A funny thing happened to me when I came home from running errands in town last week — I got old. I fed the chickens, put my various store-bought items away, and changed into a cozy flannel and some slippers. After exchanging status updates with Farley as she cooked our dinner, I decided it was a good time to sit down and start reading a new (used) book* I bought on our recent vacation.
Only I couldn’t read it. My vision from 2 to 200 feet and beyond is still as sharp as ever, but the small stuff up close just doesn’t dial in anymore. “Ah” I remembered, “this is one of the reasons I went to town today.” While picking up my first old person prescription, the glasses display reminded me of my recent visit to an optometrist, who told me I need reading glasses. I retrieved the $5 lenses, settled them on my face, and put my feet up. The text flowed wonderfully for a while, until something called for my attention, probably the activity of a young dog harassing and old one, and I looked up. There before me, reflected in the glass of our picture window, was a blurry old guy with glasses, holding a book. Who is that?
It was me, old Bryon. A flurry of questions came to my mind… who is old Bryon? What’s he like?
Bear’s senses serve me well all around the farm. She can probably even smell how this book ends.
Now more than ever, limitations on my physical capacity weigh heavily on the bank account of my imagination. I still want to do all the stuff, but my knees say “practice using your reading glasses on the couch today”. I still want to make the world a better place, but the tingling in my digits and joints says “do fun stuff while you still can”.
So what’s old Bryon to do? Burn cash seeing the world before it burns, connecting with people while they’re still mostly smiling? Or stay put and connect with nature, and maybe write a little about it so the future will know what it was like?
I am fortunate to have a choice. Still, my imagination continues writing checks on the thousands of things I’m interested in doing, and that guy reflected in the window knows that only a few of them can actually be done.
We have 100+ red alder trees coming this winter for conservation planting. Beautiful Svart Hona chicks are growing out in the yard, rare and unique and just waiting for more people to discover them if only a few more poultry freaks (ahem) would do the work to develop the breed. I have at least three friends nearby with considerable orcharding experience, and perhaps one of the best tree nurseries in the U.S. is only a half hour away, ready to provide the foundation for a legacy apple yard. There is plenty of room and time in winter for restoring old axe heads, building bird and bat houses, or… dang it, hide the checkbook!
Still haven’t been to New Zealand. Or Iceland. Or east of the Cascades.
About the only things I know for sure about old Bryon are that there will always be a place by his fire for dogs, and he has the best wife ever. The rest might take a few more decades to figure out.
*The Hidden History of the Human Race, a book about old bones. Funny that I should have this in my hands when it dawned on me I should think about how to be old. The universe often puts its cleverest clues in plain sight.
Old dogs kind enough to share a sliver of bed with me for a nap.