Get busy

This painting began with an offhanded conversation between my husband and the somewhat younger neighbor. The two of them had been standing in our driveway, talking cars or engines or something like that. Apparently the talk turned to age, because the next thing I knew, the two of them were strolling around the back of the house, the neighbor in the lead, joking about living in the geriatric wing of the street—declaring unapologetically that my dear hus was old.

I immediately reminded this neighbor that I am even older than my husband (which sadly did not quell his commentary whatsoever.) My husband explained that he had just remarked that in 14 years, he'd be 60 years old. The neighbor's wife and I took this in; it was one of those "aha" moments, and in the second or two that followed, you could almost hear everyone within earshot performing a quick calculation in their heads. I don't think anyone who stops for a moment to do that math is terribly pleased with the answer, especially if you're over 40. It's disturbing to realize just how close 60 really is. And if you're reading this and you're already over 60? Then you might be plugging in a higher number, and figuring that ever-shortening distance between current age and the unwanted goal...

Either way, it made me stop and ponder that I, too, am fast approaching 60—that is, if I am blessed with that many years on this earth.

Which in turn reminded me of the quote from a fabulous movie, The Shawshank Redemption (the Stephen King novella was even better), when a freshly paroled character—Red—comments that he'd better get busy living, or get busy dying. He's absolutely right. Every day, if we wake, we are given another day, another chance at bat, another breath to take in with gladness and purpose.

...Which is why this very picturesque morning found me loading my foldable easel into the trunk of the car, along with a slightly minimized collection of paints and brushes and a too-small canvas. It was the largest blank canvas I had. There wasn't time to go purchase larger—I needed to get busy living, see? Because I yearn to improve my plein air painting skills, and I can guarantee that I will never get better at it if I never do it. Inactivity and lack of effort, my friends, ensures stagnation.

So, I did it. I emulated my local art crush, Ron Donoughe (please Google him and join me in my adoration), and I packed my stuff and hauled it out to a scenic "rails-to-trails" path near our home (the Panhandle Trail—I highly recommend it—this view is a detail of the quarry wall). I gimped to a good spot (sore knee, doc appointment next week); then I fought at length with the easel's intricate setup mechanisms. And then, I did what I came to do.

It isn't my finest work, and it isn't quite finished. I took a photo before the lighting changed too dramatically, and I will try to refine it a bit at home tomorrow, perhaps. But today, I reveled in the morning, the developing sunshine and accompanying warmth, the passers-by, the cacophony of birds, the impossibly blue sky. I claimed it for my own in that pretty little spot with brush in hand.

Get busy living. Don't wait. Even if you're gimpy, or the canvas is too small, or you know the result might not be pretty. There will never be a better time than right now!

Pondering other people's youth...

So, a few years back, my husband and I scanned a ton of old slides for my parents. We watched as each tray-full revealed painfully young, gangly versions of the people I call Mom and Dad. We saw faraway places (my dad did a stint in the Navy during the Korean War), we saw nattily dressed youngsters who turned out to be elderly aunts and uncles and family friends, and we marveled at how America had gotten a lot more big and full of itself in the past twenty or thirty years. It was a sentimental journey because we knew some of the travelers. It was nostalgic. It was mostly fun and light.

More recently, we scanned a bunch of slides for some of my parents' neighbors. They, too, are family friends, but not quite on the same level of familiarity as many of that first bunch of images we handled years ago. To add heft to the occasion, these slides were being scanned for an upcoming sober family occasion, when family was gathering around a very ill, fading member. These films were full of many strangers, at least to me. Over and over, I popped the slim cardboard squares into position, hit some buttons, and waited while the pictures contained therein were magically transformed into digital images. The act was performed quickly, because the task was somewhat urgent, and yet I found myself staring at the pictures that appeared on my computer screen. Children, dressed in past clothing styles, sporting old-fashioned hair cuts; yards and homes now mostly gone, or changed beyond recognition. People in a small town, riding ponies on the street (my goodness, when was the last time you saw that around these parts?) Men working on and posing with their cars, showing off, hamming it up for the camera. Women in swimsuits and pretty dresses, smiling at the viewfinder.

My husband and I scanned slide after slide, marveling at the likely correct assumption that many of the featured faces had departed this earth, that the children we studied in the pictures were now older than we are. We grew quiet and thoughtful. At one point, he turned to me and said, "What do you want out of life? What do you want to accomplish?"

And I lazily replied, "I don't know." I didn't want to think about it, the impermanence of my time here, the fact that we are all just passing through. Even as a believer, even while I consider myself a citizen of Heaven, I still want my time here on this little blue planet to matter. I don't want to end up a 2-D image so removed from this moment that it seems fictional. What do I want to do? To be? To accomplish?

I still don't know. I should probably say that I want to lead others to our Creator, and I do. Is that enough? Does any of it really matter? We're just blips on a radar, really. Dust. Not to God, but to this world. It's a sobering thought, yet also refreshing in the same way that realizing no one is watching my show was liberating. We're all going to be pictures on a screen someday, and likely not the Big Screen that many in this media-saturated culture are shooting for.

Let's just live, and be kind, and give our best, and bite back the things that maim others. Ours is but a fleeting moment on Earth, after all. A snapshot, if you will.

Signs of things to come?

Lucky me—I've managed to pick up a horrible head cold, the first of the season. Thus far, my other two housemates have remained uninfected. I keep coughing in their general direction, which is my kind way of warning them to wash hands often with soap. We'll see if they listen, or also fall ill.

The worst thing about being sick is that I have no energy. None. Every part of my body feels heavier than normal, held down by invisible bands that make movement difficult and painful. Joints throb, extremities ache, my brain is dull and thick. That's the telltale symptom of sickness for me, the absolute drained feeling that causes me to sit stupidly or (worse yet) to lie senselessly on whatever flat surface is available. When I don't want to do anything, and I'm content to just sit, then I know for certain that I'm ill. Otherwise, I'd be in motion. I'm much happier in motion. It's part of the reason I shun television; I'm not even the reader I used to be, because it requires being somewhat still. (Yes, I know, I could get a Kindle and read while I run on a treadmill... Please. I want to enjoy the reading experience.)

Anyway, the whole sick thing makes me wonder if this is sort of how I'll feel when I'm old, Lord willin' and the creek don't rise. Will going up stairs take more effort than it's worth exerting? Will I have the strength to rise from my bed, or will I have to try more than once before I succeed? Will my brain feel addled and confused, like a maze of dead ends that don't lead to the right answer? Will my limbs feel constrained and leaden?

It's a valid question, I think, yet one that I don't want to consider for long. It's frightening to me, quite frankly, and I don't like to think about things that frighten me. I might be around for a long, long time, and I can already detect activities that aren't as easy for me as they used to be, memories that don't come as quickly, motions that used to be silent and now elicit an "Mmmph" sound.

The whole "is this what I'll feel like if I get to be an old woman" concern is just one more reason to hate being under the weather. Especially on a sunny day, with blue skies and warm-ish breezes. Those breezes aren't nearly as sweet when your nose takes up your whole face and the only thing you long for is a Vicks-scented tissue.

Okay, enough self-pity. Onward. I'll just carry some laundry upstairs now; I think I can break through the unseen barriers on the steps, the ones that press down on me while I'm trying to climb. I can do it. Deep breath (through my mouth). Here goes.

Your own personal zenith

I was driving this morning, running yet more errands with the boy belted in the back seat. I was delivering a raucous outburst along the lines of my own idiocy and forgetfulness and lack of focus (I’ve delivered a number of these lately) and this outburst was more vociferous than usual because it was the third or fourth time that morning that I’d experienced my own shortcomings.

First it was the misplaced keys. I suppose they weren’t truly misplaced, because I knew where they were: in the right pocket of the coat I wore yesterday. That’s where I always leave my keys. But why do I keep doing it? Then, I remembered a paper I needed and had to go grab that from upstairs while my patient son sat strapped in his car seat. And then, as we headed to our destination, I got in the wrong lane and ended up going in the opposite direction, away from the store I’d meant to visit.

That was the point that drove me to vocal uprising—that final wrong turn that took me away from where I’d been headed. I wound down the declaration of my frustration, and tried, not for the first time, to explain to Marcus why I was so angry. “I’m not angry at you, Honey—you know that, right? Mommy gets frustrated because she’s not able to think as well as she used to.” And he said he understood, although Lord knows if he does; I’m sure if he’s sitting in therapy some day, he’ll think back on my self-abusive tirades and blame them for something deficient in him.

My waning brain is cause for alarm, though, if not for diatribes. I used to be a clear thinker, able to catalog lots of tasks, and put things back where they belonged, and make certain I was in the correct lane and that the day’s events were mapped out neatly and efficiently, in geographical order… No more. It just isn’t happening like that these days. And I don’t have a newborn to blame, don’t have a gaggle of children hollering and throwing things in the mini-van, don’t take any meds. I’m just not as capable as I used to be.

That goes for all areas. Not as thin, not as limber, not as pain-free, not as able to go without rest. I’m not as.

It made me picture a typical human life of average duration as a mountain of sorts, or even a bell curve (remember, I used to teach). It seems we spend the first half striving to acquire things that we hunger for: basic skills, then knowledge, coordination, perspective, increasing freedoms and permissions. We work for all those years on “arriving.”

I don’t know if I even realized when I had arrived—does anyone? For many of us, there’s no a-ha moment of achievement. Unless you’ve earned bank presidency at a young age, or have been hired to coach for the NFL when you still have little kids at home, or find yourself aboard your own yacht while you’re still agile enough to handle the thing neatly and swim ashore if it sinks—unless you’re extraordinary in some way, it’s quite possible you’ll reach the pinnacle of your arrival and completely miss it.

You’ll figure out soon enough if it’s passed, though—oh, you’ll figure that out without any problem. You’ll start to notice brain misfires and malfunctions, you’ll start to make involuntary noises when you stand up from a squat, you’ll notice your skin beginning to sag here and there where once it was firm. You’ll play a sport some weekend and suffer for the next week. You’ll stay out too late one night and suffer sleep disturbances for days. You’ll look around one morning at work and realize that, if you’re lucky, you’ll still be here in this cubicle many years from now, vainly yearning for that corner office. You’ll stop talking about traveling around the world.

Then you’ll know, in your heart, that you’ve passed that point: your own personal zenith.

But there are advantages to aging, to becoming seasoned. I’ll tell you what they are as soon as I can remember them.