O is for Old Age

… if your spirit is still more or less intact, one of the benefits of being an old crock is that you can enjoy again something of what it’s like being a young squirt. …if part of the pleasure of being a child the first time around is that you don’t have to prove yourself yet, part of the pleasure of being a child the second time round is that you don’t have to prove yourself any longer. You can be who you are and say what you feel, and let the chips fall where they may.

Frederick Buechner, Whistling in the Dark

My mother had dementia. Her filters fell away. She said things that I never imagined her saying. Once we were in a church to watch a concert. The woman who sat in the pew ahead of us was morbidly obese. My mother leaned toward me, but spoke in a loud voice, “That woman is FAT! Fat, fat, fat!” I cringed. Filters help us be kind. Not every thought we think needs to be said.

But there is a also a confidence that comes with age, as Buechner describes.

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Young squirts and old crocks have so much in common. Intersecting arcing lines on a giant graph of life.

My body is feeling its age these days. I’m scheduled for a total hip replacement this coming week. In the meantime I traveled to Virginia for my middle daughter’s college graduation. Because of my hip, I rode with my oldest daughter’s family instead of doing the 8-hour drive myself.

My one-year old granddaughter is just starting to walk. Her favorite way right now is holding onto her mom’s index fingers for confidence. Sometimes she can be coaxed to let go and take a few toddling steps before she drops down to crawl or turns her head to look for her mom.

I, on the other hand, struggle with my first steps getting out of the car. It’s such a simple thing to do that I have taken for granted all these years. Now I pivot on my butt to get my legs out the car door and slide forward to stand the way the physical therapist instructed me. After two hours of sitting though, my hip protests. The pain is sharp and intense. I press my lips together and grit my teeth to stand and walk.

My daughter asks, “Are you okay?”

“Yes,” I reply tersely and mush on. In some ways I feel like the surgery can’t come soon enough.

My granddaughter and I are both learning to walk.

After the Baccalaureate service yesterday, the college president had all the graduating students stand on the grass of the quad lining the sidewalk. After saying a few words of encouragement to these young people embarking on a new journey, she had them all step onto the sidewalk, symbolic of moving on to whatever comes next.

Another first step. Exciting, fresh, new, a little scary.

That’s how I feel about this hip surgery. I won’t even stay overnight in the hospital. They’ll get me up and have me walk that same day. Exciting, fresh, new, a lot scary.