To Leap or Fall Flat with Guido

So, I'm reading this book "Leap," by Sara Davidson.  It's all about answering the question "What will we do with the rest of our lives?"  My buddy, Ellen, lent it to me saying "I'm still not sure what I think about it...It might be depressing...But I thought about you because she's a writer who went through a phase where she couldn't write.  But I don't know..."

Hmmm.

I took it to the hair salon.  There, beneath the dryer, I forswore People to read Leap.

So far it sounds like life's a bitch and then you die. Sometimes you find meaning and purpose but sometimes you just drop dead. I haven't finished the book yet, so maybe the "Happy Ending" is coming. You know me, I want "The Answer" and this book is all about the process and finding your own answer.

Davidson interviews quite a few famous people, like Carly Simon, and considers moving to Costa Rica and living in a compound along with some of her other aging friends.

Then there are the people she interviews who have a plan and work it- only to drop dead.

I'm reading the part about sex and aging just as my pretty, young, hairdresser walks by.  "Figured out the rest of your life yet?" she asks.

I smile weakly thinking, just you wait...

I'm reading about sex and aging.  A guy risks sex with his wife after a heart attack, each time telling her goodbye just before the "golden moment" because it's worth the risk.  A group of women find other women to help them find their "sacred spot." The author tries learning to tango as a way to find physical closeness.

I sink down into my chair and feel hopeless.  Ellen was right.  This book is depressing.

It's not just the aging thing.  It's life.  We have so much riding on it, so many high expectations.  Aging sounds like the let down you sometimes feel on Christmas afternoon, after the presents are all opened.  Someone's always singing "The party's over..."

I think I'll write my own book on life and getting old. 

I don't know famous people, but I know lots of old guys.  Here's what I'd say...

There's no Fairy Godmother...Instead, you get grandchildren and dessert.  Deal with it.

To quote Grandma Alice, "Life ain't hard, honey.  You make it hard."

My friends aren't moving to South America with me. 

We're buying an old motel and fixing it up.  We each get a room of our own.

And we'll hire a gorgeous couple, Guido and Ursula, to take care of us. Ursula will do the things we don't want a man doing, the personal, icky stuff, while Guido does the heavy lifting- like carrying us outside to our rocking chairs.

Sure, I know Medicare covers the cost of a battery-operated wheelchair, but it doesn't smell as good as Guido.

If I'm not demented, I'm saying all the stuff I don't say now and pretending it's because I'm nuts.  I want to be like the little man who looked up at me after I returned to the nursing home from vacation and said "My God! You got old!"

And if I am truly demented or have Alzheimer's- No one's allowed to speak to me as if I'm a toddler.  Furthermore, if I think Ursula's my mother, Ursula has to go along with it. 

If I think Guido's the Prince of....Well, you get my drift. If I say we live on an alien space ship, no one's allowed to disabuse me of the notion. 

I hate when well-meaning staff or relatives try to tell one of my old guys we're not on the old home place and their mother's really dead. It breaks their heart.

Life's too short to die with a broken heart.

 

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