How Many Happy Returns?

As November draws to a close, I find myself wondering more often than I should about how much time I still may have left on this earth. I tried to let pass another birthday without even the most minimal fanfare. To have now become 81 is an age that I find impossible to relate to, so abstract is the double-digit figure to me. Regardless, I am still in overall good health, but not without some aches in the lower back and in the knees. My hearing is still sharp, but lately I have found that my sight now requires light-strength reading glasses on occasion. My hair and teeth are mostly intact - and thank God I'm grateful for that - while my looks, even at this age, haven’t betrayed me too much in their wear and tear. For someone who had rough-and-tumbled it as much as I had through my prime, I think I’ve weathered fairly well. It could be far worse. Nevertheless, I can’t help but still feel the 35-year-old in me. Or is it 40-year-old? I never seemed to have outgrown it. And so I wonder if I truly have a few good years left ahead of me ... or would it be months, or days?

Vivienne had stayed the weekend two weeks ago. Her Italian friend Emilia, with whom she had spent the summer in Naples, was also a welcomed guest. The two had met at the Université Aix-Marseilles last spring, where both continue their studies, and quickly found a fast rapport with each other. One evening Vivienne asked when my birthday was. I lied when I told her that it had passed a few days earlier, when in fact it was to arrive a few days later. The girls expressed dismay over having missed it in the way girls normally do over such things, meaninglessly and melodramatically. They insisted on taking me out for dinner but I refused their offer. Acknowledging another year in any manner was something I tended to avoid. It certainly was considerate and generous of them to help me celebrate my birthday and I told them so, and I suppose I must admit to being touched by their attempt, but I knew it would only have the effect of dampening my spirits more than enlivening them. But they went out the next day and bought me a gift just the same. Now I have an easel and a full set of art supplies to thank them for. It was Emilia’s idea. She’s a good artist herself and she believed that painting for me would be a stimulating way to spend some of my time. When she had first visited with Vivienne in June, en route to Naples, she coaxed me into trying out some art on canvas. Surprisingly, I found I had a bit of a knack for it. I had never considered myself as an artist, but when it came to me with such relative ease I thought perhaps Emilia was right, that it possibly could be a pleasant pastime for me to engage in.

I have yet to begin any new artwork with the supplies, though. A fresh blank canvas still rests on the easel - perhaps as a reflection of the unknown, unimagined and unexpected that lie ahead as I creep into my 82nd year.