I’ve spent the past couple of days in a retirement home, fortunately just as a guest.  While my wife helps her 96-year old mother stay organized, I have spent my time reading, writing, or visiting with some of the residents.  I just finished Ken Follet’s lengthy new novel, A Column of Fire, where very few of the characters, fictional or real, lived to be my age.  Mary Queen of Scots, also known as Mary Stuart or Mary I, died at age 44, while her sister Elizabeth Tudor, Queen of England, made it to the ripe old age of 69.  For those of you that haven’t read it, I’ll spare you the details, but most of the book sticks to the historical facts.  The book ends as the Mayflower is about to set sail to the New World in 1620.  One of the fictional characters in the book lives until the age of 80, about as old as people got in that era.

As I look around me, I’m still a young man here in the “activity” room.  Walkers and wheelchairs are the primary mode of transportation and the majority in the room are women.  The most strenuous movement in the group is the effort to shuffle cards, followed by Wii bowling, drawing, puzzling, and painting.  I’m the only one using a computer, and it’s been quiet most of the afternoon.  One woman just came in to join the bowling action, and will actually participate standing up, rather than sit passively like her opponent.  As they are creating her Wii character, the level of conversation picked up and even the pet birds chirped louder.  The room is beginning to show playful signs of life.  Strike!

We’ll drive to the outskirts of Chicago later this evening, so my wife can gradually shift into business mode.  I will continue to have a “vacation” from dog duty, and will try once again to get a good night’s sleep in a strange bed.  During my run this morning, my I-Tunes player got stuck on the song, Gravedigger, by the Dave Matthews Band.  It replayed a total of twelve times, adding to my concerns about old age.

Yesterday in this same room, I spoke for some time to a man in his early 80’s about baseball.  He shared some memories about the Chicago White Sox and the 1959 World Series.  Although he was about 17 years older, somehow baseball narrowed the age gap and led us to other subjects.  He had lost both a wife a son a few years ago, so I felt fortunate to still have both of those treasures.  I was relieved to see that his memory was still good, after less positive experiences with my father a few years ago.  Everyone here at the Assisted Living Center is precious cargo, as life gets more and more fragile with each decade that passes.

I’m looking at my future, as hard as it is to think about.  Although it’s exciting to be in the first year of retirement, it won’t last forever.  I’m appreciative of the support staff here, doing their patient best to keep everyone comfortable and stimulated. I’m also impressed by those few here that continue to be positive and active, even though they no longer have homes of their own, have lost close family members, and have given up most of their worldly possessions.  I personally try to keep the gravedigger away with daily exercise of both the mind and body, but the song continues to replay in my mind.  Somehow, Dave Matthews makes the tune worth humming.