Being Old

Older Eyes – Bud’s Blog began with the post, Feeling Old.  It talked about the moment that the thirty-five year old living inside my head could no longer deny the truth.  I’m now sixty-seven and the guy in my head is thirty-eight.  As the years pass he has more reminders that although he’d like to drive this body as he used to … with relative if not total abandon … it’s not a wise course of action anymore.  When I’m out and about, I get called sir a lot.  People open doors for me, and if they’re blocking the aisles in Target, they say, Sorry, sir, as I pass.  Standing in the lines at checkout, young women initiate conversations with me, something that never happened to my thirty-eight year old.   I guess that means I’m old, hopefully cute and certainly harmless.   Sigh.   Muri and I still are treated as a Cute Old Couple.  There’s just something about old people in love, I suppose.  When I go to the doctor, my yearly physical is a senior assessment and I’m handed a page of senior questions.   One question this year was, Have you fallen in the last 12 months?  I’m an honest guy so my answer was yes … my doctor seemed comfortable with my explanation, a parking barrier that appeared out of nowhere.

The truth is, I don’t need the external reminders to tell me I’m old.   I’ve noticed this year that my balance isn’t what it used to be.  If my internal thirty-eight year old turns me in hurry to do something, I’m likely to feel a little dizziness.  It doesn’t help to know that the thickening of the fluid in the cochlea, the part of our inner ear that controls balance, is the culprit.   I’ve noticed that when I reach into my mental file cabinet for a name or song title, I’m more likely to come up empty.  If I’m patient, I usually find the answer but sometimes, I consult my other brain, Google on my Blackberry.  Exercise is harder to build up to and hurts more afterwards.  What I call exercise has changed.  I used to count miles run, now I count minutes walked in the park.  I have good intentions but the road to didn’t-exercise hell is always at hand.  Loading our stuff into the car for our Christmas trip to Phoenix … with our bedroom on the second floor … is a workout.  Weight goes on easier and is more difficult to take off.   My mother used to tell me, Don’t ever gain more weight than you can lose in a year because if you do, you’ll never lose it.   At the rate I can lose these days, I’m probably there.  Household chores that used to be routine can lead to sore muscles and little aches appear out of nowhere.  Body parts don’t work like they used to.

Would it seem disingenuous to say, I’m not complaining?  Because at least for the moment, I’m not … I’m simply stating the Facts, Ma’am, as Jack Webb used to say on the show that few remember.  My health is good.  I’m with the person I love most in the world and for the most part, I can do what I want.   But when I was actually thirty-eight years old, I don’t think I ever grasped what it would feel like to live in an aging body.  I don’t know what I’d have done differently if I did … maybe start writing sooner or thought things through before making some unwise decisions.   The thing is, Younger Eyes, it’s a blink of the eye from where you are to where I am … so use your life wisely.   In the meantime, life is good at sixty-seven … but very different than thirty-eight.  And whoever said that Sixty is the New Forty is an idiot.  Probably a hopeful forty year old idiot.

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Tags: curmudgeonly rants, feeling older, gratitude, humor, Life, love and marriage, postaday2011

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