Growing Old

It's been a tough holiday season for a few of my close friends who are dealing with aging parents.  

A little more than a month ago, the mother of one of my friends fell in her driveway and fractured her femur.  Recovery has been tough, as she's non-weight bearing and will be for at least two months.  She hasn't recovered from surgery the way we would have hoped, physically and mentally.  It's tough because this surgery followed hip replacement surgery a year or so ago.  

Another friend's mother recently fell while the entire family was in Hawaii and broke her hip.  She, too, had some preexisting medical issues that made surgery a dicey affair, particularly since she was 4,000 miles from home.  Fortunately, surgery went well and they were able fly back to Nashville earlier this week.  Still, she's looking at in-patient rehabilitation for at least a few weeks.

Another friend called me Sunday night, while I was watching television with the boys.  It was an odd time for him to call, so when I saw I had missed his call I called him right back.  "I wanted to hear your voice," he said, "because I knew you'd understand."  His mother had died earlier that day after experiencing breathing issues apparently related to pulmonary fibrosis.  My heart hurts for him, in part because I still acutely feel the loss of my mother, especially this time of year.  Like me almost six years ago, he finds himself an adult orphan, having lost his father in the last couple of years.  

So much of this seems to be going around, all with parents in their late seventies.  

It got me to thinking, of course that I am not that far away from my late seventies, given that I turn 60 this summer.  Over the weekend, I wondered how I can run five miles comfortably, now, on the trails or in the neighborhood, and perhaps he less than 20 years away from immobility and the every day risk of a fall that breaks my femur or hip.  I mean, damn!  The next couple of decades might really suck from a physical standpoint.  

On top of that, earlier this week I saw an old lawyer friend of mine - someone I went to law school with 35 years ago - struggling up the ramp as he walked into the courthouse across from my office.  He was in a terrible bicycle accident when he was a child, as a result of which he's always walked with two canes.  I've always admires his perseverance through so much adversity at a young age.  

In law school, he was thin with a thick shock of blonde hair, good looking by an objective standard.  He was strong, too, from all the years of maneuvering around with his canes.  Years later, I saw him in Las Vegas a few times and other than his difficulty walking, he was the picture of health.  When I saw him earlier this week and waved to him, I noticed he was heavier than I'd seen him and his hair was all gray.  And, as I said, he seemed to be struggling a bit to get into the courthouse.

I guess what hit me, hard, was he looked tired.  Really tired.  Like life had had its way with him over the past decade or so.  He had a bunch of children, as I recall, most of whom are probably grown and out of the house now.  So. what's left?  A man with a disability he got decades ago through no fault of his own, struggling to walk into the courthouse for work.

Honestly, it was kind of depressing.  All of that has been kind of depressing, not that it's about me, of course.  As JP considers various colleges and universities and Joe gets adjusted to seventh grade at MBA, I keep plugging away.  A client call in ten minutes.  A mediation later today.  Three projects I have to get done.  Telephone calls to return.  A receptionist to hire.  An office to run.  Bills to pay.

Yep, the holidays are over and the winter doldrums are here.  I haven't found the time to run this week and I need to get out there and get one it.  Hopefully, that will happen this afternoon.

Growing old is not for the faint of heart.  Truer words have never been spoken.