AGE IS ONLY A THREE LETTER WORD

 

A series of essays….

WEDDING DAY 1973

BEGINNING YET ANOTHER CHAPTER

….as seen through my eyes!

By: Jacqueline E Hughes

As I sit here on the threshold of resuming international travel — after our last retirement visit to Scotland and Ireland five years before, as well as several years of coping with a pandemic (which still haunts all of us to this day!), I find myself totally exhausted. Surprisingly, not so much physically, rather mentally with all of life’s imbalances thrown willy-nilly about the place; a whirlwind of happenings resembling fallen leaves swirling out of control on a windy autumn’s day.

Normally I don’t tend to dwell on the negatives in life (well, excluding drumpf, of course). Reading a good book, taking walks in the woods and enjoying the nature that surrounds me, and being in the company of my grandchildren can be enough to make life sweet and simple. I try to avoid the things that used to stress me before and eliminate the cause of mental and emotional strain. Always easier said than done. We humans acquire a lot of baggage as we age…

In an attempt to ‘bend the mind’ into believing that age is only a three letter word, nothing to worry about, it can’t harm me, I see how much longer it takes to accomplish tasks compared to years ago. How my left knee requires an occasional Advil or two along with a healthy spray of Biofreeze in order to function with less pain. Watching my thinning hair become more and more lackluster. Understanding that the word crêpe can describe more than a deliciously filled French pancake.

Yes, getting older comes with its physical changes and challenges. However, it’s the mental attitude toward life’s inevitable ebb & flow of reality as we age that has me thinking about the structure of my life, lately.

The sad and untimely passing of my sister-in-law’s sister, Mary, recently, at the very young age of sixty-two, has re-opened a wound that I’ve been living with for many years when my own Mother passed, quite unexpectedly, at sixty-two years of age. Leaving young grandchildren to wonder why grandma wasn’t there to play and bake cookies with them, snuggle with them when they were tired, and warm their hearts with her pure joy and love of life, family, and friends.

It had taken at least a decade after her passing to realize that I couldn’t just call Mom whenever I had questions about anything and knowing that she would have the answer to each one. Your Mother can be the lifeline to your past, your ancestry connection, your fill-in-the-blank go-to-person, your support system, and an integral part of making your life function normally while remaining true to yourself. Since we lived an hour and a half from one another, I miss our frequent and enjoyable phone conversations, as well as the ability to ask her about something as simple as a favorite Ukrainian recipe. Love.

Going back to the imbalances in my life of late… Do you know how you can wake-up and feel that something is off, not following a normal pattern? Or, the milk tastes a little off even though the expiration date is still more than a week away? It all began back on the the Fourth of July after falling backwards down two cement steps in my daughters’s mud room…

…right on my tailbone, scraping my left elbow, and banging the back of my head on the wall before coming to a twisted mass, while staring somberly at the mud room floor.  Before moving, I quickly assessed the damage and reasoned that I could move. I would get up if my brain could be convinced to allow me to do so. 

BREE AND OREO SHARING A TOY IN RELATIVE PEACE AND QUIET…

Naturally, I was all alone. Well, if you consider having Oreo, their dog, inside the house and our dog, Bree, constrained in the back seat of my car parked in the driveway as reputable help in my situation, I was pretty much on my own. Everyone had gone up north to celebrate the holiday and I opted to doggy sit instead. It was time to move. I had two beautiful creatures to take care of.

With the help of a warm, invisible hug and the strong arm of my guardian angel, I stood upright, a bit sore, with the realization that my tailbone would haunt me with pain for a very long time.

Last week I banged my shin on a brick fireplace hearth at a friend’s house that coincided with an existing gash of a few days before that hadn’t had time to heal. I spent the following hour or so feeling the warmth of blood trickle down my leg before being absorbed by my cotton pant leg all while discussing the amazing book written by TJ Klune entitled The House in the Cerulean Sea! What an interesting bookclub gathering that was!

For some reason, preparing to pack our luggage for our upcoming trip to Wales and parts of England has me more stressed than usual. Five years is a long time between international travel and things do and have changed in that amount of time. Perhaps it’s knowing that I should wear a mask during the long flight that has me concerned. The mask will be worn, but I won’t be, physically, happy about it. It is enough to comprehend that COVID-19, or a strain thereof, will be around for as long as we humans exist and, all of us must come to terms with this fact.   

I must look to the bright side and be thankful for the opportunity to travel once again; a passion of mine for so many years. I will forego worrying about the small stuff (By the way, my tailbone has healed nicely), and make the time to set the world straight again; feel happy with my surroundings and make the most out of the life I’ve been blessed with.

Dan and I, while celebrating fifty years of marriage together, will enjoy twelve days of constant movement, being a part of life’s flow, walking down quiet country lanes with astounding views, making new friends, participating in the living history surrounding us, and understanding, with joy in or hearts, how fortunate we both are. That tiny, three letter word (age) will be but a speck lodged way back in my mind. Wow! This is going to be an amazing experience! I can hardly wait to come back to write and tell you all about it.

MOVING ON….2013 TO 2023

Copyright © 2023 by Jacqueline E Hughes

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