In theory, that is nice. And we have all offered several times. He refuses to let us and gets very upset if we try to act against his wishes. I appreciate your input, but the man is far too prideful to let anybody do any work for him that he feels like he could still do himself. He still cuts his own lawn, for instance, and won’t let any of us do it for him.

When he does let us help, we do. That’s why I was there moving boxes. That’s why the walls are blue and the floors are brand-new (thanks to my brother’s installation). The fact is that he usually just doesn’t let us do housework for him.

“If I stop going, I might as well die.”

He doesn’t paint the stairs not because he lacks the ability but because he doesn’t have any reason to do it anymore. Painting them would just trigger old memories of my grandmother and he’d rather just avoid it entirely.

If I showed up there with a can of paint ready to do the stairs for him, he would throw a damn fit. I don’t think you understand just how stubborn that man is.

I have a belief that he keeps them that exact way because that’s the last color my grandma asked for. If he messed up the shade even a little, it would really destroy him. So, rather than do that, he just lets them stay the way they are.