I'm Back

Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful. It's the transition that's troublesome.

 ~ Isaac Asimov

A meaningful quote from a very intelligent man. Yeah well, I have been away for a while! Illness is an adversary that very seldom reveals it's true depth or intent until it is well established. What started as a supposed common cold finally revealed itself to be of much more purposeful intent. Purposeful to the extent that I found myself examining my own mortality and contemplating meeting my maker - whether said maker was ready to meet me I do not know. The reality for me is that, as a previously fit and healthy man, I am  now having to accept, and deal with, serious limitations to my chosen activities.

The mantle of mature years, and serious illness, brings with it definite new limitations - there is a certain gremlin that has a hydraulic jack hidden under the hill leading to my front door - I'm now sure that every day he makes that damn hill a couple of degrees steeper. It may well be  that same gremlin that by some device extracts the oxygen from my general vicinity and makes me heave and puff when ever I try to accomplish some heavy physical task. If I believed that gremlins could attack my personal being I would have to suspect that the loss of hair on my head and the southwards migration of my chest to the vicinity of my waist is also some evil plot to make me feel inadequate.

Luckily I have not yet begun to loose my mental faculties and  I have positive proof that the gremlins are also conducting other underhand campaigns that are obviously targeted against the mature of age,  if I could only remember what they were.  I know I made some notes but I can't for the life of me remember where I put them or,  if I did actually put them away somewhere. What's that you say? Put what? Where?

There are other things that are beginning to bother me too, but I'm not sure why! I seem to have developed a taste for warm Coco and I also notice that when I chew my dry biscuits I seem to dribble a lot. The rather attractive receptionist at my local doctors has become quite friendly lately and she calls me "dear". Do you think she fancies me or could there be another reason?

I wonder if my increasing intolerance of the  young and their rowdy goings on might also be a symptom of my maturity,  perhaps it would be better if I could actually see what they are up to but my eyes aren't what they used to be and my new glasses - the ones with the thicker lenses -hang like an anchor on my nose. My other complaint is that just lately everyone seems to mumble - damned if I can understand what they are saying most of the time - I just wish people would speak clearly - it must be a sign of the times. I won't even get into the way food has changed and what it does to a man's insides - and the uncomfortable results. That's in my notes though and if I can just find them I'll tell you about it next time.