on those days. But I know he really enjoys having a visitor, so I knock and say his name until his eyes open, his face lights up, and he smiles.

Sometimes I bring him a drink, a strawberry milkshake, from the restaurant across the street. I’m told it’s his favorite. He seems happy to receive it. His hand reaches for the cup. I place it in his wrinkled, thin-skinned hand. He puts the straw to his mouth; nothing comes up. He tries again. And again. And again. He motions for me to remove the lid.

When in his wheelchair, he uses his feet to scoot around the small one room he’s been given. The room is sufficient, but not homey. The nightstand has a large water mug and some tissues on it, along with a picture of his youngest daughter. The desk against the window has seen better years somewhere else, but it suffices. It holds his Bible and some other papers. To the left of the desk is a television, not one of those flat screens, but the boxy type claiming ample space.

There are some other pictures around the room, hung on walls, propped on furniture.

Pictures. Always pictures.

There’s a saying, “A picture’s worth a thousand words.” For a man who has trouble speaking, his pictures speak volumes. They paint a picture of who he was before he was here, here in this room among many rooms. An old man among many old men and women in an assisted living home. He is in a sea of people who can no longer walk on their own, or feed themselves, or change their clothes, or go for a drive, or so many other things that you do every day without thinking.

So he points to a picture you’ve seen before and he’s told you about before, and he says the same thing again. You start to realize: He’s trying to speak those thousand words. He’s trying to use what he has to tell you something. He wants you to understand. He wants you to know that that man in the picture on the wall—that’s him. The proud father hugging his daughter in the digital frame is him. The man standing in his garden in that yellowed photo; that’s him. The man standing with his family, his arm around his wife, his house in the background; that’s him.

The body I see before me now—the limitations, the inabilities, the struggles, the shuffling of feet, the bones showing through skin and the thinned hair—is not him. Those are the things you see now. Those are traits of age. But that man in the wheelchair doesn’t see himself like that. He sees himself as the man in the frame on the wall. He wants you to see him that way too. He wants you to talk to him like he’s that man.

ONE DAY I sit with him, next to his bed. As we sit there talking, two nurses come by; one introduces him to the other. Then they walk on by. One of the ladies who lives down the hall stops by. She complains about her back and asks how he’s doing and who am I. I help make his words clearer by repeating what he says. Then she shuffles along her way. A lady comes by and ask him if he wants to sit up and places a banana in his hand and walks out, on to the next room.

Then he starts singing country songs, and when he sings “Walk on By,” I start laughing. Because it’s true, so many people here, and they all walk on by, or they dart in and out. I know they have other people to attend to. But it’s no wonder he likes visitors. No wonder he likes the person who doesn’t walk on by, but the person who walks on in.

Every day I visit, it’s different. Some days are good, we both understand each other. I’m loud enough for him to hear me and he has less trouble forming words (or I better understand his charades). Other days are challenging. He may not feel up to speaking, so we sit and watch television, flipping channels and commenting on some of the shows. I repeat the news louder, in his good ear, when we find a good news channel. Not one day is like another. But on they go, one after another after another, like the photos flickering by in the frame.

I hope I understand and see him how he wants me to. I hope every day I visit, I see the picture.