Tag: Aging

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For most of this summer, I struggled with a spider on our side porch. It all started one day when I noticed the string that turns on our porch light was out of reach for some reason. I pulled it down so I could reach it better. A few days later I noticed that it was again out of reach and I wondered what was happening to the string. This was when I noticed that the string had been incorporated into a spider’s web.

At first I thought I am not going to let some spider beat me. I pulled the string out of her web but the spider kept spinning the string back into web. Every morning I would take it down and the next morning the string would be back in a spider web. This went on for a week or so before I decided I would let the spider have her way. It was only a little stretch for me and I imagined it was a bit more work for her to spin her web and pull the string into it. I was being silly to fight with her about. So I surrendered.

Every so once in awhile I would need the porch light on so I would pull the string as gently as I could so I wouldn’t yank it out of the web. Occasionally, despite my best efforts to be gentle, I accidentally would pull the string out of the web. But the spider would repair it the next day and the string was where she wanted it.

Until the other day. The string dangled freely outside her web which was no longer translucent but grey and old. Day after day, I would check to see if she had reattached the string into her web and each day I was disappointed to see it hanging there.

She hadn’t returned to her web. I told myself stories. She didn’t need the string any longer or she moved to a new location but I knew she was probably dead. Spiders don’t live much longer than a year or so and it had been at least six months since I observed her work with the porch light string. She had probably come to the natural end of her life. It has bummed me out nonetheless.

I was of Katherine Mansfield short story “The Fly” where a man who lost his son in World War I struggles with a fly caught in his inkwell. Each time the fly gets out, the man puts more ink on it and roots for the fly to struggle free from his dilemma. He keeps doing it until the fly eventually surrenders to its fate and dies — upsetting the man.

I am at a certain age when people have begun to die around me at a frightening pace. Three people who I know in just six months. Others are getting sick and taking a long time to recover. Some, I surmise, just aren’t going to get better. Then there is the daily reminder of my own diminishing abilities — not hearing everything, pains in the knee, getting winded when climbing stairs, trouble seeing while driving at night and most of this is not going to get better. Only worse. Yet we, for the most part, carry on.

In the meantime I am waiting for my spider or one of her children to return.

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Until recently, I prided myself on being able to spell the most difficult word and if I couldn’t spell it, I could generally spot my error pretty quickly when I edited. As I age, though, I find that this super power is declining. Maybe aging isn’t to blame but I have only noticed the problem since I slipped over the 65 years marker. Whatever the reason, I have noticed my spelling has gone to Hell in a hand basket.

Here are two recent and, once you see them, embarrassing, mistakes. I tried to spell technically as tycnically. I was convinced that the tycn was correct and ically was wrong after I began to edit. I spent an ungodly amount of time trying to change the ically before realizing that perhaps the tycn was wrong. I still think that tycnically is a valid alternative.

Then there was exspell instead of expel. This misspelling I blame on my sounding it out. I say ex spell when it should be Ex pel.

I am not so worried about the actual misspelling because I think that when you are writing and you need to get the word on the page, putting down a close approximation of the word is enough until you go back and edit. But now I can’t see the problem where it once, on review, was easy for me to spot. I now make countless attempts to correct the wrong syllable.

Which means I am down to one super power – parallel parking.

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I have a trick ankle that can give out for no good reason, so, even though I enjoy history, climbing through an ancient pile of rubble* presents a unique problem for me. I want to see the rubble but I also don’t want to break any bones while imbibing my whim. Even as a young man of 17, when climbing the temple steps in Teotihuacan in Mexico I saw the danger. These steps might have been suitable for the ancient Aztecs but are impossible for the modern foot. They simply do not accommodate the entire foot. This required me to either angle my foot in such a way that my foot would fit on the entire step or only using only half of my foot to push up to the next step. Either practice could easily collapse my ankle, sending me tumbling down the stone edifice. The further up the stairs I got, the more terrified I became as I stupidly turned around to see how far I’ve climbed and saw the distance I would fall. Long enough to break a lot of bones and maybe even kill me.

But nothing exceeds the pure terror of the Acropolis which combines uneven rocky pavement with terrifying heights. If I could take my time, focus on each step and climb, I think I would have been fine. The Acropolis, however, has the added danger of knowledge hungry tourists. There is a sort of pathway to the top but it is strewn with large rocks and small ones and it is all up. The further you go, the longer the fall. This is daunting enough but then you add hundreds of tourists racing around me with only one thing on their mind — getting to the top before I did. Somehow the beauty of the Acropolis is enjoyed much more if you get to the top before a struggling old man. Once I get to the top there is no time to rest enjoy the beautiful view and the old rubble. The pathways going from ruble to rubble are rocky and uneven. There are unsecured stones and pillars laying this way and that. I am questioning whether it is worth the possible danger to my body to see the ancient world. Although I did think of my million dollar idea while thinking about it — a stand renting football helmets and pads for worried travelers would give those people an added measure of security.

*Thanks to Ted Shifrin for correcting my spelling of rubble. I had ruble.

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When I was a kid, say 11 or 12, it annoyed me to hear old people (think grandmother here and not mother) always talking about how they won’t be here next year. It didn’t occur to me then that these people actually died. It seemed liked an unlikely subject to dwell on because, chances were, they would return next year. Why were they jabbering on about and making me feel bad about them potentially dying?

Then I turned 65, and I began to understand the feeling but I am having a terrible time putting it into words. I now see an end where I never saw one before. From about the age of 21 until I turned 55, I ran. It was a part of my life. It kept me in shape. And without thinking about it I stopped running. At first, it was due to an injury. I have a trick ankle and it was constantly giving out on me. Well, it gave out on me while running and I got hurt. Nothing major a lot of scrapes and bruises but I had to stop running for awhile. Except I got better and I didn’t resume running.

The truth was I was tired of running. I just didn’t enjoy it anymore. I was tired of scraped knees and twisted ankles. I was tired of dodging cars and bicycles. I was tired of making time for running in my busy day because I had a reached a point where my body required more running to achieve the same results. Now, I am sure there are runners out there saying, this is nothing, you can still run, I just need to adapt my runs to my aging body. I am sure they are right, I am just not interested anymore. Even though I made no conscious decision to quit, I know I will never run again.

This is what aging is about. There are a lot of ends coming my way. This is not something I saw when I was younger. I see it all the time now. My partner and I bought a car last year and he said this is probably the last car we will ever buy. Given that I hold onto cars for 15 years at a minimum, I thought, shit, he is right. This leads to another new way of thinking, even if I do make it to 80 — would I buy I new car? Why would I make the investment? Will I be able to pass California’s driver test? So even if wanted to buy a new car in 15 years would it make any sense given an even more restricted time line on my eventual death.

I want to come up with a word that describes my feelings here. It isn’t quite sadness even though sadness is a part of it and it isn’t quite fear although there is an element of that too. The best that I can come up with is I am beginning to see a future where I am not in it. It shocks me. I know that this sounds self-centered. I don’t mean it that way. Rationally, I know that I am not the center of the universe, the world will continue quite nicely without me. I am, however, the center of my world. I have spent the last 65 years seeing my place in this world. Year after year of working, getting an education, traveling to distant lands, reading books, seeing movies, flirting, running, fucking and all the many other wonderful things I filled my time with. I no longer will be here for the fun. It is disconcerting.

For some reason, it is quite easy to see myself in the past. I had parents and grand parents. I can see my place smack dab into the middle of a family tree. I am quite clear on where I came from but where am I going? Nowhere, it seems. No one will get to meet me. My opinions will no longer be heard. My presence isn’t required for the world to continue merrily on. Why would the world do that?

The changes in store for me are mostly ends. I will stop climbing the steps to the top of my apartment because I can no longer manage them. I will need to get rid of my worldly goods because they will no longer fit into the much smaller space I am sure that I am destined for. I will stop driving. I will get rid of my work clothes because I no longer wear them. I will travel less because it is too much of a hassle to get through airport security and eventually I will stop altogether.

This sounds rather depressing but that isn’t exactly what I am feeling. I am presently in good health and I know, if everything goes right, I have a good 20 years are so to enjoy. Yet, I continue to see endings. I continue to stop doing things I can no longer do the way I used to do. I have a limited time frame and many of my coming decisions focus on how the end of my life looks like. What will I do when I when I finally get too sick to stay in my very big and unsuitable house for an old person? What do I want to do with my body? Buried or cremated? Will I have enough money to see me to the end? What if I outlive my money? This is not a future the young want to think about and they don’t want to talk about. They don’t see the end coming. Why should they? It isn’t a pressing issue for them. But, for me, these are pressing questions that I can’t really delay answering for much longer.

The pain that comes along with aging concerns me. Aging has a lot of emotional and physical pain in it. New aches and pains appear every day now. My body is less resilient than it was before. More of my time is consumed in medical tests, procedures and operations which is letting me know that body is breaking down. Friends and family are getting seriously sick now. Who will die before me? How many deaths before my heart breaks? The end has a lot of pain. There is no way around it because even the best ending comes with a lot of goodbyes. Final goodbyes are painful.

I don’t mean to be morose. Seeing the end is a weird thing. Incredibly difficult to explain. It is a mixture of sadness and disappointment and pain but the funny thing is I don’t think I have ever been as happy as I am now. Seeing the end is pretty liberating too. I am much more sensible. I do not suffer bores and by that I mean boring people, boring books, boring movies, anything boring. I used to think I had to finish everything I started. I don’t. If I am not engaged in something, why bother. Seeing the end has made me a better manager of my time. I see time is now limited. I want to use it wisely.

And I don’t want it to end. I appreciate every moment of my life now in a way that I could never have when I was younger. I know life clearly has an end. It is a strange and emotional place to be in. I wish I could describe it better because it really is something to experience.