Aging and Self-Improvement(?) Archives - Page 5 of 5

Happy Birthday to Me

Sep 23, 2011

Here are two poems and a mini-essay on the subject of getting older. I wrote the essay in July. It’s now sufficiently aged, like the finest wines, cheeses, meats and me.

Nursery Rhyme: Numbers

by Lola Haskins

Seven old ladies crochet for the boys,
Six old ladies hear thunder.

Five old ladies afraid of the noise,
Four old ladies go under.

One old lady to pick up the lace,
One old lady is crying.

How cruel to be born with only one face
And to see in the mirror its dying.

buy from independent bookstore

buy from Amazon

I’m turning 64 tomorrow and I’m depressed. Oh, not really depressed. Maybe it’s wrong to use the word for my condition, when people I know and love are stalked by clinical depression. But you know how certain birthdays just feel really old? For me it was 8 and 13, 43 and 51. The first two thrilled me. The second two not so much. This one doesn’t thrill me at all. I feel as though I’m running out of time. I feel as though there are a thousand things I once wanted to do, and now I don’t want to, or can’t.

My life is a boring succession of minor aches and pains – ankle, groin, foot, hand. This month my shoulder is unhappy about the way I was sitting at the computer. I’ve been using my husband’s laptop and the chair is too low. Now I’m in for six weeks or so of minor disability, ice, and possibly physical therapy. When did my body get so damn sensitive? It used to do whatever I want; now it complains when I ask it to get up in the morning and make me some coffee.

A friend sent an email of three photos, called Time Passes. Five little girls, six young women, five old women all lined up looking out at the ocean, all shot from behind. The little girls hold hands, wear baggy shorts to their knees, stand so sturdy in the sand. The young women lean over a boardwalk railing, frayed shorts above their buttocks, muscles smooth and luscious. The old women are in bathing suits, bending over, showing six variations of ancient thighs. I never see my legs from behind – it’s quite enough to see them from above, with the six inch scars where my wonderful knee replacements reside.

I’d like to give credit but I can’t find the source

I like the way I look, if I don’t look too close. I like having fluffy white hair. I like the way people in South Africa call me Mama and hurry to help me. At the Origins Museum in Johannesberg I told the young man behind the desk that I had no cell phone to call a taxi. He called his supervisor. After buttering her up with a discussion of some problem he had solved, he asked if she could help him. “I have an elderly lady here with no cell phone and she needs to call a taxi.”

Elderly – that was me. Why does it sound so much older than old? I see a little, trembling, bird-like woman, leaning on a cane. No one could mistake me for a bird, nor do I usually tremble, though I’ve certainly had months with a cane, which I came to love for the stability it gave me after knee surgery, and the candy cane stripes that made children smile.

I was lying in bed, sad and stewing, and finally got up to write this. Of course I felt better after I did. Now it’s morning. I suppose I’m 64 by now, though it’s six hours earlier in Florida, and I was born at 2PM in Argentina – I have no idea what time it is there. I believe in China I would be 65, because they count the time in the womb – or that’s what my father always told us. I will choose to believe it’s already happened, so I can stop dreading it and start getting over it. I’m 64, and Joe is taking me out for a fancy lunch. I can’t possibly count my blessings because I have too many, and I’d probably lose track. Anyway, there’s no time to waste.

I Ran Out Naked in the Sun

by Jane Hirshfield

I ran out naked
in the sun
and who could blame me
who could blame

the day was warm

I ran out naked
in the rain
and who could blame me
who could blame

the storm

I leaned toward sixty
that day almost done
it thundered
then

I wanted more I
shouted More
and who could blame me
who could blame

had been before

could blame me
that I wanted more

buy from independent bookstore

buy from Amazon

Sweatin to the Oldies

Sep 9, 2011

I’ve found another hero – Richard Simmons. Because of him, I have exercise in my life again, and I love it.

I used to walk several miles every day, swim a few times a week. I liked to dance and hike. I even backpacked to the bottom of the Grand Canyon and back. For several years, before and after my knee replacements, I worked out on machines at the gym.

When Amanda came to live with us, it all fell apart for a while. She was everywhere and all the time. Once she settled in, though, I was ready to exercise again. After our morning bike ride to school, I would write and then go to the gym. But everything interfered or tempted me – a novel to read, errands to run, a nap, a lunch date.

I needed exercise I could do at home. At the library the only exercise video I could find was for pregnant women. At 63 and out of shape, I figured it would be about my speed. It was OK, though the music was faint in the background, the instructor was bland and pious, and her constant admonitions – breathe for your precious baby, this is the most wonderful time of your life – were irrelevant and faintly irritating.

So I went on line and found Richard Simmon’s Sweating to the Oldies series, and bought all four. I had never seen him, except briefly in ads. He didn’t appeal to me: I thought he was just another sanctimonious self-help guru. I was wrong. He is a man full of laughter, happy to be totally ridiculous in the name of health.

The music is my age: Peggy Sue, Dancin’ in the Street, Twist Again. The routines are a great workout. They are low impact, and use a lot of arm action to keep the heart rate up. Each disc presents a different scene: a prom with a band, a party in a diner, an amusement park called ‘Sweatinland.’ Disc Four is a sock hop but for some reason begins with a black gospel choir in robes parading in and singing Shout.

His dancers are many races, young and middle-aged, most of them overweight. They dance and sweat behind him for 50 minutes, smiling, laughing, flirting, singing along. It really does feel like a party.

Some mornings I throw my whole self into it. Some mornings I move as if I were under water. Sometimes I dance six numbers and then skip to the cool down section, other times I do the whole tape. I usually dance in a tshirt and underpants and orthopedic shoes – no one sees me but my husband, and he deserves a laugh.

Richard Simmons is happy, kind, and encouraging. Every once in a while he slips in an earnest pep talk, and you can’t help but feel he cares about you. But best of all, he is thoroughly silly.

Instead of the standard drab warning that it is a federal offense to copy the discs, he and some hulking police officers raid a warehouse. They find about 75,000 pirated discs, and a surprising perpetrator. Richard camps it up, totally over the top, and I’m convinced it is his real mother in the co-star role.

When the band begins He’s A Rebel, a couple rides a huge motor cycle on to the set. The tarty blonde gets off, gives the man an extravagant smooch, and then lip synchs the song while Richard Simmons flirts outrageously with her, dancing all the while. It’s My Party is an energetic pantomime, complete with crying.

At the end of each disc, the dancers form two lines and applaud each other as they boogie one at a time down the middle. For some the screen shows how much weight they have lost; the numbers are impressive. They say Richard Simmons has helped millions of people to exercise and enjoy themselves. Now it’s millions plus one. Bless him.

THE GOOD OLD DAYS

THE GOOD NEW DAYS

click

Happy Birthday to Me

Sweatin to the Oldies

Categories

Pin It on Pinterest