I’m Off
By standard metrics, I’m old. My sixtieth high school reunion is next year. And I feel as though I look old, too. Gravity, after all, pulls and tugs and skin sags. But I don’t feel old, although I’m not sure what old feels like. And it probably helps that I have most of my hair, even though it’s a little thin and white. My body can’t do a lot of things it used to do, there’s some arthritis in my fingers, but I can still walk, and a quick five mile walk is really no hard thing.
This week I’m off to the mountains to test my legs and see how old I really am. And this will be the last thing I post until I return. There’s no electricity where we’re going, and I don’t want to make us run a generator if we can help it just because I need to charge my laptop battery. So, I’m taking my journal. I’ll make notes and write them up when I get back. That seems reasonable.
And it may actually result in better work. I can let my thoughts percolate through my gray matter and see if they age a bit and pick up some wisdom and wit. It’s a time-honored tradition. And I like giving a nod to my betters, the one who actually know what they’re doing, people like Thoreau and Emmerson and Muir. And I’m making no pretense I’m in that company, but you need goals and you might as well set your sights high. So, here we go. Wish me luck. I’ll post again in about a week.