aging poetically

Old age hits us like a truck just as we round the corner and cross the street in front of it, at least that’s how an old Far Side cartoon by Gary Larson illustrates how fast old age hits. All the sudden the joints and muscles that once moved fluidly now resist with painful twinges of protest. It took me a year or two to realize “Oh, that’s Arthur(itis) come to visit,” when a stormy weather front moved across the area. Old age brings many new experiences. In the Bible, Ecclesiastes 12 describes it so poetically that I did not understand what it meant until the Youth for Christ leader explained it.The chapter begins simply, “Remember your Creator in the days of your youth, before the days of trouble come.” At 15, who believes troubles are coming, let alone that we will be old before we know it. Now in my 70s, I realize my life has reflected the rest of the chapter. As a teen I did not understand the phrase, “While the sun, or the light, or the moon, or the stars, be not darkened, nor the clouds return after the rain.” That meant I had sharp eyes. As a 20 year-old I could see everything clearly then but the passage predicted readers in my 40s, bifocals in my 50s and conversations about cataract surgery in my 60s and 70s. I thought I had missed that one until the optician said, “Have you noticed you can’t rub your eye enough to see clearly? You have a cataract.” Me!?! No!Physically, I now live “in the day when the keepers of the house shall tremble, and the strong men shall bow themselves.” Are the guards scared? No, those words refer to losing at least five percent of our muscles every decade after 50. Don’t sit down and give up, though. Slow down the inevitable process and go exercise. That’s the one thing I really don’t want to do. “Exercise!” I tell myself, “it’s better than a wheelchair.”Old age is one loss after another. Next “the grinders cease.” The writer is not talking about the grist mill. He means “welcome to the age of dentures or expensive implants.”The next bit of poetic description left me muttering, “what did you say?” “The doors shall be shut in the streets, when the sound of the grinding is low, and he shall rise up at the voice of the bird, and all the daughters of music shall be brought low.” In other words, “Speak up, Sonny. Quit mumbling like everyone else these days.” Including Hubby who has the nerve to say the same thing to me.Even in his 80s, Hubby does try to defy the next sentence, “When they shall be afraid of that which is high.” Hubby afraid of the big, bad ladder? In his 30s, Hubby roofed our two story house with our 70 year-old neighbor. In his 70s he hired a crew to cover our one story ranch. He says he hired them because the neighbors and family worried about him climbing up there. The last time he said something about ascending a step stool to change a lightbulb, I recalled my three falls and three broken bones. “No thanks. It’s cheaper to hire someone to do it than to go to the hospital.” Ahh, the wisdom gained while reaching the time of life when “the almond tree shall flourish” which means, “Your hair is white.” White hair, toothless, tottering, deaf and blind. All told, old age is not for the faint of heart. The poet ends with, “the mourners go about the streets … and you go to your long home.” That’s a weird way of saying we end up six feet under. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, that’s what happens to the best of us. So remember your creator in the days of your youth. Because even if 60 is the new 40, these days do not last long at all.