Reflections from the Slippery Slope

Old Woman Fathoming...

Cobb Creek

It’s morning at the creek edge

and the question is:

Shall I jump as usual and enjoy,

as I have hundreds of times,

the casual down thrust of my legs

on the other side?

Certain factors are unavoidable, still

something in me

refuses to abdicate.

I don’t spend much time on it.

I jump

and for the first time in my 77 years

I fall in.

What a beautiful splash!

———Mary Oliver

It appears that Mary Oliver, a wonderful poet and guru of mine, laughed loudly at the notion of a Slippery Slope. She knew “certain factors were unavoidable”, hoping muscle memory would prevail, but plunked into the water with a “beautiful splash”. She said nothing more, no regret, no a-ha flash to confirm the decline of physical prowess on her psyche.

I, too, am 77. The Slope is greasing up rapidly. Unlike Mary, I mourn the abilities I have lost, but feel ever hopeful of a “wonderful splash”. This unwelcome arrival of elderhood, which requires coming to grips with loss, is a critical rite of passage in preparation for Death. I intellectually know this. However, sheer guts and resilience are required, which I currently lack. Mary Oliver was cool with her loss of jumping ability. I love her for that.

I am working on it. I am seeing about facilitating a Death Cafe. I watch carefully the expressions of those on walkers or canes for signs of anguish and rarely see any obvious discomfort. I try not to remember how I bounded down steps like the young people I see who use no handrail and just flow from top to bottom. I force myself to get up from the most comfortable position for me, which is sitting, to do my household chores. I fill the too many hours in the day with reading and learning and doing what is possible to fight injustice. Bed at 7PM; no matter, up at 4AM to start the ball rolling again.

I think I am in a GAP, which means I have lost a lot, but am hanging in there, WAITING, like the high divers soaring off cliffs in exotic places before they hit the water: I have left my world of safety and physical mastery for a long, long space of nothingness. Will I jump and know the glorious splash of success——-to reach the sea unscathed with new knowledge and passion for living? A bumper sticker on my car: Live Like They Left the Gate Open. May it be so.