Another year headed for the record books. I turned 60 this year…that alone made for several surreal months. A friend of mine tags all his emails with the line “Inside every old person is a young person wondering…what happened?” I have asked myself that question many times lately.
Things got off to a good start when my step-daughter and I spent a January weekend together at a science-fiction convention in Chattanooga where I was the guest-of-honor. It was cold while we were there, and I was delighted.
And healthy. I didn’t come down with bronchitis until I was back in the Sunshine State. By the time I was back on my feet three months later, 2008 had taken a turn toward the grim.
Those of you who’ve been getting the previous installments of this journal know that there was a time when Bob Asprin and I were happily married and a time when we weren’t. In May, Bob dozed off while reading and didn’t wake up. Bob was never the sort who paid much attention to his own well-being. Everyone who knew him worried, but no one was prepared.
Wives become widows; Ex-wives become…more than a little bewildered.
Midway through the fourth Indiana Jones movie, Harrison Ford seemed to be talking to me when he said, “We seem to have reached the age where life stops giving us things and starts taking them away.”
The year didn’t really improve after that epiphany. I’ve held on to my family, but lost too many friends-close friends and younger friends, which is simply wrong.
Factor in a year that has been economically challenging for everyone and it should be no surprise that I find myself in a cautious mood as the year winds down. (Or that I’m late with everything, including this letter!)
Maybe I’m finally old enough to start appreciating poetry, or maybe just the poetry of Robert Burns and the Days of Auld Lang Syne.
Look Who’s Talking…