What I Miss

As you get older, you begin missing things you either once could do because of physical capability or miss it due to innocence you had as a kid. Might even be from naivety, I know there were plenty of things I didn’t understand when younger that I do now. Probably what I hate most is the loss of physical ability. I have to use my dreams as a place that I can still run fairly fast as I never was consider a speedster. Heck, I remember around the age of ten almost getting thrown out at first from centerfield. Sad, but true, I didn’t have the speed which is why I find it strange that later in my teen years I was a tight end receiver in football. Not only was I a receiver, but I was selected as a first team All-state receiver in my junior and senior years of high school. In my dreams, I still have the moves, I still get into situations that require physical prowess to maneuver through and get out of a situation. But, even in my dreams, at some point, I’m going to take off running and get a cramp and then wake up screaming at the cramp in my leg and me trying to get up so that I can stretch my dream-worthy muscular legs back into my sixty-three-year-old reality. When I was a kid, I’d recover from a sore foot in days instead of weeks, finally deciding the only way to cure the problem is lie around for a few days with my foot elevated. The foot is just an example, oh believe me there are issues all over my body. Heck, I’m sitting typing and my fingers are going numb due to my shoulder pinching some nerve. I’ll have to stop now and stretch my shoulders to continue to type. Man, that’s sad when typing becomes a physical sport! Okay, I’m back from stretching everything I can do from the chair and I’m ready to go again. I really have to use humor to accept that my youth was so damaging to my elderly use of my body. But the mind, the mind that used to think six steps ahead of any situation and adjust has now turned into mostly reaction time to an unforeseen circumstance. Given the time, I will think through most all aspects of something, but now it has turned into an amusement for Jen in telling me we have missed out on a perfect rental house, maybe an excellent car, and certainly it took only five years to find the boat that was priced right enough that I felt I could move to buy. Writing has most assuredly helped my mind, but hang on, I need to chair stretch again. Okay, writing, yes writing has been a very friendly thing for me in recalling the English language, punctuation, but mostly in my mind focusing on a task and flowing in some seemingly flowing nature of a story being told. I’ve digressed enough, let’s get back to what I miss.

I can remember hiking and fishing as a teen. I could jump off rocks in the trail, wade across creeks, run from bears, and all without much thought about anything other than getting from point A to point B. Last night, we went on a sunset cruise and mostly what I was thinking about for an hour prior to getting on the boat was exactly that, getting on the boat. I was thinking about that initial awkward step to get on the boat. Thank goodness that one of the crew was there to lend a hand as I stepped sideways and up at the same time. Dang, two obstacles at once, I’m back!! Not really, because it was followed by lots of handrail holding moving around the boat. Which brings to mind that I was going to suggest handrails going down the steps to the bathroom and then one to hang on to while peeing to avoid peeing on my leg as I was moving about above the toilet. Maybe I just should have sat. Balance and the fear of falling almost consumes all people over the age of sixty. We all hear the horror stories that someone fell, broke a hip, and then died two weeks later from complications. I have never put the two together really in my mind, but it happens all the time.

Sports, the last of which was golf that I finally had to give up. The sport of retirees, along with tennis, and I had to give up in my fifties. Two back surgeries and not even my love for the game will allow me to risk messing up my back a third time. Another sport I have always loved is fishing. I have a boat and could go everyday and maybe I should start doing just that, but the fishing I’m talking about is the sport of fly-fishing and wading a river to catch a monster trout. I used to laugh about the section of the North Platte River known as the Miracle Mile when I would talk about wading that river. The reference we all used was like walking on butter covered basketballs with round bottomed soles on my shoes. I’m not lying, I can remember you’d be wading along and all of sudden water was pouring into the top of your waders, thirty-three-degree water mind you, and you were scrambling to stand again also fighting a thirty-two-hundred flow rate of water. Sometimes the best you could do was get to the edge of the bank on your knees and grab onto something not moving. Some of the problem is that you were laughing so hard that you couldn’t do anything. I would call it a success if I was upright and still had my pole in my hand. Once, I remember finally getting up only to realize I had a fish on. Now I tie flies and remember, but if we could get back to Wyoming to fish, I’d still give it a college try, the worse that would happen is that I fish from the bank, but still a day fishing is better than any day not.

I used to be pretty good at shooting pool. There was never a thought about anything other making the shot. Now I have to figure out which of the three tri-focal lenses I should look through and still realizing I can’t see a straight line for nine feet. Someone along the way called me a Wicked Stick. I loved it and even had a license plate referencing it, but now I would have to add Crooked to the middle of it. Still, I try and mostly am frustrated when I can’t beat my boys playing a game I used to win money at playing. I never was a Minnesota Fats, heck I wasn’t even a Colorado Fats, but I loved playing and still do. Every once in a while, I’ll still pull a shot out of my hat that seems impossible, but probably surprising myself more than those I’m playing.

I also miss the ability to sit and read a book cover to cover without feeling there is something else I should be taking care of. This one I can do something about, but really any of my thoughts about missing something could still be done if I would just lower my bar of expectations a little bit. If I set the bar right, it wouldn’t matter how fast I could do something, how high I could jump, how flawlessly I would step, or how perfect a cast or shot I make. Maybe it isn’t about how well I do something anymore and more about that the fact I just keep trying. There is some old saying about it doesn’t matter how well you play the game; it just matters that you do. I probably need to stop thinking about what I miss in terms of ability and more focus on just doing and enjoying the freedom that comes with my age in being able to do them whenever I want. There are so many other things I could have mentioned like riding bikes downhill at fifty-miles-an-hour and laughing all the way, hiking ten miles and not sleeping the next ten hours, or any of a countless number things. I wonder if I can force my dreams to have the same reality so that I stop waking with these stupid cramps. I’m getting tired of bananas and potassium for breakfast.