This tender painting is titled, Old Lady with a Rosary. It was created by the Scottish portrait painter, George Fiddes Watt (1873-1960).
There is so much to notice here. This elderly woman lives in extreme poverty. Her dress is faded and worn. Her threadbare, tattered curtains are useless. There is what's left of a broom leaning against the wall under the window. Her spinning wheel is there as well, but I sense she is now too frail to use it. The wooden table with the damaged edge has been around a long time.
There is a small pitcher on the table and a cup of tea perhaps. She has just placed it there — see the steam rising from it. The walls and the floor are the color of the earth. They remind us that death is near, as does the clock on the wall.
What thoughts fill her rosary prayer? What does she bring to her prayer? Maybe just an uncomplicated love of God. Is she lonely, having outlived everyone? Is she mourning the loss of dear ones? Has her poverty reduced her, such that she is asking for death? Maybe she is praying for strength to accept the challenge of dimmed sight, arthritic hands and spine? The beads she holds delicately have gone round and round for a very long time — what stories they could tell. I think she is an image of a faithful soul, accepting what comes each day. She is taking her time — a contemplative soul, full of inner awareness, and I expect gratitude for all that has upheld her over the years.
Even to hold the rosary is a prayer. But if we learn nothing else from her, perhaps this, that finishing the whole thing in record time isn't what matters, but that we pray even the littlest bit of it with attentive love.
