birthday eve redux

OK, while there's still time, one more self-pitying, whiny reflection on turning 65 (O My God!) tomorrow.

I was standing in the kitchen figuring out how to be elderly, when Bern came down.

"I never meant to be this old!" I told her. "I was going to live fast, love hard, die young and leave a good looking corpse...."

She looked at me in that way she has for, lord have mercy, 42 years of marriage, shook her head and said, somewhat (but not totally) kindly, "When were you going to do that?"

I agreed, "well, probably never...."

"You were born to be an old man," she told me, "You've always wanted to be an old man."

There's some modicum of truth to that, I suppose.

Once I heard Jimmy Connors, the tennis player, talk about how he played tennis. "I try to 'slow the ball down'," he said, "just like an act of will--make it go slower...."

So that's what I plan to do now that I'm in my dotage. "I'm going to slow Life down" and savor it like a fine wine, like a firefly filled evening, like a series of ponderous moments, like something pregnant and important.

So, if you're around me, expect time to be like molasses, like a glacier. I'm going to 'slow it down' and take it all in and be present to it in a new way.

I have, Bern's right, always thought I was an 'old soul'. I just never thought my body and my life would catch up to my soul.

Maybe I can figure out the whole "Wisdom Thing" in the time I have left.

Something devoutly to be longed for, leaned into, explored.

We'll see. We'll just see.