Life at 90

I wake up after seven hours of sleep interrupted by infrequent bathroom visits (helped by surgical bladder repair), breath in my inhalants, for my COPD (Chronic Pulmonary Disease, or “Smokers’ Lungs – having smoked until age 55), loosen up my hip bursitis, put in my partial (nicely anchored to my tooth implants), put on my reading glasses over my 20-20 vision (thanks to surgically implanted plastic lenses), put drops into my drying eyes, do a quick head maneuver (to eliminate dizziness associated with Benign Paroxysmal Postural Vertigo), stick my hearing aids into my ears, take my high blood pressure pills and my Premarin, then an Alleve for all my arthritic joints, then my Nexium for the reflux that causes my cough, do my Theraband therapy for my torn shoulder ligaments, place a band-aid on another bloody scuff of my sun-fragiled skin, check on the healed sutures of my recent brain-tumor surgery and on my facial pre-cancerous healing spots, change the bandage on my leg’s skin cancer, do my stretches and lift weights, then I look in the obit column and if I’m not there, I breath a thankful prayer to modern medicine and go out and play tennis. If it’s winter, I may head for the ski slopes. I go very slowly, of course. But I go.

That’s what it is all about: how to deal with all the ailments of Old Age. Forget about them, and “Get A Life”! Not only that – get a life that’s dashing, exuberant, a little crazy, but one that becomes a model for all those young 65-year olds who think that the Fun Life ends at 65.

From “Memories from a Life in Audiology: Sones from an Old Sound Room” written by Marion P. Downs, 2004.