How can being older feel like an unfamiliar experience? Awake every step of the way, but we seem lost and unrecognizable. I know how we got here, but it feels like a runaway. The world hasn’t left me behind and I am certainly not senile. I just don’t like us much right now. Sometimes sad or just plain mad, I don’t like myself much these days, always worrying and fretting about the future.
There is a dream of a farm dear to my heart. Pull through the gate and back the trailer into its spot. It takes a few tries. Snake the way around a tree and miss the propane tank by an inch or two. Then walk the south pasture, straw-dry most of the year with cactus and a few wildflowers. So it’s for the wild creatures, like the pond is for herons and flotillas of ducks. There were pelicans that one year, but fewer birds come now and some years a drought sends those off too soon.
In the dark, a feral tom cat streaks across the open space and slinks along the fence lines. Coming at the night feed, eyes reflected iridescent gold in the yard light. Hurrying like a shift change in a factory. The kibble is gone by morning and he takes some rodents with him when he goes. Sometimes you know what’s happening by what you don’t see.
Horses linger in the shade of the barn tree. Some came to this farm for sanctuary. They remember humans with fear, but there is no bit now, no spurs. Other horses grew up here, as close as kin every holiday. The llamas cush nearby and the goats are on the picnic table again. An army of long ear sentinels bray a warning if intruders come close. There’s no separation between the living and those remembered.
Days turn into years. The weather still changes so we have something to complain about. There’s only enough mucking to get your hands dirty. Continuing to tinker at things we’re good at, holding tight to that feeling of being capable. Useful. Check on friends, read all the books. Eat fresh bread. Sleep through the night, wear t-shirts all day. Slip time and go walkabout.
This is my past and future farm. It exists inside me. I come here when the world gets too mean, to drink a strong cup of coffee with friends who have walked on. To let the wind run its fingers through my hair, and get some hay in my Crocs. To inhale dusty air and exhale revenge fantasy. Gone to a private place for five minutes and come back resilient and ready to forge on.
No one was fooled, nothing was missed. The big world is right where it was, spinning and howling profanity, as babies were born and babies died. News comes hard and fast, shocking, numbing, shocking again. It would be good to be magic, to set it all to right, to save the world from itself -rather than feel like a tourist. If that isn’t possible, then do all the minor acts of kindness mentioned in smarmy quotes about peace, but let them be a battle cry. Maybe we’re disoriented by the noise in their bravado, but we’re not outnumbered. Perhaps a thousand cooling hands and a thousand bandaids can counteract what feels like death by a thousand cuts. At least try to believe there are more people to love than there are idiots in traffic.
Memory is not a weakness, but our superpower. A strategy for the future. We didn’t know before because memory is wasted on youth. No one has nostalgia for marginal freedom, endless rules, and dorky teen angst. The advantage of age is we’ve seen it all. Survived more than we thought we could. It’s a choice; we can believe humans are basically good and act like it. Curate the memory that reminds us of our best days. That we aren’t drifting in space. We have something to defend. That we eventually choose hope over loss and regret. Isn’t that wisdom, after all?
Maybe memory has to mature and ripen into a place of solace. I never expected that memory could be such an aid and comfort. No matter how crazy the world seems, it’s an eyelash flicker away. The safe room you don’t have to dig a hole for. A spa for folks who can’t sit still for a mani-pedi. You can bring the dog.
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Thank you Anna.
You’re very welcome, Julie
I’ve started relying on your weekly dose of perspective, so important at this time. Thank you.
Thanks, Andrea. I keep writing so I can figure that out myself.
“There’s no seperation between the living and those remembered”
None.
Thankyou for that beautuful sentence.
Thanks, Val. I hoped that one would land.
Yes. All of that. My goodness, what a balm those memories are. And the last, most important… you can bring the dog. 😊
Not going anywhere without them. Thanks, Justinn
It will be both. Readings these always helps. Cheers to Fridays, even as they blend into the rest of the calendar. Thank you.
Thank you, Anna, for a moment of peace. With all that is happening in the world and coping with a body that I no longer recognize, this time is stressful enough. Throw in a horrific animal cruelty case this past week, and it all seems too much. I am old enough not to have been boots on the ground for this case, but seeing the aftermath is enough. Watching the suffering of the animals and my younger co-workers who witnessed these horrors is painful enough. At least I have the benefit of experience and perspective and can be there for my friends who need someone to listen. Thank you, Anna, for helping me breathe a bit. Now that I am breathing again, I can go to the barn.
Dear Anna,
I read your blogs periodically. I mention the inconsistency only to remind myself how often what I need finds it way to my door, as is the case here. At 80, this one speaks to me particularly – you so accurately and beautifully describe the now, but also the then and even the might yet be. I equate because I’ve lived in such a place as you describe; sans the mules, but with horses and even a goat and the cats, when I was younger and stronger. It is one of the most healing places in the universe……I know.