I have just come in from ferrying one of my wrinklies to the home of two others for a 'shut ins' communion.  When I was training for ministry one of my supervisors said he always liked to take at least one other person with him when he was doing a 'home communion' because it is a better symbol of the church gathering.  I think he is right - and sometimes it gets a few done in one go, which is also helpful from a logistics perspective!

As they chatted about past events and remembered their children's childhood (before I was born...) one of them observed that 'God gave us memory so there could be roses in December.'  I like that - it has depth and meaning, it is hopeful and honest.  It may be that supermarkets and hothousing make it more figurative than literal, but to me it carries a powerful truth: 'Lo I am with you always, even to the end of the age.' 

I have now typed it into 'Google' and find it is far from original, indeed it originates with J M Barrie, may have been part of a song sung by Vera Lynn and is certainly the name of a book about grief.  Yet it was 'a word in season' for two elderly women on a dull February afternoon when communion happened.