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Posts Tagged ‘aging’

Beware of Old Buicks

Posted in State of Mind, Time, tagged , , , , , , , , on October 30, 2015| 7 Comments »

Cautiously, I started to pass the large, slow-moving two-tone brown ’76 Buick LeSabre I’d been following for several minutes. The car with no visible driver. The one that couldn’t quite decide if it was in the right lane or the left lane.

I knew what I’d see when I pulled alongside the old Buick. Two small hands gripping the steering wheel at 10 and 2, a tightly permed white-haired head peering just barely over the giant steering wheel, eyes straight ahead.

It was a poignant moment for me. I could place myself, as a child in the passenger seat, excitedly riding with my grandmother to the washateria that was next to the S&H Green Stamp store.

But I just as easily placed myself in the driver’s seat, driving the same route I’d driven for 40 years in the same car, but anxious about all the new traffic and pedestrians and bicycles and construction. Everyone so impatient. Feeling like a nuisance.

I was reminded of one of my elderly clients, Charles.  Charles came in to my office to “make some changes to his Will.” Again.

Charles was stooped and each step was painful and slow, but he was determined. Even with his thick bifocals, Charles could barely read the paper he held right up to his nose.

“Shall I call you a cab?” I asked when he finished signing. “Don’t need a cab – my car’s out front.”

Did someone drive you here?  No, I can drive myself.  But, how, Charles, how?  You can barely see.

Well, I open the car door just enough so I can look down and see the white lines on the road and that keeps me going straight.  Been getting around that way for years.1976_Buick_LeSabre_Custom

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Is It Just Me or Is Time Actually Flying By? or “Having Breakfast Every Half Hour”

Posted in State of Mind, Time, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on March 26, 2015| 2 Comments »

Despite indisputable evidence to the contrary (chronology), I’ve coddled the notion that I have time on my side. Not that I have more time in front of me than behind me. Not that I have all the time in the world. But that time is still…friendly.

I prefer to think of time as being circular, without end. Or multi-dimensional. Or relative – dependent on my perception – at the time. I don’t understand time travel but I embrace the idea.

In a culture hell-bent on defying and denying time, I have done my best to wage war alongside my comrades – armed with positive thoughts and a bag of supplements. If only I could clearly identify the “enemy”.

Ancient Rome had Saturn – god of time.  Saturn was heir to the throne; next-in-line to be king of the Titans.  But his father, Uranus, was in no hurry to step down as king so Saturn took time into his own hands and, with a slash of his sickle, castrated his father.  Of course, it was only a matter of time until Saturn was overthrown by his son, Jupiter.

If the god of time can’t control time, how can my comrades and I?

I remember, exactly, the day my friend and colleague sat across the table and asked me, “how much longer do you plan to work?”  Hers was a very practical question – if we hire you, how long will you stay?

If you are part of the workforce, time is always breathing down your neck.  And, if you are a woman in the workforce, that foul-smelling breath whispers words like competitive edge, staying current, and skill sets interspersed with crepey neck, puffy eyes, and veiny hands.  And no amount of positive attitude or magic potions can halt the ravages of time.

Time is moving at a rate at which I cannot keep up. In fact, it seems to be moving so fast that I can hear it. Not a steady deliberate brisk march. But a bullet train. And I’m hanging on for dear life.

When asked by Steve Kroft about “this whole aging thing” during a 2013 60 Minutes interview, British actress, Maggie Smith, age 78, remarked, “Noel Coward… said ‘The awful thing about getting old is that you have breakfast every half-hour.’  And that’s sort of what it is.  I can’t understand why everything has to go so fast.”

Dame Maggie gives me hope.  At 80, she is in demand and bankable – a stand-out in Downton Abbey and The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel and the sequel, The Second Best Exotic ….  I can just picture her riding the bullet-train that is time with an Oscar in one hand and a script in the other, trying to keep her glasses from blowing off her face.

“Time is the substance from which I am made. Time is a river which carries me along, but

I am the river;

it is a tiger that devours me, but I am the tiger; it is a fire that consumes me, but

I am the fire.”

-Jorge Luis Borges

Ah… now I get it. Time is me. I am my own enemy. Waging war against myself. What else is new!

time-warp

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Bones

Posted in State of Mind, Time, tagged , , , , , , , on November 2, 2014| 1 Comment »

“My advice?  If you ski, don’t.”  Well, the last time I snow skied and fell with both legs splayed out in two different directions; I decided to sell my skis.

“Don’t put on a pair of skates.”  Well, OK, no skating.  I turned 64 last month and, short of a brief, passing interest in the crazy inline skates Cesar Millan, aka The Dog Whisperer, wears while effortlessly taming those crazed pit bulls on his TV show, I haven’t even thought about skating in years.

“I wouldn’t even climb a step-ladder.  Your osteoporosis is acute.”  Now you’ve got my attention.  I do enjoy climbing a step ladder every now and then.

“A drug called Forteo will fix your problem.”  Wait!  Not so fast!  What about Eli Lilly’s bold disclaimer on the first page of the slick brochure and in the CD that comes with the slick brochure?  WARNING: POTENTIAL RISK OF OSTEOSARCOMA.[1] 

Ah, well, that has to do with the results of the company’s testing on rats.  Rats that already had some health issues that were given excessive doses of the drug.  I processed this as “So, you’re saying these were compromised, weakened rats, bombarded with a powerful drug and this really has nothing to do with what might happen to me on this drug since I’m not a stressed out sick little caged rat.”  Osteosarcoma has rarely been reported in people who took FORTEO.[2]  Rare is not the same as never.  Please, do go on.

How powerful is this drug?  Well, it requires a daily injection for 2 years.  And for no more than 2 years.  What happens after 2 years?  I’m not quite sure.

At a cost of give or take $1500 a month.  I have incredibly crappy insurance so maybe I would qualify for some type of break from Eli Lilly.  Or maybe I can wait until Eli Lilly’s patent expires and the price goes down.  Way, way down.  If I don’t ski or put on a pair of skates or climb a step ladder or step off a curb wrong or pick up a gallon of milk the wrong way while the company recoups its research and development costs and makes billions.  While all we baby-booming women get our annual bone density tests.  A roster of small white women with osteo issues that I assume includes bone medication spokeswomen Sally Field and Blythe Danner (well, their TV ads seem credible).

This really isn’t a rant about drug companies.  This is a rant about aging or, more particularly, an acknowledgment.  Here it is.  More than the evidence I see in the mirror.  More than the way my knees feel when I climb the stairs.  This is something that, but for technology, would have stayed silent until it could not be ignored.  It is about feeling vulnerable.  And about staring mortality in the face.

I have been blessed with good genes.  And while I may be more diligent than some in my lifestyle choices, what I eat and drink, how I care for my body, mind and spirit, I know that I am blessed.  I don’t really think I’ve deluded myself into thinking I would not get older, it just happened so fast, while I wasn’t looking.

To the young, beautiful, competent, compassionate pharmacist I spoke to about by Forteo dilemma, I’m sure I looked and sounded like every other 60+ woman she talks to on a daily basis.  I wonder, though, if she could see herself in me.

I hear my young friends talk about time.  Time flying, where did the time go, not enough time.  In this fast-paced world of instant communication – instant change, how can anyone not feel time’s incessant steady vibration.  The enormous universal clock.  The biological clock that ticks for us all – not just for women and their finite eggs – but for every living thing.

I love clocks.  I bought my favorite clock at an outdoor fair in Santa Fe, New Mexico many years ago.  The clever artist used a dental router to etch the words “There’s No Time Like The Present” into a small piece of flagstone, added an inexpensive clock mechanism and, voila, made my favorite clock.

There is no time like the present.  But I believe in the future and preparing for the future and my future in this body is finite, plain and simple.  So, I will study my options, weigh the risks, percolate on the challenge, and appreciate with gratitude overflowing the way my bones have carried me and those I care about, figuratively and literally, so far.

[1] http://www.forteo.com/potential-side-effects-of-osteoporosis-medication.aspx?WT.srch=1

[2] Ibid

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