What's on my mind today is aging

Aging is another of life's processes. It's one that you get to have a slight amount of control over, but, generally speaking, there are inevitable things that begin to occur as the body and the cells degrade, without human growth hormone to bring them back.

I have an incredibly detailed, high pressure job; one where I must remember many details every hour. Unfortunately, one of the first manifestations of aging for me has been memory loss. Now, I NEVER had good short term memory, essentially because I had a serious accident with carbon monoxide when I was in my twenties, and it damaged my frontal lobe to the extent that I lost the capacity for short term memory.

So I learned to play tricks with myself to compensate. I used a pile of memory tricks, and they were reasonably effective for multiple years, however those tricks aren't working so very well these days. I write down as much as I possibly can, and that is how I manage to continue to function in my job. My iPhone tells me when I have to be places and where they are. These are the "new" tricks I need to utilize to function.

Unfortunately, I simply cannot write down EVERYTHING -- and so things drop through the cracks; through the saturated sponge of my mind and just right out of my world.

I don't know how to find words to explain how utterly frustrating and difficult this is for me. I just want to shake it off and have it go away; but that's just not going to occur. I have to learn to live with it - and it is not a pleasant thing to live with. It's no more pleasant than the agonizing pain my hands feel when I wake up in the morning; the osteoarthritis that I have created from years of non stop typing, martial arts, wood splitting and snow shoveling in the mountains. Many factors create the situation I am in and there are not many alternatives to make these things go away.

So, I try to find ways to live with this; to accept this as the way things are going to be. I try hard, but sometimes it just fails and the frustration swamps me and I begin to become angry with myself. This isn't a rational reaction - and I fight it when it occurs, but it does happen.

When I'm on a stage and doing a performance, and the lyrics of a song simply just fly out of my head - I realize that it won't be long before I won't be able to be on a stage singing, unless I am willing to sing with a lyrics sheet in my hands; and I view that as so unprofessional, that it's not likely I will do that. So I will lose singing, one of my life's greatest joys.

So aging means losses. It means your friends are dying, your body is starting to fail you and, even worse, your mind begins to fail you. Some genius decided to call these the "Golden Years" and I haven't the faintest idea why. Losing your capacities, your expectations of what you can and can't do, losing your family and friends and the simple loss of your youth -- all these things are very painful and you learn that every day, you must come to grips with these losses; to accept them as inevitable and to reach far to search for positive ways to look at this and learn to come to a peaceful acceptance.

None of this would be so damned difficult if I didn't get any backlash for forgetting something. It is that refusal to understand this situation is going to be ongoing from someone that I love unconditionally that is extraordinarily painful. I cannot reconcile that position in my mind - not that I don't realize it's somewhat annoying, but in comparison to the huge pile of frustration and pain that it causes me in the first place - the backlash just bowls me over and wrecks me. So I'm currently in a heap, and operating without the necessary information to plan something - which will force me to make a solitary plan. I guess I can live with that - but I don't view it with anything remotely resembling happiness, but rather with great sadness. This is not a condition that is going to improve with time - if anything, it is going to get worse. I can write down what I can, use all my memory tricks that I am aware of - keep trying to retrain my mind to improve my memory skills - but I fear that it will continue to degrade, and along with it will be the degradation of a relationship that I value greatly.

And THAT loss, for that one, I will be inconsolable.

On losing my mother

My mom died last month. Just two or three days before this event, she was talking to me on the phone, sort of sounding like she always did -- but, there was an elephant in the room, as I have said before and it is called cancer.

Apparently my mom didn't want to live out her prognosis of 9-12 months, or the oncologist was really off base, who knows? I just know I set out in my car to drive up and help my brother take care of her...packed with at least 1/2 a year's worth of stuff and my lovely daughter in tow - only to take a phone call in the middle of Ohio to be told my mom died.

I promptly chose "The Wall" to listen to and continued to drive and cry - I was still 10 hours away and needed to get there to help my brothers with the funeral arrangements. Like all road trips with my daughter, this one ran smoothly, even with this knot in my gut and the pain of knowing I couldn't even say goodbye to my mom -- still I drove on, needing to get to where my family was.

Yes, it was two weeks of hell - there is no other way to describe it. I felt numb and sad, my defensive walls were up over twenty feet easily - no one was getting in. I kept telling myself it was one of life's passages and I just had to get over it - but I was so angry and I couldn't figure out why.

I left there angry - and stayed that way until after I had a conversation with my daughter that provided the epiphany allowing me to understand the rage I was feeling. First of all, it wasn't really rage - that was the disguise for the sad, hurt part inside me. It was that part, the inner child, if you will, that realized that the very open conversation I had with my daughter could have never taken place between my mom and myself, because we never really knew each other all that well. We hardly got along and really only begun any level of intelligent communication subsequent to my father's death 17 years ago. But even then, my mom had a perception of what I was that I didn't feel - and, honestly, there was a LOT about her that I didn't know at all.

And now I never will.

Life is a fleeting gift - and the people you love in your life, you should treasure them. I am not reconciled to whether I truly loved my mother - it's kind of like I loved her because she was my mother, but on many levels, I didn't like her and our relationship was very superficial. I worked very hard to raise a daughter differently than I was raised, and I believe that I was successful. Not always perfect, who could be? But I think I did a damn good job and got a friend out of the deal.

I have this "rule" with my daughter - that she is not allowed to predecease me - because that loss I would never get over - my life would have to end at that point right along with hers. She is the thing that tethers me to the planet in many ways - the thing, the person that matters the most to me - the one I love the most, unconditionally - whether she is annoyed or angry or tired or cranky or the ton of fun she can be when we are together - it doesn't matter to me - there is never any feeling but love for her, always.

My mom? I did love her in a way - and I do miss her terribly - we have talked a lot in the past 17 years...although we have never lived close by each other; we did share a love for reading, for discussing politics or just whatever we were cooking for dinner. That is gone and it is in my head and my heart, but will never be manifested again in a simple phone conversation.

Not being able to say goodbye to her did hurt me terribly - I felt like she should have waited for me and I know that is irrational, but, yet, it still haunts me. Fortunately, I saw her a month prior to this event, on my annual Mother's Day visit - had I known that would be the last time I would see her - I would have stayed longer, talked to her more - something, anything to remember, to hold on to, to chase away the incredible feeling of alone that I now have, since both my parents are gone.

That is all I want to say, except never look that gift of love in the eye and turn away from it. Hold onto it, treasure it, feel every good thing about it. Some day it will be gone.