WE NEVER GO MAD

3 of 100

 "It was only lately that she had become so absent minded and she struggled to cover up her forgetfulness. It was hard work being old. It was like being a baby, in reverse. Every day for an infant means some new little thing learned; every day for the old means some little thing lost. Names slip away, dates mean nothing, sequences become muddled, and faces blurred. Both infancy and age are tiring times."

— Elizabeth Taylor, Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont, 1971

This is certainly true of Janet. 

Is this too much of a bummer with which to start a post? You've all probably stopped reading by now. But it has the ring of truth. My memory is still pretty good, but I do have more trouble finishing my sentences and quickly recalling the names for things. Part of that is likely due to not having enough opportunity to interact with humans, or at least different humans. The cats don't care what I say as long as I don't call them late for supper. And the real motivator there is the sound of dry food hitting the bowl or the sweet sweet sound of an opening can.

Fox is in here with me in my very messy study. I think in another world, he would like to sit on my lap, but we are rarely in sync on that. Right now, I am perched at the end of my desk chair, so there is no lap to speak of. Meanwhile, he is china-shop-bulling around the room looking for a comfortable and inappropriate perch. David reported that both Fox and McCoy cuddled up with him on the couch when he would get up at night to watch tv. They want him to come back.

My current state is not really depressed, but somewhere on the grumpy and dissatisfied spectrum. Earlier today, I was even in a good and enthusiastic mood as my cousin and I successfully modified a pattern to fit her better. This cheered up the both of us and hopefully sets along a productive sewing path this year. It is much less frustrating to work with her. 

And, all in all, it was a productive week for me, punctuated by visits with Karen who was in town. My goal is to do three things a day (maybe I mentioned that in my last post), and I was sufficiently accomplished in this. Last night, I made some Moroccan Stew and Chipotle Brownies. Both came out well, but Janet was not a fan of the soup. Fortunately, I can share with Patrick so I won't have to get tired of it. 

Food-wise Janet and I are on different palate planets. 

And I finished reading my second book of the year. I have been so far away from the reading habit, I feared it could not be re-instituted. Mrs. Palfrey was not much of an upper, but a good read nonetheless.

My biggest accomplishment was finishing the Wednesday New York Times Crossword Puzzle with no help. I had just assumed that all of them were too hard for me, but maybe not. And I did make it to Saturday Morning Yoga.

"By the mid-sixties, America was experiencing the 'generation gap'. Parents whose kids returned from school or college with long hair and a rebellious attitude often went into shock. Children were disowned, 'grounded', locked up, beaten, shorn, lectured, or sent to psychiatrists, military school or mental institutions. In Britain I visited pubs where earringed boys with long hair stood drinking a Sunday pint next to their dads in cloth caps. Neither seemed the least bit concerned. Americans were so unsure of their often newly won status that they could not comprehend the next generation rejecting what they had worked so hard to achieve. The British seemed to feel that little was going to change, no matter how long their child's hair grew. My egalitarian American impulses were unnerved when comedians or pundits referred to some working-class parents' reluctance for their kids to be educated 'above their station', yet much of British society seemed happy and content compared to status-anxious America.

— Joe Boyd, White Bicycles: Making Music in the 1960s, Serpent's Tail, London, 2006

Among some of my friends, there is an ongoing thread about the "march of history" as we experienced it. And this does explain a bit why there was such a volcanic rift, or so it seemed to us, in the 1960s. Whatever greater insight on this topic that I once had has since fled (it has been a couple of weeks since I marked that passage to quote) but I found it worth including.

THE NEGATIVE VIRTUES

loneliness

is a luxury beyond the reach

of those who have no privacy left

and live in the hope

of its constant invasion

but to those

who have always been alone

it is a friend

poverty

gives us a sense of direction

when we don’t know which way to go

and when we walk 

on the edge of its cliff

we never go mad we can’t afford to

fear

like courage and charity

begins at home and expands in circles

rocking all the boats it touches

and bringing in its wake

the last of the negative virtues

maturity

which is not what we wanted

but comes anyway when we realize

that the things we feared

as children

can no longer hurt us

and that we fear them no less

— Richard Shelton, The Bus to Veracruz, University of Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburg, PA, 1978