aging

  • Unrealistic Expectations

    I’d love to be able to create a bike naturally, and would even be willing to go to term with it inside a womb if need be. (I would need to get a womb first, of course). But it ain’t gonna happen. And like a lot in life, being able to give birth to bicycles is just one of the many things that don’t turn out how I want them to be. Expectations are never kind, particularly so when they are unfulfilled. I guess I have failed to meet expectations of me, and am even guiltier of expecting more of others. I’m fighting with myself almost constantly over coming to…

  • It’s Not How Old You Are, But How You Are Old

    I’m old, but like to think I do all right. However, it’s getting increasingly harder to kid myself. I can’t hear, can’t see, can’t chew properly because my teeth are going or gone, can’t remember anything and can’t learn new subjects no matter how hard I try as nothing sinks in. I wake up to pee several times a night (which is still better than not waking up to do so), barely sleep and feel constantly harangued and harassed by life. Arthritis in my hands is agonizing and makes nearly any task gargantuan, not to mention turns cycling, my sole saving grace in terms of physical activity, into an excruciatingly…

  • Rav-AGE!

    Getting old is not much fun, nor, as the late, great thespian Bette Davis once famously said, it’s not for sissies. But I’ve becoming increasingly conscious of age over the past few weeks. My eyesight is going: quickly and rapidly. I’m seeing less in the dark and rain, vision is cloudy and peripheral vision untrustworthy. Arthritis in my hands is making even the most minor of tasks a tough one. And my professional life, such as it is, is slipping from disaster to disaster. All these things are adding up to fill me with fear and trepidation, which has become paralyzing, and even worse, kept me away from one of…