“I don’t know who you are.
You stoop a little as pain creeps into your joints
Like a burglar stealing the precious jewels
Of swift, free movement,
Leaving you seated in life’s chair.”
These lines are from a poem I wrote about eighteen years ago called “Twenty-Twenty Vision.” It’s my only published piece, having been included in the local newspaper’s poetry corner not long after I wrote it. I came across it this week in a folder of poems written over the years. The poem offers me a bittersweet dish of hindsight. It reminds me of my long-ago perspective on aging and my physical decline as I began my fortieth decade on earth. It paints a picture of the joys of diving for the ball in a hard-fought game of softball, of pushing a double stroller, legs pumping, muscles jumping, as I lean into the joyful burden. It reminds me of the hours I spent kicking and punching my way to strong muscles and a flat stomach with Billy Blanks’ tae bo all through my thirties.
At the time I thought this poem was a eulogy for my youth. Now I read it as a celebration of those active, vibrant days. I celebrate the time when I had a body capable of running, jumping, twisting and turning. I celebrate that time when I could do jumping jacks and toe touches and sit-ups. I could walk with my kiddoes. I could play basketball and volleyball with them. It’s a love letter to my younger self and learning how much living costs.
The last two years of my life have given me perspective. What I have learned has been hard. I’ve learned from the inside out what it means to live with a physical disability caused by a chronic degenerative disease. I’ve always thought of myself as an empathetic person. But the truth is we don’t truly understand what people are going through without going there ourselves. That phrase “walk a mile in his shoes?” It’s dead-on. I walk with a cane, but
the day may come when I need a walker, then a wheelchair. What must it be like to move a chair from a car, get into it, get across the parking lot, into a building, to an appointment, then do it all again, when it’s time to get back to the car. Every time. To take a shower, to get into bed, to accomplish simple tasks. I have trouble tying my own shoes. I’m not asking for sympathy or pity on behalf of myself or anyone else. I’m suggesting we all use our imaginations. Be that person for one moment.
I thought about this recently when a woman posted a rant on Facebook in which she complained because someone with a handicap placard had parked in a non-handicap spot. “If we can’t park in their spots, how come they came park in ours?” she fumed.
When did it become an us and a them? When did we become so immune to the difficulties of others that all we can see is our own inconvenience? When did it have to become our disability for us to truly see and feel what our fellow human beings live with each day?
For every Facebook ranter out there, I run into a half dozen kind, smiling folks who hold the door for me at the post office or the library, who help me put on my jacket or carry a bag for me into church, or simply ask me if there’s anything they can do to help. There’s the lady who picked up my tissue for me when I dropped it while I stood an hour in line to vote. She said, “that’s okay, sweetheart.” Those people make my heart swell with the possibility of a world worthy of leaving to my grandchildren.
In the last few weeks (or year it seems) when
there’s been a swell of ugliness and vitriol on social media, I’ve sought beauty and solace in words, in poetry, in stories. And I found this poem I wrote years ago in which I thought I was seeing me old and I was lamenting what I’d lost. Now, in this day, I have perspective. What I had then was good. Very good. It was the natural aging process. I was gaining gray hairs, but also wisdom. What can I learn from this shift in perspective years later? That what we’re going through now will look differently ten years from now. Or twenty years from now. We’ll have learned from it. We’ll have grown. Our children will too. Our world will look differently. Life will go on. We won’t fold. The sky won’t fall because I can’t skip, jump or hop anymore. I can watch my grandchildren do it and for that I am supremely grateful. The world won’t fall because x y or z was elected or wasn’t elected to office. God is still in charge and He is still good. He can use this for our good. He promises He will.
Hindsight is twenty-twenty vision, my friends. Joy and peace. Feel free to share your thoughts!
Here’s the poem in its entirety for anyone who’s interested . . .
Twenty-twenty Vision
On a whim, I stick my hand through the mirror,
Casting about like a blind woman
Frantically feels the walls in a strange room.
I touch someone. There. No, wait. There.
Her long ponytail gallops after her
As she flings herself forward, glove outstretched,
Victorious as she captures the softball.
I don’t know who you are.
Silver threads are woven into your long hair.
Lines that intersect around your faded blue eyes
create a road map to your past.
I long to find that other woman.
I see her striding uphill, pushing a double stroller.
Legs pump, muscles jump as she leans
Into the burden, enjoying the stretch.
I don’t know who you are.
You stoop a little as pain creeps into your joints
Like a burglar stealing the precious jewels
Of swift, free movement,
Leaving you seated in life’s chair.
I see her. There. No, wait. There.
She kicks a leg high,
Delivering a decisive blow in the air.
Forward, then back. A fierce daily warrior
In the battle against a sagging behind,
a battle already lost.
I don’t know who you are.
Reflected in my mind’s eye,
I still have twenty-twenty vision
held captive in a forty-something body.
