Growing Old And Losing Freedoms

John Denver's song "Some days are diamonds, some days are stones" says it all.

I think that the hardest thing about growing old is having to give up things that represent freedom for you.

Babies expend a tremendous amount of energy just learning the basics. Turning over, hand to eye co-ordination, crawling, learning to walk. Falling, hurting themselves. But having no fear, rising to begin the lesson again. Finally, the freedom to walk from place to place without falling. But the first step to freedom has been taken.

Remember your first pair of roller skates. The scraped fingers and hands, knees and elbows,the bruises on the head. Of course today's kids have gloves, knee and elbow pads and helmets. So, they miss those joys of that knowledge. But they do get the end goal - freedom from being tied to the house where safety lies; home. More freedom.

Then, the adventure of learning to ride a bicycle. Feet getting caught in the spokes, pant legs getting caught in the sprocket. And more cuts, bruises, maybe broken bones. BUT then mastery and the ability to roam far from home. A bigger freedom.

And finally the ultimate freedom learning to drive! Mastery of a manual transmission that was the TOPS! If you learn on an automatic, you were kinda of a woosy.

I just turned 67. I really don't feel old; but my brain reminds me that there are certain things that I can not do. I don't have the sense of balance that I had at one time. I could walk a steel beam over 100 feet in the air, with no fear. Now, I trip and stumble over an uneven sidewalk. My sense of balance causes me to stagger unexpectedly. Being blind in one eye effects my depth perception. So, I have given up riding a bicycle, a motorcycle, and driving. (Roller skating hasbeen out for some time!)

But all of this is in preparation for the final loss. And I really can't bitch. I've buried better men than me. I've made much further than they did. Audie Murphy's book "To Hell and Back" describes the landing at Anzio. "If you stepped one way, you were dead. If you stepped another, you became a grandfather."

And I am a grandfather.