My younger sister, Karen, who lives in northern California, was here for a visit the first part of this year. Along with her and her husband, Dick, was her precocious, four-year-old granddaughter, Jayne.

On that day we were watching a lot of football, making our way to Superbowl.

After some time, Jayne was bored, and frankly so was I.  It was time to get out of the house, and anyway, Jayne wanted to go play on the swings in the park close to my house.

As we pulled in to the park, we could see everyone in the greater Los Angeles area had also decided to go to the park that day.

At last we found a parking place but it was some distance from the play area and quite a hike to the swings.

Halfway there, my sister took pity on me, watching me limp my way to the playground because of a sore ankle, and let’s face it, a deteriorating body. She said, “Why don’t you take my car home, and when Jayne’s had her fill, I’ll call you to come pick us up.

After an hour or so, I got the call.  I picked them up near the swings and then headed home. As we pulled out of the park on to the road, Jayne said to my sister,

“Grandma! Who is that old lady driving your car!? (I had spent the entire morning with Jayne.  Did I age that much in just an hour?  Possible.  I find new “things” on my face each morning.)

You might have guessed that old lady was me.

Jayne’s assessment just confirmed for me what I already knew; I AM an old lady.  I started thinking about some of things happening to me in older age — the odd things that I was not prepared for — and it prompted me to explore those things. I decided to make an Old People’s List of Facts:

You often lose your balance, sometimes staggering down the hallway, bouncing off the walls.

You drop lots of things – keys, phone, caps on bottles, tiny blood pressure pills – and the funny thing is you don’t just drop them.  By this I mean that you drop something perhaps right by your foot, but when you go to pick it up, it’s not there.  The object has somehow acquired feet and walked or rolled away – sometimes never to be found again.

You wear out early in the day and need a nap. I’m getting sleepy writing this, and it’s only 11:00 a.m.

You have to be close to a bathroom or know where they are – everywhere. You blame this on a bad urologist back in the eighties, but you know it would have happened anyway in the 2000’s.

You don’t care about any award shows, and there seem to be tons of them these days.  The musical award shows, for instance, are  every other week, and the Academy Awards – which you used to LOVE – and Golden Globes are wedged between dozens of other film and television awards.

You finally reach that stage where you say fuckit to diets and vitamins and cleanses and strenuous exercise.  You barely do the stretches your physical therapist gave you and wonder whether they help or not.  You’re extremely sore afterwards – and hungry.

In fact, any exercise of any duration or strenuousness (is that a word?) makes you hungry beyond control and tired.

You might even be too tired to own a dog, that animal that is touted to bring you peace and happiness.

Every dog we’ve ever owned wanted my constant attention, if they weren’t  sleeping eighteen hours a day themselves.

If I make a move while they’re sleeping, they are instantly awake and staring at me…and following me wherever I go; hoping food is in the very near future, which it probably is.

If I’m cooking, they are at my feet.  In fact, any activity — even a stroll through the kitchen to the laundry room — prompts following, staring and dog muttering while trying to get me to meet their pleading-for-a-snack eyes.

To boot, I recently babysat my daughter’s two dogs. I then had four eager dog faces in my face constantly – not to mention the shit, pee, vomit and unidentifiable remains of all the dogs –but mostly Desi who is the oldest in the group, bless his little heart – or maybe it’s a big heart because he seems on the brink of death but then has an energy surge that surprises the hell out of you, and he lives on.

As an old person, am I the human version of Desi; dragging my ass on the floor and biting off the head of anyone who annoys me?

One day I was getting ready to do my Qigong exercise.  I moved to remove my slippers, and when I looked down I realized each one was on the wrong foot.  Had to be for a couple of hours at least.  It was dark when I put them on this morning.

You need more money, now that you’re living on a fixed income, and you’ve tried to find a job, but you haven’t tried that hard – okay, once I contacted a work-at-home-agency for retired people.

They wouldn’t even give me information!  They only wanted recent retirees, and I’m sure they were all making fun of me when I said I had retired fourteen years ago.  How could I possibly have any abilities left at all?

My husband contacted one place to work, and they asked him when he graduated from high school.  When he told them it was 1961, they hung up on him!  Sneaky way to get around the “How old are you?” question.

When one is old, one begins to lose people that you have loved — and to be honest even some that you didn’t love, but they touched your life — which is certainly the worst thing about reaching old age.

Being a very large and close family, I’m feeling the sadness about my aunties and uncles who are slowly, but surely leaving me.

Friends are going away, too.  That’s why I made a special trip a couple of months ago to meet up with three of them from an important chapter in my life – travel across and then out of the United States to Europe.  Two of our original group have already passed on

In February, I went to the memorial service of one of my beloved uncles.  He was 93, but still, when I looked at the slide pictures of his life …and mine…it became clear just how many are gone from my life —  pictures of picnics, birthday parties, and holidays.

In one of the picnic pictures, we look like the Joad Family from the Grapes of Wrath.  Now there’s an uplifting story, but as I looked at us having a great time at something as simple as a family picnic, I realized that although we were not wealthy people, we didn’t know we weren’t, and it certainly didn’t stop us from having great times.

Our numbers are  diminished, but do we only gather for this kind of event — funerals?  No, we still have  weddings and new births and other life milestones, and I don’t want to miss a one of them while I’m still above ground.

I’m happy to still have my mother’s remaining sisters – Marie at 87 and Rosie at 91.

On my father’s side, there are two uncles left – Jim (91), and Jack (86).  Jim is still driving although crashing into objects*, and Jack is driving but forgetting that he was.  He, at least, handed his keys over to his son after the second incident.  I talked to him recently.  He’s home after a stint for who-knows-what in the hospital.  He seems a bit—shall we say, “not himself.”

I wonder about the service they will give me – maybe none I’m thinking.  I’d like them to spread my ashes at Mt. Shasta, in the spot where my sister, Karen, has buried her dead pets.  It’s a beautiful spot in a small grove at the front of her property.

I think they should skip a funeral service and just have a big party on me.  That’s assuming I have any money left then and am not living in a tent on Main Street in downtown LA.

NOT YET THE END

*Uncle Jim has stopped driving, but now he’s p.o.’d because his daughter took away his credit cards.  Oh the humiliations of old age.