I don’t like being old. It isn’t working for me. I wish I could have a younger body again. I’ve forgotten how to move without these aches and pains, creaks and moans, the oohs and ahhs and oh nos. But at least I can move; I can swim. Every morning, I wake up to my internal clock that drives me to the pool in the darkness. I slink into the water and feel its coolness surround me, lift me, stretch me, welcome me back to life. I glide, I flutter, I float. It’s wonderful. Then back to gravity. Ooh.
After swimming, I drive out to my daughter’s house. She lives close to my youngest daughter. Today it’s Julie’s house, tomorrow it’s Abby’s. Julie’s vegetable garden is on the south end of her property, in full blazing sun. Her forty acres stretch from the road to the creek. Half of the property is rented out to one of the local farmers who had decided to plant alfalfa this year. When he plants corn, you can sit out on the back deck and listen to the wind breeze across the tops. Close your eyes and you’ll think of the lake; the big vast blue of Lake Michigan that lies only ten miles east of here. It’s so quiet here, unlike my house. It used to be quiet, nearly 40 years ago when we first built. But now, with the near by expressway getting busier and the new developments popping up everywhere, the peaceful sounds of the countryside have slowly turned into the sounds of a growing city. I suppose we could move, but the house is paid for and the gardens are in bloom. Where else would I want to be other than my home?
I pull up the long gravel driveway, twisting this way and that way, listening to the stones pop up underneath the tires. The crickets are deafening as I step out of the car. I reach for my gardening box before I shut the door, a sound that ricochets off of the garage and wakes up the dog. A large yellow lab starts to howl from his kennel several yards always from the house. I take a deep breath of the sweet fresh air. With my box in tow, I head for the kennel to say hi to Ollie and make my way to the garden. The dog’s tail is waging so fiercely that his whole back-end moves, his hind feet slightly lifting off the ground from the rapid movements. His tongue is lapping at his lips and I know that if I open the door, his tongue will be all over my face. My back is aching and I decide to spare myself the unnecessary discomfort of trying to bat his paws off of my shoulders.
“Hi, puppy,” I call to him, wave my fingers at him which sends him into more frenzy, more excitement, and more waging. Just two of my fingers fit comfortably through the wire fence and he greedily licks them like he hasn’t seen another soul for months.
“Whas-a-matter, puppy? Don’t they love you here?” A question I already know the answer to. Ollie is never want for anything. His toys litter the cement floor of his kennel, plastic containers of treats and goodies line the outside of the fence. His round, golden tummy jiggles a little as he jumps up down. Oh, yes. He is loved. I wave to the dog again and reassure him that I will stop by later when I am finished in the garden. Ah, the garden. I couldn’t count them among their wild branches, but I know that somewhere in the jungle there are about 40 tomato plants growing. I smile to myself. Oh, heck, there’s no one around so I laugh loudly. I could just taste the juicy sweetness of a red, ripe tomato, dripping down my chin. We used to eat them like apples when I was little. My dad’s little garden producing the most wonderful tastes with the most unconventional methods, like old leather shoes buried in the asparagus patch. Fertilizer, he had called it. I’m glad to see his passion for gardening is being passed down to my children. Hopefully, when Julie’s girls are older and more settled, they’ll love it too. I laugh again. Julie is now the proud owner of an empty nest. Her youngest has been gone for two weeks now to the university. I wonder how she’s coping. Me, personally- I couldn’t wait to get them all out of the house. After six kids and countless baseball and football games in the back yard, I am finally able to have my garden. My flowers, finally, have a chance to live.
Ooh. My back stiffens slightly as I bend over, readying to pull weeds. Ahh. My legs shake as I stand back up. I don’t how she does it, that Julie. She’s been a dancer since she was little. So much energy. Now she’s a fitness instructor and coordinator at a posh, upscale health center. She teaches, yoga, pilates, spinning, aerobics, some other classes I could never take, and her newest fad, Zumba. She said it was like salsa dancing. I said I eat salsa, not dance it. I’m too old for those kinds of things. I’ll stick to my swimming. But what she really loves is biking. She’s already rode in several century rides this year, and is always looking for more. I wish I had her energy. I wish I had a young body again. Not that I would go bike riding, mind you. But I might be persuaded to take a Zumba lesson or two. I giggle at the thought of my 5 foot round frame boogieing to beat of the salsa drum.
I set my eyes on the reddest, roundest tomatoes I have seen in a long time. My mouth starts to water. I can’t wait to get home and sink my teeth into them. Oh, my teeth. That’s another thing. With three pulled within this year alone, the rest are not looking too good. I think it’s next Tuesday that I go back to the dentist. We’ll see what torture he has planned for me next. I place the weeds in one pile outside of the garden boarder and the tomatoes in my handy basket. Julie’s husband, Matt, told me to just leave them there and he’ll pick them up with his tractor. With this size of yard, he needs one, but I think he wanted this size of yard just to be able to get one. Not to mention the 4-wheeler and the go-cart stashed somewhere on the property. Boys and their toys.
I make my way back up to the house, and Ollie starts to bark. His hind is facing me, so it’s not me he’s barking at. As I come up over the hill, I see the always smiling face of my third oldest. “Well, hello there!” she calls to me.
“Look what I got!”
“Don’t you want some more?” she seemed to beg rather than ask.
“Oh, I’ll be back.”
We meet at the top of the hill a ways away from the dog. He’s doing his frenzy dance again. Julie ignores him and walks me back to the house.
“Ooh,” I say as I place the basket on the cool garage floor.
“Stiff?”
“Yeah, it must the weather changing.”
“Getting cooler out.” We both nod our heads in agreement.
“I was just thinking how nice it would be to have a younger body like you again. No aches and pains.”
Julie laughs.
“Not to say that you don’t have your share, but it’s not like mine.”
“True. But do you know what I was just thinking?”
I shook my head.
“I was thinking how I would like to be you for a day, to see first hand what some of my clients at the club go through. I have so many that are older, and to know how they move, what their aches and pains are may help me to understand how to help them better.”
I was shocked. I never thought that a younger woman would want to try out my body. I always thought they were wishing that they had the bodies of their 20 year old daughters, not the body of their 73 year old mother. It was my turn to laugh.
“Well, if you want to switch, by all means. I’m game!”
Julie shrugged. “Ok.” She took a step back and cocked her head to the side. She gives a slight nudge to the left and crack, she was loose. She twists her head to the left, all the way around her self, and lifting it up and off of her body. I shrugged and followed her lead. Tilt, crack, twist, twist, twist. We looked at each other through floating eyes. Gently, our hands held out our heads to each other, and just as gently, took them back again. Julie placed hers on top and gave a nudge to the right. “Remember, righty tighty, lefty loosey,” came out of her mouth that was now on top of my body. Twist, twist, twist, and I was on too. We look at each other. If it wasn’t for the different body shapes, I would have never know that she is me and I am her. Or am I?
“I don’t feel any different.”
“Neither do I.”
“Bend- do something.”
She bent over to pick up the basket of apples. “Ooh, yeah. I can feel it.”
I smiled. So I wasn’t crazy. I took the basket from her and immediately felt a twinge in my lower back. “Ow! What was that?”
“My back has been bugging me for years.”
“Really?”
“Yep. And my feet ache a lot too.” I could feel it.
“Behind the calf?”
“Yes, that can turn into Charlie Horses if I’m not careful.”
“What’s that pain in the back of my neck?”
“I pulled that painting one year. Never been the same since.”
“And the shoulders?”
“I rode 50 miles this morning. Still a little sore. But wait until tomorrow! That’s when it really hits.”
I suddenly felt very disappointed. “How do you feel?”
“Fine.”
“Fine?”
“Yeah. Nothing unusual. Pretty much the same.”
“Knees?”
“I have the same creaks.”
“Hands?”
“Mine hurt, too, sometimes. After I pull weeds or fold laundry.”
I could feel the pain within them. “What about your energy?”
“I feel good. How do you feel?”
“Tired.”
“You should! You just rode fifty miles!” she laughs.
“Well, you just swam a mile and a half!” I retorted.
“Want to come in for some breakfast?”
“Sure, but can I have my body back?”
“Are you saying you don’t want to keep the younger body?”
“No, I guess I’m doing pretty good after all.”
“That’s good to hear.”
“So, what did you learn?”
“I learned that my clients are bunch of whiners."
“I don't think they're going to like hearing that."
"Tough. If my mom can do it, so can they!"
I smiled. I can do it, can’t I? I can soldier through the aches and pains to live another day. But why complain about it? I’m not the only one in the world who is old... I held out a tomato in my smooth, young hands. "There are some advantages of being younger," I say. We compare hands. They both look so familiar.
Julie shrugged. “They won’t last. Soon, they’ll look more like your hands.” They are like my hands.
They are my grandmother's hands, my father's hands, my mother’s hands, they are everyone’s hands. A warmth came over me as I think of Julie's girls and how their hands must also have this look. Perhaps that is where my youth lies. "Tomatoes for breakfast?" I ask her.
"What else is there? And don't forget to take some salsa home with you. I've made about 50 quarts already,” she says with a slightly disgusted and exhausted tone.
I suddenly remember all of the canning we used to do at home, when I was young and with my own daughters. All of the jars we had to sterilize, all the produce we had to gather and clean and peel or mash. All the futzing, the bubbling over, the spills, the messes...Ooh. I giggle slightly. Now that I'm older, I don't have to do that anymore. I'm able let the young ones do it and take a share in their bounty. I let the young ones do what young people are supposed to do. I don't have to do any of that anymore. No more shuttling around kids, no more basketball games or girl scouts, no more moving kids into apartments or dorms. Their on their own now. No more full time job. I especially like that one. I enjoyed doing some of that, being able to have my kids and to help them when I could. But it’s my time now. I have the time to do the things I want to do, to plant my gardens, to read my books, to enjoy my day where ever I want to be.
I change my mind. I like being old.
