Is It Really a Phone?

I have become disillusioned with my lovely new phone. It has many functions and will do many tasks, but I don't know how to operate it and all this technology is wasted on me. When I want to make a call the keyboard is hidden. There are rows of icons to choose from, but none of them relates to making a call. I just want to call the bank and check on my balance and make an appointment with the dentist. My 11 year old granddaughter looks at me with pity. She tries not to be insulting, but it's not hard to feel out-dated and inept under her watchful eye. 

The phone did come with instructions, such as they were. They were printed in two or three languages in very small type with a photo of the phone detailing the function of the buttons displayed. 
If I can find the English version of the instructions and the magnifying glass, I might figure some of it out.

Oh, I can play a game on it, but it runs the battery down in about five minutes. Sometimes newer and better just means I can't do it. Getting better as I get older may take a long time. 

A New Year to Explore!

Sometimes we get obsessed by sadness and nostalgia of time passing. We sing "Auld Lang Syne" and count our regrets and failures, but we also have an opportunity to explore a new year with new opportunities and new obstacles, new acquaintances and new heights to climb.

This year I'll face some new challenges in "the home." I'll remember the "way things used to be," and create an identity that includes the way things are going to be. This is called "growing up." Here at "the home" most of us don't want to grow up. Most of us want things to be the way they were. We have memories that contain our ideal life. Growing up means we will never repeat that life--it's a great memory and we can claim the things we learned to help us through this new stage, but the time that has passed has taken the former life with it. Growing up is the only option. 

That's not quite true. We can hold to the past, and become bitter, and stagnant, but we lose the ability to achieve and accomplish and experience joy.

The Best is Yet to Come

Somebody said to me, "I'm getting better as I get older." Hallelujah! I'm in good company. I believe that. I want to make it a new battle cry. Commercials and nationwide advertising looks at the older generation as past the prime of life and less than modern or current. Style and fashion certainly dismisses older as worse, old hat, decrepit, and senile. Most of us don't do the Charleston anymore, heck even the young people don't do the Charleston. My generation did the Jitterbug, and that is now retired to the archives too. I don't even know what the new get-down dance is, line dancing, maybe. All this is for the young, agile, and athletic. The body does limit the physical activity, and much as I proclaim my mental activity to be still vibrant and insightful, my body is yielding to old age.

I walk slower and get tired quicker than I used to. I find slow walking gives me a chance to view the vegetation and watch the birds. I hear people say all the time, "Stop and smell the roses." Going slower means I can reflect on things with greater attention. I kinda like it.

A New Bump in the Road

Lots of diseases and conditions are more likely to occur when you get older. I was first diagnosed with Diabetes when I was past 50 and I managed for a long time to keep it in control with simple strategies like losing weight and controlling what I ate. I did finally require medication by mouth, but I dreaded advancement to insulin therapy even though I knew it was probably coming. 

Well, get over it. It happened today. The doctor called the dosage small. I guess it is, but it still indicates I am getting worse. That's not something I want to shout about. I don't like to advertise my illnesses or seek pity or privileges due to this condition. I feel a little ashamed or embarrassed about it. Maybe I'm giving it more power over my life than it warrants. Maybe I can manage it without great parades and the bands playing, but somehow this marks a new milestone in my life. It's no longer just something that I can control with a better diet and a pill once a day. Now I'll be more at risk for low blood sugar because of the shot. I'll probably have to see the doctor more often. She may expect me to count calories. Whatever the requirements, I already don't like the way this is going. I've seen the damage this disease did to others and reduces my optimism about getting old. 

I had really kind of settled on growing old gracefully, but debilitating disease does not enhance that possibility.  

Resolution Before New Year

Old people looking at something (Photo credit: Jared Wong)

I've been messing around for a while now here at the home, but I think I've found my niche. I'm not really interested in playing cards or going to "Social Hour." I think I'll regress into things I found rewarding earlier in life, like writing. I've been piddling with the blogs for a while now, but I'd like to do some serious stuff again. I like Apologetics and fiction. Maybe more academic writing would occupy my time and attention, but I may need a great deal more work to accomplish that. 

I haven't written a poem in a while, and that is certainly one thing I want to do, but I have read some modern poetry lately, and I wasn't very impressed. Some of it was O.K. But I want to write for readers that live in the real world, or better yet, for people who live in the world of aging. The stuff I found depended on shock and odd spacing and harsh images. I didn't find much that was uplifting or encouraging. The authors were mostly college professors. I will seek common experiences and emotions to write about--sometimes from those people who play cards and go to "Social Hour."

Carl Sandburg wrote about Chicago's hog butchers and Robert Frost wrote about New England farmers and Emily Dickinson wrote about bees and prairies. I'll probably follow their lead. I know they wrote in a bygone era, but I belong there, too. I am old and I like the lessons yet to be found there, so here at "the home" I hope to get my priorities in order and write more consistently and more regularly, with greater discipline and critique.

Getting Older Is Getting Harder

I really believe I am better than I was when I was young. My brain is better, and my understanding is better, but I have less bodily strength and endurance for physical activity. I count the mental activity and disregard the physical stuff so I can say I really am better now that I'm older. I like to read George Valliant's work with the aging population. It cheers me to hear him say that the aging brain is still active. If I'm going to have to live to be very old I at least want to enjoy the benefits.

After I was 70 I went back to school. It may have been the best thing I could have done to deal with the death of my husband. I studied history, English literature, and Latin. I'd like to do it again, but it does cost a lot of money. I am reading as much as my vision will allow. I want to be more in tune with life and joy and love as I get older, but in many ways I want to be free from people with their judgments, competitions, and jealousies. I don't enjoy the frivolous activities of the retirement home I live in. I don't like the card games and craft projects. I am trying to inspire a Bible study and poetry reading. I'm afraid I won't get many bites, but I've have thrown out the bait. 

I would like for this time to produce a truly vibrant mental activity. Of course when I went to school, the other students were mostly in their twenties. It will be a different quality of discussion that came from that group. Well, maybe not. There were grouches and lazy slobs in that age range and I think there are still some of them around now. I guess I've got as good a chance of provoking a meaningful discussion here as I had at the University.

Anybody want to talk about Isaiah or Robert Frost? 

So I Can't See!

I got my eyes tested yesterday afternoon. I was not impressed with the exam. I thought the doctor was sort of non-communicative. He implied that I didn't know my own history and dismissed me as too dumb to understand what had happened to me.

O.K. I'm old and not a doctor, but I was still his patient. I expected some respect and acknowledgement. When my eyes did not dilate readily, I got extra doses of the drops intended to accomplish the procedure.  In all, I got two doses initially, then two more when the pupils did not respond quickly. The purpose of the dilation is to give the doctor a window into the inside of my eye. He had already finished the part I cared about which gave the prescription for my lenses. I suppose he learns about the condition of my eyes by doing this, but it doesn't improve the correction or change the grinding of the lenses. It took extra time and it bugged me. But that wasn't the worst part. I have never had dilation last overnight, before, but this time it did.

 Today I can't watch TV very well. I can't stand the brightness of sunlight, and reading is severely limited. For these reasons, I have formed a very poor opinion of my new ophthalmologist. .The dilation also prevented my fitting of the new glasses. I'll have to go back later to do that.

Maybe this is just an excuse to get mad at some inconvenience. It does indeed rise to the lever of dissatisfaction and the desire to scream at the doctor. This kind of thing happens occasional.  Something I was promised is compromised, and I want somebody to gripe at. Fixing the problem would be nice, but mostly I just want to express my frustration. As I said before, I'm old and I want things to go my way, to be controlled and predictable, to be safe and provide comfort. And just now I want to be able to see. Short of that, I want to tell somebody I'm mad.