There are a couple terms referring to elderly women that I’ve heard most of my life. I once thought they’d never apply to me, but here they are, looking me square in the eye. “Spry old woman” and “aging gracefully.” I seem to be failing miserably at the first and struggling with the other one.
Back surgery, nerve damage, creaky knees, eighty-eight years have brought many changes to my body. My head tells me that I’ve not changed a whole lot since I was in my mid-twenties; my body says – oh, yeah? Take this! And I find it impossible to get out of that comfortable, but too low chair without help. It’s embarrassing. It’s also a bit frightening and a whole lot annoying to find I can no longer do some of the simple things that were once so easy that I didn’t even need to think about them.
I have to talk myself into attempting certain things. Where, once I grabbed the sweeper wand and captured cobwebs from the corners of the ceiling, I find I can no longer even reach down far enough to get the plug in the wall socket or reach and look up without fear of falling over. Needless to say, if someone else doesn’t do the vacuuming, it doesn’t get done. The golden retrievers I had for many years kept all edible crumbs and spills pretty much cleaned up before they were ground into the carpet. These days, I have real evidence of how much stuff I actually drop and spill. I clean up the liquid spills by shoving a paper towel around with my cane or with one foot while leaning on the walker. The rest wait for outside help. I live in fear of the day I drop a raw egg.
It takes me three days to talk myself into doing a load of laundry – then two days to do it, and about a week to get the clean clothes put away. This is a big change when I regularly did over a dozen loads a week, sandwiched in between gardening, housework, volunteering, teaching, cooking, shopping, transporting four kids to and from various activities, and finding time to read, paint, write and attend writers’ meetings and occasional classes at the University. As you can well imagine, I don’t get nearly as many things done in a day as I once did. But then, I no longer have as many responsibilities as I did then.
I didn’t wait for someone to tell me that I should no longer be driving. It became obvious to me when I realized that stiff joints and sore muscles could easily prevent me from moving quickly enough to avoid hitting a deer or other driving accident. Among family and friends, it was relatively easy to find someone to do my grocery shopping, pick up my mail and drive me to appointments.
During the first year of the pandemic, all the organizations I enjoyed canceled meetings or met through Zoom. Not being on-line, I sorely missed the contacts with my fellow writers and artists, but soon realized that physical limitations would probably prevent my attendance even if the face-to-face meetings continued. Eventually, those lost contacts were replaced by increased correspondence with relatives and former classmates. Since I’d never participated in e-mail or texting and have never been one to carry on long phone conversations, written letters have always been my preferred method of staying in touch. Writing this column, putting together the annual newsletter for my high school friends, reading works by favorite authors, researching things I’m curious about and working on the stories and poetry I enjoy creating are enough to keep me occupied intellectually.
Physically, I’m learning to compromise and lowering expectations. Those cobwebs on the ceiling are put there by spiders who catch flies, moths and other creepy crawlers that sneak into the house. I don’t like finding spiders behind the shower curtain, but I don’t like spraying my house with poison either. Flyswatters are not an option because I can’t move as fast as a spider.
As for that other phrase about aging gracefully – I don’t know if I’m succeeding or failing at that because I’m not sure just what it means. Physically, my hair still has most of its color and my forehead shows few wrinkles. Mentally, I’m still curious and creative and happy. That’s got to count for a lot.