LAST LEGS – Giving My All to Walking Tall

On the self-consciousness scale of one to ten, I’m about a six. It’s far from an obsession, but it does enter my mind now and then: How do I look or sound—or smell, for that matter—to others?

But the list of things I’m self-conscious about has seldom included how I walk. Until about my fifties, that is. That’s when putting one foot nicely in front of the other started becoming something I could no longer take for granted.

MY ACHING BACK
I was a jock all the way through college and beyond. In high school, I’d played football for a leathery ex-Marine coach who labeled a sniveling coward anyone who shied from blocking or tackling head-first.

When I was a junior in college, I was in a bad car accident. Most of the damage involved having my face pushed in, but I always wondered if any musculoskeletal after-effects might show up.

Then there was about 20 years of ice hockey. Oh, and flipping 60- to 80-pound canoes up and down from my shoulders—something I’ve kept doing into my mid-seventies.

So, though I suspect none of these factors by itself resulted in significant impairment, together, I’m afraid they stirred up a perfect storm of damage to my poor spine.

TILT!
I’ll never forget the day, about six years ago, when my orthopedic surgeon at Mayo showed me that CT scan of my spine. It wasn’t just a bit worse for wear; it looked like the backbone of someone who’d just jumped off a cliff…and landed on his tail bone.

The surgery alleviated the worst of my referred-pain symptoms, but it could not fix what decades of degeneration had wrought. Alas, the 15-degree sideways S-curve in my spine remains.

Crumbling discs, narrowing nerve pathways, bone-on-bone abrasion. By rights, I should be a cripple…but I’m determined not to look like it. So, of course, I’ve  grown quite conscious of trying to stand straight, walk tall, and not limp.

By the time I knew what was happening I’d already lost the battle between dexterity and gravity.

RUDE AWAKENING
Now that I’m in my mid-seventies, my screwy spine is just part of my posture problem. There’s also the inevitable wear and tear of aging on one’s bones and muscles. Not to mention balance, that precious asset whose denigration is a dead giveaway for old folks and drunks.

(I sometimes wonder, if I ever got pulled over on suspicion of DWI, would I be able to walk the straight line—even if I hadn’t touched a drop? I doubt it.)

That reminds me, I’ve recently had a couple of sobering falls. One time I unknowingly stepped off a curb, and by the time I knew what was happening I’d already lost the battle between dexterity and gravity. 

 
FLATTENING THE CURVE
A few years ago, my wife Sally started pointing out that I slouch. Ever since, I’ve made an effort to suck in my gut, rock my hips forward and pull my shoulders back.

Doing so actually feels pretty good. At first, the resident pain in my lower back eases and I feel younger, stronger. I imagine that Sally’s not seeing me as a stooped old man. After a few minutes, though, it starts to feel like a lot of work. I let go of the effort…and of my short-lived fantasy.

     Every time I pretend the curve’s still there,
     it’s like trying to bend a two-by-four.

I’ve come to realize why standing straight is so hard for me: When most folks rock their hips forward to stand straighter, they’re actually flattening out the smalls of their backs—those inward curves most people have just above their butts.

But after my lumbar spinal fusion I no longer have a small of the back. That surgery, by fusing together the three vertebra central to the lumbar spine, flattened out the curve and rendered it more or less rigid. So every time I pretend the curve’s still there, it’s like trying to bend a two-by-four—one anchored, by the way, by four three-inch titanium screws.

LITTLE BIG MAN
Walking tall is about more than appearances or pride; it’s also a survival strategy.

Some years ago, my friend Silverio and I spent a very late night in a bar on Garibaldi Square, one of Mexico City’s seediest attractions, notorious not just for its glut of mariachi bands, but for its rogues gallery of thieves, beggars and drunks.

As we’re stumbling out of the place in the wee hours, a group of four or five wiry young men approach and start harassing us. All five-foot-eight of Silverio puffs out his chest, swaggers right up to the punks and gets in their faces.

They backed off, opting to look for someone less formidable.

Later, I asked Silverio about the incident. He explained that, growing up in that close-quarters city of 20-million, he’d learned the hard way that stature is about more than height; it’s also about attitude, the way you carry that height.

To this day, when I take our dog, Sylvia, out for her last walk before bed each night, believe it or not I find myself channeling Silverio, aware of exactly what the way I walk says about me and my vulnerability.

        Like my dancer alter ego, I’ll hobble
        as if no one’s watching.

HOBBLING WITH GRACE
Especially to us humans, a spine fit for walking also means freedom. It’s hard to imagine losing that elemental ability to go wherever we want, whenever we want, under our own power.

But lose it we will. Aging and physics assure it. In the meantime, I plan to fight the inevitable at every turn. Can’t walk so well? I suppose I’ll get a brace or use a walker. Still can’t walk? There’s always a wheelchair. (My mom got around pretty well in one till she was 100.)

And what about the self-consciousness? I guess I’m counting on its waning at the same rate as my abilities. Like my dancer alter ego, I’ll learn to hobble as if no one’s watching.

Something I now know that I didn’t when I started writing this post: Consciousness—of others, of Nature, of joy—is just too precious to waste any more of it on how I walk.

“Look outside and you will see yourself. Look inside and you will
find yourself.”  ~ DREW GERALD

HOLD THE HIATUS – Keeping One’s Spirit Alive During the Pandemic

I’ve been journaling about this whole COVID 19 situation for nearly three months now. Besides simply documenting the experience for posterity, these jottings have served as my sounding board, my companion and, occasionally, the vehicle of my venting.

They convey spans of emotion from profound loneliness to a proud sense of community, from abject despair to guarded hope, and from mild concern to sheer terror. Even the occasional embarrassment of riches, finding myself so little affected by the crisis, and so…well…happy.

But I’m afraid it’s taken me all of these three months—even expressing those feelings, even doing other things right like maintaining daily structure and a sense of purpose—to realize I’ve not been doing as well as I thought.

   There’s an aspect of “survival mode” that’s not 
   serving me—nor anyone else for that matter—
   very well.

INDOORS AND OUT OF IT

Yes, I do have routines, some of which entail a purpose: long walks with the dog; correspondence with family members and friends; volunteer letter writing to hospice patients; and, of course, my ever-present blogging and Facebook nonsense. 

But even with those pastimes keeping me busy, there’s a troubling undercurrent of inertia. An aspect of “survival mode” that’s not serving me—nor anyone else for that matter—very well. 

I suppose it’s something instinctive, a sense that in order to get through this prolonged uncertainty and “sheltering in place” I must somehow put my “real life” on hold. Like swimming the length of the pool underwater; basically everything stops but the swimming. Make it to the other side and only then can you come up for air.

Granted, we’ve all been, shall we say, encouraged to physically stay in the house, keep our distance and wear a mask. And, as one who’s especially vulnerable, that’s what my determination not to catch the C-bug tells me I must do. 

However, I’m afraid I’ve also let the virus keep me stuck indoors mentally and spiritually, and that’s what’s taking the greatest toll. It’s more about attitude than behavior. I guess when you’ve spent your whole life taking freedom for granted, even the slightest crimp in your comings and goings feels like a gradual suffocation. 

  These two-going-on-six months “on hold”…that’s 
  about one twentieth of my time left in this world.

BY THE NUMBERS  

Now don’t get me wrong. I’m not one of these MAGA-dunce-capped idiots demanding their God-given right to catch the virus and pass it on to whomever they like. No, I won’t soon be getting any closer than about ten feet to anyone. And I won’t stop sanitizing my groceries when they’re delivered. 

What I have done, though, is to take a cold, hard accounting of what spending these two-going-on-six months “on hold” means to a 75-year-old man. And the bottom line is that If I’m lucky enough to live another ten years, that’s about one twentieth of my time left in this world. And that’s enough to make me think.

There’s a point, isn’t there, at which what it takes to keep oneself alive might be worse than the risk of dying.

A GOOD PAIR OF CHOPPERS

Sure, there are periods in one’s life where you have to hunker down for a while. Extremely hot or cold weather for example. But even on the coldest January morning, there’s a way to outfit oneself to safely venture out of the house. 

That’s how I have to think about this surreal time of uncertainty and paranoia. As if the virus were a huge pocket of that minus-30-degree arctic air we’re famous for here in Minnesota in January.

Yes, it keeps me from running out in shorts and flip flops to walk the dog. But as long as I put on my parka and a good pair of choppers, pretty much anything’s possible. And if one keeps doing anything long enough, it no longer seems like an imposition on one’s freedom; it simply becomes part of life.

So, instead of my attitude clawing its way back to normal only when this crisis is over, I must unlink the change from the outcome and replace the denial with acceptance. In other words, accept that many aspects of what I’ve been seeing as deprivation have become the new normal.

Just like my parka keeps me alive on that bitter cold January night, these masks, this distancing, this heightened awareness are the new garments of survival. And it’s entirely up to me how well they fit.

    Part of my not knowing what to do with 
    my spirit during this time comes from grief.

I CAN DO THIS

So now’s the time to recalculate, to start taking those risks with the biggest rewards, planning, as much as possible, how to take the dread out of them. Going back to actually physically entering the supermarket. Riding in the car with Sally, even though maybe only four feet apart. Having friends or family over for dinner.

Armed with the few N95 masks I have, a stringent touching and hand-washing protocol, Sally’s thoughtful measures to protect me, and a fairly good understanding of how the virus spreads and what blocks it, I can do this.

Resetting the “hold” button won’t all be about logistics. Part of the process will involve forgiveness, recognizing that some of my not knowing what to do with my spirit during this time has to do with grief…and the attendant guilt.

Many of us are not just mourning the loss of our relatively carefree “normal” lives, but empathizing with so many of our fellow human beings, near home and around the world, who we know are fighting for their lives and losing loved ones—most often in the cruelest of ways—to this disease.

Who are we, I often wonder, to even aspire to any kind of “normal” when so many of our fellow human beings have seen their lives turn so abnormally tragic. But we must go on, each in our own way, living lives that, at least in our hearts and souls, are free once again to grow, to dream, to celebrate.

THIS, MY ONE PRECIOUS DAY

Another in my ongoing series of reflections, As If For the First Time, describing the most mundane of daily activities through a fresh lens, one of innocence, wonder and gratitude.

I awoke this morning to a gift, one laid gently on my being by the hand of providence. It is the gift of a certain perspective, one I try to cultivate, but which seldom gets the chance to leaf out in that groggy torpor when thoughts first jostle
to fill the blissful vacuum left by sleep.

PHOTO: Pixabay

It is that rare awareness that, despite what may be on my mind’s calendar for the day, the agenda for my heart and soul will not be confined to some little boxes on a page or screen. It’s knowing my prospects are, at least for this one day, about nothing but blessing and bounty.

In this frame of mind, it is not lost on me that this one precious day just might be my last. It’s not a morbid thought, just a sharpening of my resolve. Let's just say this day most certainly will be the last one just like this one. 

Today, I am uncommonly mindful of how thoroughly, deeply blessed I am, and a silent prayer emanates from my consciousness: Let me be worthy of these many gifts. Let me truly know them, love them, share them.

           Are you able to seize the day, or does 
           the day, with all its expectations and 
           obligations, seize you?

SUPPLY AND DEMAND
Funny, isn't it, how much more significant this state of promise becomes as one ages. For with each passing year one’s remaining days—however many there might be—become an ever-smaller, ever-more-precious percentage of one’s lifespan. Supply and demand, I guess you could say.
 

PHOTO: Children's Theater Company

As if to underscore this awareness, it seems more and more of our loved ones find their once-ample outlook suddenly eclipsed by some dark curtain falling between them and their future—a loss, a crisis, a life-threatening infirmity. I thank God—especially on lucid mornings like this—a barrier like that has not yet fallen between me and what I somehow imagine should be the rest of my life.

So, how do you approach each new day? Do you think you fully appreciate the freedom and grace bestowed on you by a future whose only limitation is your imagination? Will you allow yourself the joy of it? Are you able to seize the day, or does the day, with all its expectations and obligations, seize you? Can you see all the wonders it offers as if you were glimpsing them for the first time?

  Greet sun and fresh air today as if you’d spent a lifetime in a cell. 
  Like a wonderstruck child, let a brand new world delight you.
  Then turn this around. Imagine a today with no tomorrow. 
  Notice how your appreciation moves from wonder to gratitude?
   FROM JEFF’S BOOK, UNDER THE WILD GINGER – A SIMPLE GUIDE TO THE WISDOM OF WONDER

LOST LANDSCAPES

When I converse with Nature, just as when I converse with people, perspective is everything. Close up, I can see the pores and the warts; far away, details start to blend together, and the subject becomes shape, pattern and movement.

Perhaps this is why I so appreciate a beautiful landscape. Both broad and deep in its scope, the view rolls out in a seamless progression of receding layers all the way to the horizon…and beyond. It always fills me with wonder and gratitude.

But something's been happening to our landscapes, something that's occurred in just the last generation or two. Fewer and fewer of us—most glaringly, fewer of those under thirty—seem able to find one any more. Part of it is that such unbroken stretches of unspoiled land are disappearing. If a housing development hasn't obliterated the view altogether, a highway, power line or cell phone tower stains it.

But as I so often preach, seeing is a two-way street. It doesn't have to do with just the quality of what's being looked it; it also has to do with the looker. And that we can do something about.

   These mental eyesores are about as unwelcome 
   as a frac sand mine in Eden.

EYE OF THE BEHOLDER
A panorama might have all the qualities you could ever want in a vista—all those sublime strata of terrain, foliage and sky, unmarred by any trace of man's meddling. Maybe a lake or river graces the scene. If you're lucky, a tired sun pours that last, precious, liquid-gold light over hill and dale.

As ideal as it sounds, that picture can still be marred. This time, though, the defacement occurs at the other end of the exchange—in the eye of the beholder. The rude blurting of my cell phone blocks my view; cynicism slashes the canvas; concerns with time or responsibility dog-ear the corners.

Whatever the culprit, these mental eyesores are about as unwelcome as a frac sand mine in Eden.

Think of it as one's state of mind being his or her internal landscape. I see more, reflect more, learn more when that inner view spreads out all around me as if I stood atop a mountain. And anything that spoils that sensual, spiritual space ruins not just my mental outlook but my woods-and-rocks-and-waters view as well.

It all comes down to my belief that we see pretty much what we want to see.

   The view starts deep in my soul and extends, 
   simultaneously, to both earth’s horizon and  
   that of my deepest internal knowing.

To understand this in the context of my pantheistic view of the world, it helps if I see the inner and outer views as one entity, one continuous vista that starts deep in my soul and extends, simultaneously, to both earth’s horizon and that of my deepest internal knowing.

WHAT'S YOUR VIEW?
Where does your outer landscape end and your inner one begin? Are you aware of how they overlap? Can you feel your ability to appreciate the view improve when you clear your mind and spirit of distractions? How do you do that?

NEITHER HERE NOR THERE – The Wonder of Flow

Beyond flesh and bone, beyond earth, wind and fire, beyond every tangible thing, there is flow. It is the story of life, the story of everything. Everything flows.

For the human animal, it all starts—and, one might say, ends—with blood. That is what we first are; it nourishes our earliest being. If it were the only thing that ever flowed, that would be some miracle indeed.

WATER, WATER EVERYWHERE
Water is the quintessential liquid. We learn about it in utero—how it feels, how it moves, supports, soothes and quiets.

Once we’re out, our relationship with water deepens. We soon become aware that it has to go into our bodies—and come out again. But first, before we appreciate most of its serious qualities, we learn to play with it. We splash it, squirt it, jump into it and blow bubbles in it, among other amusements.

      We may catch an occasional glimpse of
      what an utter miracle this clear, quicksilver
      stuff really is.

Eventually we’re taught how water’s a vital part of every living thing. We study how it seeps, pours, breaks into drops, and transforms to vapor and ice. We learn, often the hard way, that it can also hurt us, burning, freezing, knocking the wind out of us, drowning us.

If we’re lucky, if we can allow wonder to draw our mind’s eye around its ubiquitousness, we may catch an occasional glimpse of what an utter miracle this clear, quicksilver stuff really is.

HARDLY FLOWING
Water is our model for how other substances, even unlikely ones, sometimes act like liquids. The easy ones are particulates like sand, soil or snow. They may take a bit longer to give in to gravity’s urging, but eventually they do. It’s only because we become so accustomed to seeing these materials as part of solid earth that landslides, mud flows and avalanches so often catch us unawares.

         Mt. Rainier is, geologically, a ticking 
         time bomb of flow gone wild.

Even whole mountains flow. The immense, seemingly immutable hulk of Washington state’s Mt. Rainier is, geologically, a ticking time bomb of flow gone wild. The mountain’s internal hydrothermal system, acidic chemistry and 26 glaciers have conspired to turn much of it into a stew of rock, ice and mud.

Rainier’s collapse—some say it’s inevitable—could release a volume of material greater than the nearly one cubic mile set loose when Mt. St. Helens erupted in 1980—enough to pour, 20 or 30 feet deep, all the way, over the city of Tacoma, to Puget Sound.

Not just water and steam, but also heat, can render the hardest substances runny. Hell, here we are, clinging to the eggshell-thin crust of a big ball filled with 2,000- to 9,000-degree liquid rock!

ONE PERSON’S EBB...
Flow is relative. The other day, as news broke of a wildfire sweeping across part
of northern Wisconsin, I was struck by the irony of the opposing flows—even as
a steady current of wind swept smoke and ash eastward, the fire itself crept relentlessly westward.

       The pessimist sees time as flowing away—
       running out, as it were; the optimist sees it 
       flowing in.

Which way we go with the flow depends on where we are and where we choose to look. I float in my canoe down the St. Croix. The water next to me tells me I’m standing still, yet the shore insists I’m moving. One person fears being inundated by a looming life challenge; another paddles hard, catches the wave and rides it to a happier shore.

Isn’t that the way it goes in all of Nature and life? One substance, thought or emotion streams in; another flows out to make room. The Army Corps of Engineers builds seawalls and dikes to save a city, only to squeeze the floodwaters out somewhere else. The pessimist will see time as flowing away—running out, as it were; the optimist sees it flowing in.

One way or another, through all the turbulence, through all life's comings and goings, flow is what makes it all end up in balance.

       They pour through the conduits of our 
       universal connections...as sure as any 
       river of finding their ultimate equilibrium.

DAMMED IF WE DO
Not all things that flow can be seen, yet we know they’re there by observing their effects on other things. Life, love, moods, spiritual energy, time—all these forces pour through the conduits of our universal connections with one another and with the earth, as sure as any river of finding their ultimate equilibrium.

I think this may be why I’m so enamored of rivers. Their flow reminds me of all flow, assures me that the best I have to offer to this world will be carried downstream, perhaps to slake the thirst of others. On the other hand, anything I need will eventually float down to me—some of it nourishment from the efforts of others; much of it directly from the Source.

Surely one of the great delusions of human existence is that we can stop flow. We can’t. Have you ever dammed the flow of rainwater in a street gutter? You can can create a huge lake, but sooner or later the water finds a way around, over or through even the best of dams. And the greatest joy, of course, is taking the time and place of that breach into your own hands.

    Watch with gratitude as it 
    flows with us, through us, 
    past us.

Isn't this the way it is with the flows of fortune and failure, of pleasure and pain, of love and loss in our lives?

Let us acknowledge and celebrate the wonder of it all, this force of beauty and goodness that animates paramecium and blue whale alike, moves the smallest particle and the very planets, and connects all of it.

We can stall it, we can divert it, but only for a time. Best to embrace the flow, perhaps find a way to harness a part of it. Draw power from it; give power back to it; find beauty and inspiration in it; and watch with gratitude as it flows with us, through us, past us.

Or buy a canoe.

 TIP #83
Turn a chore into an experience.

No matter how dirty or menial the task, invest yourself in 
the sensations; get in sync with its rhythms and repetitions.  

Relieve the task of expectations. Gently turn obligation to 
intention, and welcome it into your beautiful life.
 

HOW TO BE IN THE MOMENT – 101 Tips

TIP #25 

Adopt a fresh perspective.

Sculpture and photo by Trevor Shannon

Put something you’ve seen a hundred times on a virtual lazy Susan. Spin it and look at it from all sides. What new aspects do you see?

Once you can do this with things, maybe you can put a new spin on matters of more consequence: feelings, beliefs, attitudes.