Bucket list

A couple of my co-workers celebrated their 50th birthdays recently. It won't be long before I'm facing the same grim milestone.

I feel like a grump admitting it, but I've grown to hate birthday celebrations. Unless you're under the age of 19, is a birthday party really necessary? I don't expect anyone to mark the day I entered this world, except for my parents and my spouse. Are any of us with a driver's license all that excited about getting older?

SO and I figure we have about 25 good years left. Anything after that will be gravy, and depending on our genetics and environment, it might be lumpy gravy at that. Our own parents, well over the age of 65, have a combined list of ailments that includes (but is not limited to): osteoporosis, arthritis, high cholesterol, bipolar disorder, prostate cancer, fallen bladder, and cataracts.

Sometimes I ponder the sentiment, "Die young and leave a beautiful corpse." It's catchy, but a recent brush with the Grim Reaper left me certain that an early death is not on my Top Ten list of things to do. Heading westbound on I-40, a semi-truck threw a tire in the eastbound lane. My hands gripping the steering wheel, I watched as it bounced (in apparent slow motion) on the line dividing my car from one to my right. In the rear view mirror, I saw it hit the shoulder and roll harmlessly into a ditch. There was a surge of adrenalin. My hands started shaking when I imagined it deviating slightly and crashing into my windshield. I would have bit it but good. As for a beautiful corpse -- well, I'm sure it would have been a closed-casket ceremony.

If I had a bucket list (and I don't), I'd feel pretty good about marking off some things. True, I'll probably never tour Europe or hike up to Machu Picchu, but I've seen the Grand Canyon and driven up Pike's Peak. I wrote and published a book and I found my True Love. I had a part in creating two unique and entertaining individuals and I've laughed -- a lot. So when the end comes, it comes.

I just hope it comes without any surprise birthday parties. I hate those things.

The spice of life

Love is in the air. It’s possible I might be getting a new grandpa for Easter. My grandmother’s got her eye on a wheel-chair bound resident down the hall. In fact, she’s got more than an eye on him. Apparently, she groped the gentleman during a sing-along of favorite church hymns.

Nearer my God to thee, indeed.

Sexual harassment or senior moment? Both families pledged to keep the elderly Juliet away from the aged Romeo, but I didn’t have the courage to ask her about it Sunday when I picked her up for lunch. The image of my granny playing fast and loose with forbidden fruit was too much for me. Always elegant, proper, and reticent, it was impossible to imagine her doing such a thing. She probably wouldn’t even remember doing it, to be honest.

Grandma wanted to go out for a hamburger, but her favorite place had closed down. We ended up at a Mexican food restaurant, eating fajitas and soft tacos. She put away an entire bowl of salsa and queso, smacking her lips with satisfaction. “I love that spicy food!”

That's one thing we've got in common.

Spring is also in the air, and I spent Saturday afternoon in the yard, preparing my flower beds, pulling weeds, and watering. “You wasted all that water,” Sport said when he saw it was raining the next morning. True enough. I was also sore from all that squatting. I still need to spend many more hours out there, but I’m not sure how I’ll fit it in – Sport’s got soccer games and piano contests every Saturday until the end of May, and LegoGuy has his church youth activities and orchestra competitions. I’m getting too old for this. I’d love to hire someone to help me – preferably a young latino man who looks a lot like Antonio Banderas.

With Grandma as my role model, I think I'm going to refuse to let the aging process kill my spirit. I’ll refuse to wear a hat in the sun, embrace my gray hair, and look at each wrinkle as a badge of honor. I’ll squat in the mud, eat spicy foods, and occasionally grope my gardening assistant.

"Mmmm, spicy!"

Grandma doesn't live here anymore

Grandma’s roommate is crazy. I don’t mean to be harsh, but the woman wanders around in her wheelchair, asking for help in putting on her shoes, searching for her mama, and muttering in a low but gravely voice. She wants my grandmother to help her, and it’s hard to turn down those insistent, plaintive demands.

“She’s crazy,” Grandma tells me, laughing a little. “God bless her. Crazy as a loon.”

After a series of mini-strokes about a month ago, Grandma’s condition deteriorated enough that she needed to be moved to an assisted living center. It’s been a difficult choice for my mother, but Grandma’s short-term memory is very limited. She needs to be constantly monitored, but she’s not like the other lost souls in her Alzheimer’s wing where she’s got a room.

Luckily, she’s got a good attitude about the whole situation. She knows Mom can’t handle any more stress. So she tries to be patient: she eats her three meals in the cafeteria with the other patients, she listens to live music, she attends craft programs.

But I wonder what she thinks about when she’s lying in the dark, trying to get to sleep.

Does she think about her life as the child of a cotton farmer in West Texas? Her marriage at the age of 16 to a preacher man, the birth of her two children, the miscarriage of another? Does she think on the loss of her first husband to lymphoma, her marriage to a widowed preacher, and his death after 30 years of marriage? What of all the vacations she took to research the family tree? Of her son, the scumbag who swindled her out of her life savings? Of her daughter, dealing with the effects of bipolar disorder? What about her 8 grandchildren and numerous great-grandchildren?

I found myself wishing that, as our elders aged, they'd also get smaller -- shrinking to the size of babies so we could have an easier time taking care of them. Don't most babies look like old men and women anyway? (Except Suri Cruise.)

On my way home, I started crying. I hated seeing Grandma like that, knowing she’s on the final leg of her journey. This woman was the key ingredient to building my self-esteem when I was a kid. She loved me unconditionally. She made me feel special. I felt helpless, wishing I could do something to make it easier. Is loving her enough?

I don't like facing the reality that most of us are destined for such a place. I hope I'll have to grace to be gracious, just like Grandma.