A Stern Lecture to My Geriatric Self

Dear Body,

Shame on you! We’ve been together for nearly 75 years. 75 years! And now you’ve become unfaithful—betraying me. At first there were the endless good times running, climbing, dancing, and lifting. My wish was your command: jump, sprint, swim, or backflip (well, maybe not that one). Now if I so much as wish to walk briskly you quietly limp away, very slowly. You have created pain in my knees, hips, shoulders, fingers, and most of the rest of my body for no apparent reason. Did I hurt your feelings? Are you punishing me?

I’m sorry if you think I’ve abused you—but it wasn’t too much or too often, was it? You used to recover quickly, even from those more serious and sometimes questionable-choice injuries. Now you just sit there and groan. You’ve quit trying. You’re not playing by the rules (my rules). Can we talk about it? Let’s go for a walk! No? A glass of wine? Are you listening to me? 

Dear Mind (such as it is),

Remember all those great times as a kid, going to college, raising a family, travel, jobs? Well I don’t. You served me well, so I’m told, for many years. So what happened? I still treat you well and feed you every day—reading books (at least Facebook entries), listening to Public Radio, and then there are those daily sessions with Jeopardy! But you don’t pay much attention any more.

Every day you taunt me by hiding my keys, my phone, and even my half-empty  coffee cup! Not funny! You erase the names of my friends from my memory bank—and probably laugh about it. You won’t even discuss phone numbers and addresses with me. Where the heck have you gone? It feels like I’m losing you. What have you got to say for yourself? Where did I go wrong? How can I win you back?

Love,

Me

 

Bottom Line

If you can’t count on your own body and mind to support you in your old age then there’s no justice in this world. All you can do is keep on keeping on—I actually can’t remember what that means but it sounds good. Does all this sound familiar to you?

axman

,

A Leged in My Own Mind

…how do I want to be remembered - is there even a choice?

When I was a kid growing up way out in the country, I knew a lot of older men who seemed ancient to me at the time – wrinkled, bald, fat, and sometimes crippled. I was told these guys were war heroes, ex-major league ballplayers, and bi-plane pilots. In my adolescent mind this wasn’t possible. Old duffers were always old duffers; they couldn’t possibly have been young and strong and brave in some past life.

Now I’m older than they were when I knew them. And even though I fit the description from above (wrinkled, fat, bald, and gimpy) I still remember the time when I was young and strong and adventurous. But how do my grandkids (and maybe great-grandkids) see me? Could they even imagine what I was like 25 or 40 or 60 years ago? Probably not.

Will they even know what it means to work your way through college? Would they believe I actually ran all those marathons and ultra marathons? And how could I have survived without HD TV, computers, cell phones, iPods, and especially wifi?

I guess the solution is: don’t worry about it, be happy. Keep doing what I do now. And accept the fact that I will be remembered as a strange old man and not the Greek God I would have like to have been in my wild, impetuous youth. My youngest grandchild was just born - what will he think of his old grandma and grandpa? Don't ask...


axman