Reba Chainey, right, prepares dinner for roughly 50 people every Wednesday for “Happiness Hour,” when families and elders convene for a meal, conversation, and, later, playtime. Credit: YES! Magazine/Paul Dunn. All rights reserved.
After a long day of preschool, five-year-old Joaquin Crowell still has energy to burn. He bounds from a TV cartoon to a magnetic fishing game, from blowing up a green balloon to listening to his favorite story, Bedtime for Frances. And 73-year-old Chris Conners is only too happy to oblige. To Joaquin, she is his oma— “grandma” in her native German. And to Conners, “He’s like my grandson. I fell in love with him the first time I saw him.”
