Charlie, a neighbor who I’d been visiting in a nursing home for the past four years, died last week. He is not the first friend of mine to have died, but he is the first friend to have died simply because he was old. His death, or more specifically his funeral, gave me a sense that my own life had turned a page. It was not so much that I suddenly realized my own mortality – I am seventy-two years old, after all – but that it was time to give my mortality some thought.
Following the funeral, I spent the next few mornings thinking about my remaining years. Not surprisingly, the result was more a series of musings than anything that might be described as a plan. My first realization was that I used to think that being mortal meant that I was fallible. Now it means that I will die. That’s a change. Secondly I concluded that letting my mind wander first thing in the morning is a good way to start the day. If anything, it is regrettable that I didn’t do more of it when I was holding down a job. I do waste some of my waking hours (e.g., too much tv, going down rabbit holes on the internet), but daydreaming on my front porch during the month of June is anything but a waste.
Third, while I have never been particularly ambitious, any ambition I once possessed is gone. With a combination of above average intelligence and good luck, I’ve been able to live a good life by letting things come to me. Even as a young man, I usually went with the flow, but back then I had the paddling skills to redirect the boat when I needed to. Since retirement, I have either lost or thrown away the paddle. Fortunately the water I travel in now has slowed, so I have little chance of dumping.
There just isn’t anything that I feel the need to do. I have no bucket list. A good example is my writing. Because the subtopics in this blog started out as a series of disconnected random thoughts, it took me the entire week to get them in order. As a result, I did not look at my larger book project at all. And I was okay with that. I’d like to finish the book, but I will be fine if I don’t. I don’t want to be picking away at the same manuscript fifteen years from now, but I’ll make sure that that doesn’t happen.
At one point in my thoughts, I concluded that I’d like to live long enough to see Clare settle down. That was followed, however, by a hope that Clare never settles down. Once those two realizations canceled each other out, I was back to thinking that whatever happens happens.
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Before Charlie moved into the nursing home, he would watch for me from his house when I took Jack for a morning walk. I’d be gone for thirty minutes, and by the time I returned, he’d be sitting in a wheelchair on his driveway with an adjacent lawn chair set out for me. Franz, the guy who lived next to Charlie, would also watch for me, and as soon as my dog and I showed up, he’d come out of his house in an electric wheelchair, motor that chair down his own driveway and then up Charlie’s.
Franz died three years ago, and now Charlie is gone. My dog died last February. I miss the conversations in the driveway, and I really miss my dog. I still expect him to greet me at the door, and I still instinctively apologize whenever I accidentally kick something with my foot.
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