An Age

From a writing prompt: "What's the best/worst thing about being the age you are right now? Write about it."

"It's an arbitrary, man-made magic number."  One of a series listed on the
back of a fortune cookie slip, a fortune cookie that topped off the meal I
just ate -- and eating is so important now, a finer thing that became over
time.  Now you can't eat just anything anymore, just when you've grown to
appreciate variety (even though you've stopped stuffing frozen junk
through your system).  But the body fails, that's obvious and no surprise. 
Why think about it more than you have to?

The mind is different: hardened, but at the same time less certain.  It holds
both actions never taken and rituals, faithfully acted to help mark the
passing of time -- something always done only on the weekend to make the
Sunday dread of slow ending less paralyzing.

The flowing river branches, memories are fragmented, working backward to the
single narrow inlet where shapes are blurred and uncertain.  In the other
direction, more branches reach: the trunk is a fact, but indistinct, a core
fashioned of fondest and most regretful moments.  Even as these thoughts
proceed, an e-mail from a friend dips into the stream.  Effortlessly I reply
with a taste of the words that pool here -- unavoidable interruption, flowing
change, the flow only parts to collect again beyond the obstacle. 

The branches, the limited possibilities all subdivide as shed tree limbs
dry up and break apart this winter.  What is renewal?  What is this healing
process of life that tears, splits, wants to cling?  I see a familiar
tortured, wind-twisted coastal starveling spruce drawing impossible life from
cold rock every year this time, even as cruel sculpting elements reveal a
material soul.

The scrawny sapling has clearly taken shape long ago.  What is unlikely now? 
What can be changed and pursued, and why are those things important? 
Sometimes the sap carries a reminder, some half-remembered resolution or
desire, a nostalgic itch, pointing back in a vague way that is more specific
than the sweeping solar azimuth.


03-FEB-2010