In Des Moines, Iowa, Maria and I were invited to breakfast at Wesley Acres, an independent living community. We came into the dining room at 8 a.m. and sat down at a table for four, we both bypassed the tables for two, I am not sure why. We ordered our breakfast and in a few minutes a resident named Betty Haas came asked permission to sit with us, I had the feeling we had chosen her  regular table.

She said her name was Betty Haas. She said she was 94 years old. We ate quietly for a few moments, and then Maria’s eyes widened and she asked Betty if she had made her earrings, they were beautiful and original. Betty nodded and said she practiced tatting a fine and rare kind of embroidery. I told her Maria was an artist also, and her eyes widened and her smile widened. “Oh, Maria,” she said, and then she got up walked to her walker, opened a bag and pulled out two handkerchiefs with tatting.

I could almost reach out and touch the powerful emotions these two strong women were evoking in one another, this very personal connection, this artistic connection. They just connected a couple of feet from me, they lit up at the recognition each saw in the other, they were not strangers meeting but old friends sharing a way of life.

I took out my Iphone and showed Betty some of Maria’s work on her blog, we asked Betty about her very difficult life. She grew up in a two room farmhouse in Iowa with six siblings, a weary mother and an alcoholic father with Emphysema.

Betty has had a hard life. Her husband returned from World War II damaged and changed, he died 15 years ago. She has worked on her tatting her whole life, ever since her mother taught it to her children so they wouldn’t drive her mad in the harsh Iowa winters.

Betty talked about the difficulties of aging, the struggle to get up in the morning, to remember things, the realization that one cannot take care of oneself alone any longer. When she fell and broke  her arm, her two daughters brought her to Wesley Acres, she is happy and grateful to be there.

“There is no sense in whining,” she said, “it doesn’t get you anywhere, you just have to find the strength to keep doing.” And, clearly, it is difficult at times. Betty blushed when Maria told her she was an artist too, Betty couldn’t quite except it, but it was clear it meant the world to her. They just knew one another, instantly, even though they never met before and are unlikely to see one another again.

But it was one of the most powerful moments in recent memory for me, these two knew one another, they had reached across a vast divide of geography, time, space and circumstance to find one another, they are at opposite ends of the spectrum of life in so many ways, yet their come together in the powerful space of creativity and meaning.

We both loved Betty Haas, and her brave and cheerful soul, her creative spark and the gleam in her eye that never quite leaves. I imagine a potholder will arrive in Des Moines soon enough. Life does deal a lot of hard hands, but no one can ever take from us the choice we have about how to respond.

We had to get up and leave, I had an interview, an old friend of Betty’s joined her at the table, I felt the tide of life wash over us and close behind us. So this is why we sat at the table, we told one another, this is why she joined us. It was inevitable that we would find one another.