Like family: 95-year-old picks girl's name off Grandparents raising Grandchildren tree.
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Kingston Residence provides assisted living. Ten-year-old Taylor Giles is just one of the perks.
The little girl skips across a floor more accustomed to wheelchairs and walkers than the nimble steps of fourth-graders. She waves to residents and crawls into their laps for cheerful visits. She hugs the receptionist. She says she has more friends here than at school.
It was Christmas in July when 95-year-old Inger Hogan picked a little girl's name off the Grandparents Raising Grandchildren tree. She didn't know she was getting a gift, too.
The tree was there to connect residents with children whose grandparents need a little help providing school supplies, clothes and the little extras such as the Heelys, those sneakers with wheels in the sole, that were on Taylor's wish list.
Hogan picked the little girl's name because her granddaughter, Taylor, was going away to college in the coming the months.
"So I lost my Taylor," she said. "I needed another Taylor to love."
She put a note explaining her reasons inside the school-supply package. She also wrote that she hoped to meet the child, to welcome a new Taylor into her life.
The new Taylor and her grandmother wasted no time showing up for a visit, then another one.
Now Taylor is usually at Kingston Residence every other week, spending time with her "Grandma Inger." Sometimes she's there from morning to dinnertime.
They get to know each other over board games. They watch movies, chat on the telephone and exchange letters. Hogan taught Taylor to knit. Last month, the little girl had her birthday party at Kingston Residence so Grandma Inger could be there.
With the way Hogan brags on Taylor, no one could guess they aren't blood relatives.
"She is so smart," Hogan said. "Her teacher said she will probably be a genius.
"And you should see the cards I get. I got one that said 'You're the best grandmother in the universe.' Not the world, the universe. She's just a perfect child."
Taylor's biological grandmother, Lisa Thompson, is a CNA at Brian Center and has a sewing business on the side. She calls Hogan "Grandma," too.
"Grandma can spend quality time with her that I can't," she said.
They sat in the family room Thursday afternoon, Taylor trying out the seat and fiddling with the adjustable arms on Hogan's wheelchair. Community Relations Director Tim Sullivan walked by on his way out. He stopped to talk and mentioned, as all new parents will, he and his wife had just had a baby.
"They are a special gift from God," Inger told him.
"So are adopted grandmothers," Thompson said.
Credit: Hickory Daily Record, N.C.
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