esrosedotblog

Today, an interesting article in the NYTimes.

The Insomnia Machine

For a long time, I drank to go to sleep.

Not a good idea. I ended up in deep deep trouble. With the help of doctors and the best recovery program known to man, I was able to climb out of the pit I had dug with that one.

But lack of sleep or the idea of it haunted me for awhile.

No more.

I can go to bed and am gone in minutes.

I had techniques that I used and, still, occasionally use to get on the sleep train. The most dependable method is to focus on my body, one part at a time. Starting from the toes is good. I do not think I have ever gotten to my head. Also a random accounting of all my pieces works too.

One rule. I never get up except for a few minutes to pee but nothing else. This is against the law with sleep specialists.

Naps, too, are prohibited by the specialists. Verboten. I am a rebel here too. I nap every day. I get up early in the morning, wide awake, at 4 AM. Sleeping in does not work for me. But later in the morning, I go back and nap. Not a "power nap" although I perfected that when I did management training. For lunchtime, I would go back to my room and lie down. Zzzzzzz. I could get up on time, sharp, refreshed and go to work. Same now with the longer naps. About an hour and fifteen minutes.

I rarely have any trouble going down for a nap. If I do, I get up and take the message from the universe that a nap is not on my list of activities for the day. This happens rarely.

This could be genetic. I learned it from my Dad. Emulation. Nature and nurture. He could drop down like a rock. And stay there. We worked together for a couple of years. I watched him go to the car and drop off for awhile, snap up in time and be refreshed. I did the same.

Good stuff Dad.

So, I suppose I am not an insomniac at all. In fact, I am convinced that if I thought I had trouble going to sleep I would. Have trouble. This was Dad's trick. He just assumed he would drop off and wake up in time. No worries. Me too.

When I have had some bad "can't sleep" spots here and there I have tried counting but not in a sequence. Usually starting at 300 and counting backward.

Another counting trick that works is to count in threes. Not every other number but every third. I think what happens is the mind rebels against such nonsensical exercise and just shuts down into alpha and beta waves.

I would never eat anything to go to sleep. Warm milk. Yuk.

I have no personal hints.

Perversely, when awake there are some annoying things that can happen that make me sleepy. When I least want to shut my eyes.

One is meditation. Somnolence is considered one of the mind's tricks to keep us from finding whatever it is we are looking for in sitting. Gentle treatment brings us back to the mind through breath.

Meditation is another subject however. The problem there is more the idea that we should be mindless. Not so. Mind-ful-ness means being able to see the mind at work and letting us know about it. Just information going through. Bubbles.

But meditation is a kind of work and my experience that trying to meditate lying down is not a good idea. Not for the soul and not for sleep. In fact, if I meditate in bed I am stoking insomnia by mind focus which is the last thing I need for a good night's rest.

Sometimes when I am at the computer, I get sleepy. Work aversion? I don't know.

Same with reading. Even a good action packed novel which is mostly what I read now. Non-fiction, a guaranteed snooze. But give me a good M/M romance with plenty of sex and I am your master reader. Dozing the farthest thing from my mind.

There are a lot of paradoxes here. A maze. I sympathize with the real insomniac. Thank god I am, ultimately, too much of a sleep hound to miss another opportunity to take a nap.

Finally, let me give you one hint which is of absolutely no practical use. If you have trouble getting to sleep or having naps, get old. The old timer in the rocking chair is no myth, Sleep is the natural haven for the codger. A pick me up for creaky bones and a mental balm for erasing self pity. So, try it. Get old like me and your sleep will come along with you.

It took me almost 80 years though. You may not want to wait that long.

Labels: aging, life, sleep

I pay a lot of attention to the old guys around me.

I mean the guys who are ten years older than me. Which is now, the guys who are around 90.

I liked this clip about Norman Lear who is still active at 93 going on 94.

How to live.

Labels: aging

I went to take my written drivers test today,

In California, people over 70 have to go in every five years to be "looked at".

It is not a cursory examination. There is an eye test right at the sign in.

Then on to a written test which is not easy.

If you want to have some fun, take the practice test(s) California DMV Practice Tests

I have been scheduled for a test today, the written one only, for about a month. In the last few days I have been shitting bullets over it.

I learned tha last time we did this that it should be taken seriously. As I recall, I flunked and had to go back another time.

So I have been stretched out the last few days. Not freaking but just at an edge. I suppose a good one.

This morning I got the old training morning heaves. The dry choking.

It has been a long time since I have had any of that.

Well, actually, it is always present in a light form.

As you probably know, I pray about stuff in my own way. So I took the advice that I hand out to people and sat with this and asked for help.

Not with the test. I do not think God delivers answers to which turns are illegal. But there is relief from "the bondage of self". And I got that.

By the time I got to the DMV I was cruising.

I went to the designated "appointment" line and there was one guy ahead of me. He turned and smiled (very cute) and then turned again and he had a familiar symbol on the back of his jacket. He has three years in the same Program.

Just what I needed. He was not there for a test just some paperwork as a limo driver and also to give me a bit of a jolt of knowing all was OK.

Even if I flunked it was OK.

But I did not. I passed. Got one wrong (you can "skip" three) and then was out of there. Less than half an hour door to door.

My new license will be in the mail and I am good for another five years.

Labels: aging, driving

It is hard not to personalize films that come close enough to feel their breath on my neck.

Still Alice (2014)

gets pretty close.

Julianne Moore plays a woman who has early onset Alzheimers. Somehow they are able to do this without becoming all clinical about it. More human.

The thing that I have always feared is that I would know when this was happening to me and would be powerless to do anything about it.

The old word was "dementia". But that is a general term. Alzheimers is an identifiable genetic disease which has predictable results. Incurable, it has a downward progression which is irreversible.

I think that it must be difficult to make a film about something like this. Not make it a horror show and, on the other side of it, not to candy coat it.

I think there me a bit of candy coat here but that is OK with me. Moore does a great job in allowing us to see through the disease and to see that she is still Alice.

Alex Baldwin is great as the husband and Kristen Stewart is kinda the star as the struggling actor daughter who comes home to be with her Mom.

No soap opera here. Some tears of course. But still, warm and beautiful and, after all, human just as this whole experience is for a family.

As far as I know, I am safely beyond the point where this will happen to me. And even if it does strike, it will be something else that probably gets me first.

Another example of all the stuff we worried about happening not happening.

It is hard to rate this by my normal criteria. I will give it a 4 even though I do not think I would want to see it again if on offer. But then, I will have to bow to the system and give it a 3. Good enough. But once is enough.

Labels: aging, films

I am not sure that I should be looking at a cartoon about old people.

Particularly when it seems true and frank and clear right down to the core of it.

And a cartoon! Many eons from Mickey Mouse.

Wrinkles (2012)

It was hard to watch and, at the same time, very cleansing.

This film puts it all out on the table. The good, the bad and, well it is all kind of ugly but not always.

I think that the animation allows a certain reality. Ironic, that. There are no actors mincing around pretending to be geezers.

This is an Argentine film. The thing takes place in an old age "home" so there is a certain cast to it which I think is not in our/my future. Somehow we have made a transition from "homes" to home with at-home help. If you go to a home it is a nursing home and it is because you must have nursing. These people are not there yet. That happens "upstairs". The dread end point for the terminally sick and the demented.

This is a very good film. The animation is superbly done. Not at all "life-like", that wouldn't work. But stylized in a way that keeps a strong connection to reality.

I do not want to see this again. Once is enough. But that is more because I am living out my own wrinkles and do not need any reinforcement. I should put a smiley face next to that. I am not really in a downer about the film or being an old fart.

A 4 out of Netflix5.

Labels: aging, cartoons

Sometimes, a lot really, I feel like I am defying the inevitable time line of aging.

I feel a lot younger than I am. Or, rather, I feel a lot better than I thought I would at this age.

But then there are days that I fucking feel my age. Not old, in the way I thought I would be. Feeble, simple, drooling.

It is more fundamental than that. I feel as though I have had a really heavy workout. Over the top. Weary.

I ache. Here, there, well, everywhere. Goddam it.

There is no cause or cure. Doctor Jim says, when age comes up, that I am just "old". That is the condition. The blatant truth right out there in his office. The physician speaks.

For a long time I have not acknowledged being old. Oh, from time to time, when people express surprise to find that I am 77, I wallow in the implied compliments. But usually I am quiet about it.

I am not sure that is a good thing. I don't want to be a whiner but the fact is that I am, somedays, not in the best of condition.

This does not involve "health", incidentally. This just means that chronic, moving around aches and pains are usually present.

We saw Bruce Dern yesterday playing an old man and the stiff walk was, in a way, comic.

But when I get up, the first few steps are very Dern-like and anything but funny.

That's it.

My dose of small self pity for the day.

So I ache. I earned it. One way to think about it. Like war wounds.

I still go to the gym every weekday. Half an hour on the bike, different body parts every day with the weights. That doesn't hurt.

It is immobility that hurts. The inertia sets in and I have to get going again.

Actually, this is my solution. Keep moving. The old Satchell Paige quote. "Don't look back. Something might be gaining on you."

If you are younger than me and reading this it is probably a little scary or you will not want to hear it just because it is negative thinking. Or something. Good. Don't think about it. There is nothing in hell you can do about it when your turn comes.

OK. I am going to get up now and start moving around again. Next thing will be a nap.

Labels: aging

JUST IN TIME

I am leaving for my 630AM date to have my second cataract operation.

Look at this!

Improved Vision After Cataract Surgery Lowers Risk of Broken Hips, Study Finds

In this morning's NYT!

The study adds to findings from earlier papers indicating that the benefits of cataract surgery, a relatively safe outpatient procedure with a high success rate, may significantly enhance the quality of life for the elderly, improving sleep, enabling them to be more engaged and mentally alert and curbing depression.

OK. Although I sleep like a log.

We are about to leave. John and Booker will do their walk there and I expect to be out around 8AM.

If this is as good as the first one was/is then I will be very happy.

Labels: aging, cataract surgery

CLOSE CALL

Johny, the guy at the gym, asked if I had a new id number because it showed me "inactive" this morning.

Look, given my new accelerated bike program (full half hour at the machine's max effort) I am anything but inactive. So I freaked when I realized that I had not paid up on the 7th of May due date.

Why is this important?

Because when John and I moved to Palm Springs, the Golds, then a franchise, was in trouble. They had overbuilt the facility and there was a bad economy again. We look back to bad economies in the way that people look back at a city they are leaving. There are so many that looking into the future is just a mote in the sun.

Anyway, we went to a movie and there was an ad for Golds, we had been going someplace else. They were offering a lifetime membership for 99 dollars a year. All you had to do was buy two years NOW.

I had been going to Golds for quite a while before we moved here. All the way back to the old location out in the desert. In a Mall.

So we went and joined up.

Today the annual membership costs about 450 dollars. Bang!

So I went out today in person to re-up and hope I wouldn't have lost my privileged fee.

As it turns out I have thirty days after the expire date.

Then the high fee kicks in. Over the years it involves a lot of money.

My surprise was over the fact that I missed the date.

Because of the money advantage and the belief on the part of the dwindling number of people who have the 99 deal and the paranoia we have about the gym being out to take it away from us on a technicality, I have worried my way along with it.

Always on my calendar. Why not this time?

Shit. Maybe it is because I am feebing out. But then, the woman who took me in told me she was shocked to see my birth date, I look so good.

Ahhhhh.

Labels: aging, gym

DAVY JONES LOCKER

I am at the age where everyone is dying. Except me, so far.

Often there is little surprise in this. The people who passed were either older than me or the same age.

The ones who surprise are the ones that I presume were younger or were, in fact, younger. In this case much younger

Davy Jones, Monkees Singer, Dies at 66

I was a fan of this show and Davy was my favorite. By a long shot.

He was funny, he was very handsome and above all, he was short.

I am a connoisseur of smaller men. I married one.

They pack a lot into a tight space. They are reachable. You can fold them, well never mind.

Davy was small.

I had a crush on him. It continues today. A post mortem crush.

He had the goods. And he had talent.

Here is the surprise. I thought he was a lot younger because that is the Davy in my mind. I never saw him as he grew up and out of cuteness and into God knows what. I did see a YouTube of him in which he is playing the guitar in one of those old star autograph shows. The clip below just turned up.

But this is not Davy Jones. This is an old, pleasant guy strumming and singing. I have had a crush on a personality stuck in amber for all these years. God, at least 40 years.

Unrequited love is a sad spectacle. So unrealistic in the first place, pathetic in the final awakening to reality.

Here he is in his last performance. A reunion tour.

You can see the young man under what is now mugging for the camera. This is why I never went back to training and quit before I became a mockery of myself.

Labels: aging, fun. music, life

SOFT SHOULDERS

In the Bill Withers film, Withers talks about aging and laments the disappearance of his shoulders.

I have just been going through this over the past few months.

There is nothing to do about it. Well, maybe pads.

First, the appearance of moobs (man-boobs), then the pot.

All those lead to the illusion of narrower shoulders or, to put it another way, if you are getting moobs and a pot, wider shoulders will counterbalance them.

But, sooner or later, the shoulders go too.

Well. I am almost 75. 74.5.

I still go to the gym and do the cardio and enough weight training to keep things strong. But strong is not muscle mass. Muscle mass is down the drain after a certain age.

Labels: aging, gym

THE GEEZER MARKET

I hope to take advantage of some of this stuff, eventually,

A Greying Population Spells Business Opportunities.

Right now it sounds like horseshit.

Good and well meaning horseshit but still.

Horseshit.

A lot of it is trivial.

Look at the video from the MIT AgeLab.

AgeLab. One of those mashed brands. Two caps, one word. Oh, Jobs what have you wrought.

Look at that age suit. She says it is for someone my age. I mean that us emulates someone in their 70s. The restrictions.

I tried all the things the suit seems to say I have trouble doing and I can tell you the suit is a lot older than me.

I suppose there will be a time when my kids will want to monitor my pill intake and when I turn on the goddam lights but I don't plan on reaching that any time soon. It is true that they have no idea what pills I take and so be it. The dependent become more dependent. If they know it all then I can forget it. No.

Do you note a hostile tone here?

You are right.

This kind of thing is so condescending as to be meaningless. These young whippersnappers have no idea what aging is like and they will not until the day it starts to happen to them, assuming they don't get the big A first and get silly.

They will find that life in the 70s is not a burden. That a lot of the things they want to do, we do not want to do anymore, and are glad to be rid of it.

And I can put my arms over my head full and touch my hands and so they can take those silly elastic bands off the suit.

What they need to know is that the Boomers who sat on their ass (them) and couched their way through life aren't savable. The ones who got wise to all this and started working out and eating right and quit the drugs are way ahead of the AgeLab. We are part of the new 70s.

There is my hero Jack Lallane drinking his "cocktail" probably at 80.

I am pre-Boomer. Just the right age. Not too old to have seen the handwriting on the wall about being in good health. Not old enough to be some new niche market for the hucksters.

Now I suppose, ironically, I will drop dead tomorrow and prove the point of the article somehow. But I will have cheated the business men who wanted to make a buck out of my geriatricality.

Fuck 'em all.

Labels: aging, gay life, MIT, technology

LYING LOW

I haven't done it since, well, I can't remember.

Thursday is an off day for me and today was really off. I got back from the gym and had breakfast. Went to the computer for some internet. Got and sent some email. Farted around in general and never got dressed beyond my boxers after the shower. Then a robe.

I hung out for the morning. John was gone to "work". And Booker and I just relaxed. A nap. Then I dressed.

I used to take days like this when I was really working. Between trips.

It was nice.

I might do it again sometime. I don't even do this on my annual retreat to San Diego.

Maybe it has something to do with it being my birthday tomorrow. 74. I have been telling people that is my age for a few months now.

Is this the beginning of the decline. Pajamas (I will have to buy some as I don't own any) and lazy mornings. I don't think so.

Well, not often anyhow.

Labels: aging, life

PARTY PARTY

We are going to a birthday party today.

80. A birthday girl.

I thought to myself, "how old"!

And then realized that Ruth has only six years on me.

OK.

We are taking Booker. He will be a distraction for the in between times that I have trouble with. I am good at the arrival and departure. It is the middle I have trouble with.

Walk the dog. Booker needed some air.

There is no food involved. Cake and coffee.

Then home.

I hope to be on the ground about an hour at most. Hopefully, less. We get there at 230, cake at 300, out on the road by 330. It is way out in the boonies.

Home in time for dinner and a short poop walk. Booker. I use the occasion to have Stouffers Pot Pies.

No work and lots of calories. Comfort food.

I got the large because the small seems too small.

We only have pot pies about once a year because they are so rich. But the one time. So good.

Sun today. Went to the pool. The party makes it a sort of fucked up day as far as my routine is concerned but I have framed it well.

Labels: aging, birthdays

MUST HAVE

There is no excuse. There are no options.

If you can, in any way afford it, you must.

We were advised in our early 60s to get Long Term Care Insurance.

It costs what everyone else in our age cohort cost who bought it at the same time. About 2500 dollars a year.

Ignore Long-Term Care Planning at Your Peril

The younger you are the cheaper and better.

We have never had a rate increase. We are with Genworth, owned by GE.

That doesn't mean there will not be any.

The good news here is that people are living longer and many are using their policies and the policies are paying off. But there was an actuarial miss for some companies and some are raising the rates.

Believe me when I say that this will not likely happen again. They got burnt. The realities are now baked into the new policies.

There are many harsh realities in this article. One is that Medicare or other general health insurance will not help with the costs if you are disabled by age. Well, some things will be covered but not the expensive care element.

Some people think that their children will take care of them. Money or actual nursing. Perish the thought.

The insurance kicks in when you have three of the ten or more signs of being disabled. Can't get up, can't feed yourself, incontinent and others. Those are the ones that scare me.

With my insurance we will get home care if needed plus all the equipment.

This isn't a very cheery topic for the blog but, since our annual bill is coming up, it is on my mind and here was this article.

Labels: aging, health

GROUNDED

We have covers for our living room skylight. They need to be taken down in the fall and put back up in the spring to block the sun halfway.

This means getting on a ladder and climbing up.

I think that I reported that I was self grounded two year ago. I got up there and I felt "funny" and I really didn't want to come down and I got shakey on the rungs and, as my feet hit the ground, I said "never again". And it has been that way for me.

Last fall, John reached the same conclusion.

The day that happened a young friend was here and he said that there was "no reason for you guys to do that". He and his partner would come and do the job.

And so they did just the other week and they did it without any serious instruction from us.

In the fall, they will also clean out the gutters to get ready for the winter "rains".

And we will stay on the ground. Feet firmly planted. End of an era.

Labels: aging, life

NOT ME

I have written about my desire to make it to the age of 90. A healthy 90, of course. Not one all tubed up and crinkled into a fetal position. I came in that way.

But don't count me in with this bunch of show-offs either.

Seeing Old Age as a Never-Ending Adventure

To me this is all just horseshit.

They don't show the crew of people behind these geezers who are propping them up and keeping them going.

I didn't see how much this was costing them. A lot, I bet.

I know. Here I am. Being cynical again.

But I figure that these are just the usual loudmouths and showoffs that I am around now. Hogging the limelight. Not satisfied at being a certain age. More into being a phenom.

I mean, look. Wing walking? On a biplane?

Hiking is OK but if you break your ankle isn't that a warning sign?

I gave up reading this after the first half. It was too tiring to read about these freaks trying to be young again.

How about this as an alternative. A nice life spent with neighbors and friends in low profile activities. Living in the world, aware of what it going on and participating in it. No "look at me" "gee whiz" shenanigans.

Ego. Annoying the shit out of other people. what gives geezers a bad name.

I am not too worried about risk. Life is risky enough. Why would I want to stand on the top of a wing? To be seen, of course.

I will go for the quiet anonymity of a good life.

I didn't try sky diving or any of that stuff when I was younger, why would I try it when I am on my way out? The rush? Please. I have tried "the rush". It ain't all that it cracked up to be.

If you have to have that adrenalin coursing around to keep you going you aren't looking around you and smelling the flowers.

And, with that, I will go take a nap.

Labels: aging, heroes

72

Yesterday was my 72d birthday.

I went to my Meeting and word had already reached the group. Lots of hugs and best wishes and the inevitable question, "How old"?

I love saying "72". I love it so much that I have been saying it for about 6 months.

I won't start saying "73" until about June.

I love being old. Does that make sense to anyone else? It even seems a bit weird to me but that is how I feel.

I revel in my age.

That might have something to do with the fact that I am way healthy. No pills to speak of and no "conditions" to worry about.

I keep a low profile on the celebration. I asked for "nothing" so John made an empty box out of a nice set of cards.

I did ask for the coconut cake (boiled icing) from Billy Reed's (local restaurant of long standing) for dessert. We never have dessert.

John got these candles to put on top. Nice. Mine were black and white.

I bought a barbecue chicken for dinner just so I wouldn't have to cook and also because I love it but wouldn't normally buy it. Too fat. Dark meat.

But I tempered that with a salad.

I had a lot of phone calls and emails during the day. Nice.

And then it was over.

Did I tell you? I am 73!

Labels: aging, birthdays, life

THE HOLIDAY

For some, the holiday looms ahead.

In our house, the holiday has already passed.

Yesterday was John's 70th birthday and it was a nicely orchestrated extravaganza.

No one actually orchestrated it but it had the aura of a performance nonetheless.

A parade of friends, FedEx men, postal workers, florist delivery people as well as phone calls came in a regular cadence. Flowers, gifts, messages of love. Even a bunch of balloons while we were having cake and ice cream. Talk about perfect timing!

Inside the house we had two best friends visiting to give a bit of human mass to the birthday dinner (roast beef and oven roast potatoes) as well as the cake and a lightly sung "happy birthday".

There were some neat gifts.

Good tidings.

This morning another beautiful tropical flower display. I wish the weather matched it.

Of course, I am just an observer but I think that he had a pretty good time. I think yesterday's events were unexpected, in a way, because the biggest event was his trip to Italy. This serial celebration was icing on the cake, so to speak.

I had a good time too. I get to smell the roses and play with the gifts!

I realized today that I have a husband who is 70 years old.

I told him recently that it had never occurred to me that I would end up married to a 70 year old man.

We think like that.

I never expected to be a 70 year old man myself. I must say that being one has been rather nice. Painless. An easing into the unexpected.

I think that most of us realize throughout our lives that we will continue to age and then die. This is just a superficial awareness. The actual experience comes as a, so far, gentle surprise.

So here we are. Two guys who made it this far and have so much more to see and do.

What a wonderful time of life!

Labels: aging, birthdays

OLD MAN

Sooner or later everyone will have to face the issue of John McCain's age.

He is my age.

He is an old man.

Now, I am an energetic, extremely healthy, aware and bright old man who is in very good shape.

I am not fit to be President.

I am probably not fit to hold down any 9-5 job.

I get tired.

I have seen too much. I am a cynic.

I lack ambition.

I am privileged and spoiled.

I have forgotten half of my experience and more.

I am obstinate and woefully out of touch with 'regular' people.

I am not a regular person.

I am an old man.

He simply cannot do it. So what does that mean?

He will be a surrogate.

His 'people' will run him.

Now don't get me wrong.

I am still good for something.

I work with a lot of people one on one. But I can't stand crowds any more.

Watch McCain. He can't either.

He schmoozes. That is OK. But he does not handle groups well.

I remember when my Dad hit that point in his life when he was pretending to 'get it'. I find myself doing that a little now and again. I stop it immediately.

I see this with McCain.

He misspeaks.

So do I.

I have excellent short term memory for a person my age.

But it is not enough.

I do not want that man's hand anywhere near the bomb or anything else.

A while ago, while I was still getting my haircut by a barber, I noticed a huge election sigh in the window. City Council. A man who had years and years of experience. He was 70-ish.

I mentioned that I would never vote for anyone that age.

The barber was incensed.

Probably still is.

These are the people who will vote for age.

The ones who venerate age for all the wrong reasons.

There are a lot of good things McCain can do.

We know that he is already an expert curmudgeon. A sign of codgerism if there ever was one.

He can be a Senator. We know that isn't hard work. Your staff does everything.

He could stay in the Senate. He could be a good advisor.

He could sit on a committee.

But he cannot be President.

No matter what other reason I would have to vote against him, this is the killer.

Labels: aging

WALKER

I was walking with Franklin on an old trail out to Granada and back; the big loop.

We don't do that one much anymore.

He currently favors anything that loops through the trailer park—sorry—the mobile home club.

We do not have trailer parks in Palm Springs.

He likes this new territory because it is new and also one of his best friends, a terrier mix named Foxy, lives there. She is one of my favorite dogs too.

There are also way more kitties per square foot than anywhere else I have seen and now that bunnies are practically disappeared from our territory kitties are the only blood quarry that a dog can go after.

But, occasionally, once a week or two, we return to the big Granada loop.

You can't abandon good paths entirely. There are old friends and sights and smells to visit and a lot of pee mail to collect and deposit.

We went out there this week and as rounded a corner an old guy came out of his house with a walker, all shaky and slow.

Our trajectories were such that we sort of hit the same spot together.

As I approached, I realized that this was Maurice's walker.

Maurice was this great cockapoodle with bright black eyes and great white hair. He and Franklin were great buddies and would always get up for a visit with skips and jumps.

Maurice was the only dog that I ever saw actually leap about ten feet forward.

I am not kidding.

He was the jumpingest dog.

I had not seen Maurice or his walker for quite awhile. A year? More?

Anyway. This was him. The walker. Not Maurice.

Shrunken. Half with it. He did not recognize me.

He asked if I could get his mail out of the box and put it on the bag on the walker.

I did.

He was kind of curmudgeonly about it.

Somehow I couldn't bring myself to ask if he remembered me or where Maurice was or what had happened.

I just got the mail and put it in and experienced the sour sick sweat smell that comes from lack of bathing and poor health.

Besides Franklin was jumping and trying to get back to the walk and I didn't want to have him in the way.

All that.

It was quite disturbing.

This guy was vital and alive and full of fun the last time I saw him.

Can it happen so suddenly?

All that lost?

I don't often get upset about my aging but every once in awhile I get an eyeful and a warning.

It is a little scary.

But then I realize that I don't have to cross that bridge until I come to it and it might not be on this road at all.

Labels: aging