“Old age ain’t no place for sissies.” – Bette Davis
Poor Eckhart Tolle.
It would seem the man took some heat in my last post’s tirade. Hardly fair, given that he’s not exactly here to defend himself. Then again, I’m quite sure that the pot-of-gold at the end of his book-selling-rainbow probably offsets any pain I could inflict.
Besides, I am confident that anyone who read that post was able to determine fairly quickly that I was simply feeling beat up in my life.
Most of the time I am quite aware that life is not fair – sometimes I feel like railing against it anyway.
Life, if you’re doing it right, can actually be pretty hard work.
Bette Davis kind of nailed it with her quote. If you’re going to roll over, be a sissie and start moaning about the injustice of it all, you may as well give up right now (this, obviously, is directed straight at myself).
I have always maintained that most of the best moments in my life have been as a result of hard work, commitment and endurance. Whether climbing a mountain, making a marriage, raising a child, dealing with death, grieving my own illness or a friend’s, cycling through a mountain pass, or working on a tough assignment…pretty much everything requires some of the same skills:
Show up. Stay focused. Work hard. Kick some Inner Child butt and work at toughening up, both mentally and physically.
It helps too, that when I know there is a big black monster waiting in the other room in the form of bad news, my job is to try to remember that this particular minute, this present moment, right here, right now, is perfect. (Happy now Eckhart?)
I need to remember that it’s also okay to feel, to weep if necessary, and then to get back up and get in the game.
Most importantly, I work at reminding myself that most of the time my life is filled with a crazy amount of abundant grace and wonder.
Maybe Mr. Tolle isn’t a twerp after all. And really, what the heck is a twerp? Who actually uses that word??
Let us end with some wisdom from the woman who I quoted at the start of this post. She may not have had the book sales that Mr. Tolle enjoys, but the late Bette Davis sure looked like she knew a thing or two about life:
“There comes a time in every woman’s life when the only thing that helps is a glass of champagne.”
Wise – and beautifully written.
Bless you Sharon. I’m not feeling particulary wise these days, so that’s nice to hear that there might be something buried in there that’s worth reading.
I’ll drink to that. Champagne, gin, tequila, whatever it takes.
I use my sense of humour to trick Life’s Nasties (possibly twerp moments). Like today, when a friend was helping me clean my wounds from a beach reef wipeout. I’d bought everything except an antiseptic cleaner to sterilize the wound. I did have tequila, so I instructed my friend that if he didn’t double-dip the q-tip in the tequila, I could drink what was left. It worked well. I also bought Muppets bandaids, figuring why be boring?!
So although I woke up sore after another night of not being able to sleep on my left side, my ankle swollen, upset with my lower lip quivering, by noon, between the Muppets and tequila, I felt better, thumbing my nose at Life’s Nasties.
When life doesn’t make any sense, when everything is screwy, why not take it to the next level, stick your tongue out, smuggle that champagne into the hospital ward, and do whatever the hell you feel like to mark the moment.
I’ve met The Eckart, I think he’d agree. 🙂
Elinor, you are one smart Muppet-bandaid-wearing tequila-snorting woman. I am definitely sticking my tongue out at all this, but that doesn’t seem like quite enough. I’m desperately wishing for a punching bag and am smart enough to know that with the way I’m feeling I shouldn’t get behind the wheel of a car right now.
I’m afraid I might become one of those road-raging crazies that crashes into the next unsuspecting slob that dares to cut me off or look at me the wrong way. My meditative Zen-grace and love of all humanity seems to have disappeared into the need to punch something. Hard.
This too, I know, shall pass.
But right now I think it’s best if I stay away from innocent bystanders.
I think we need to drink a glass of champagne together.
Count me in Carol, though I might be hard-pressed to stop at only one. In the words of Pink Floyd, I would like to ‘become comfortably numb’. Is that so wrong?
I love the word Twerp! Surely that’s as much of a verb as twerKing? I know I am capable of twerping regularly. It’s like the happy cheep cheep of a gay little bird, only it’s not – more like a sanctimonious chest fluffing followed by an awkward squawk. Still gay though. In my case.
Old age ain’t no place for sissies is wonderful, but I’ll admit I feel in sync with you – somedays up and ready, other days a good cry would do. So long as the feelings happen with a bit of grace I can usually manage it, but on the hard days I look in the mirror and think an extra is along for the ride… me, myself, I and That Other Gal. I try to remember to stick my tongue out at her once in a while.
Have been thinking of you and your friend frequently, and ran into an old connection at a weekend fair who told me he is having brain surgery in 2 weeks for a large tumour. It was quite bizarre to stand in the hot sun watching his very bristly & grey eyebrows shuffling up and down and hearing him say, “I’m due to judge dog shows in Finland, Britain, and New Zealand next year, but on the other hand it is a bit strange to not know whether I’ll wake up.”
How we humans go on with this kind of foreknowledge is a miracle, truly.
Oh darling Laurie. Twerp. Twerk. Tweet. Twiddly Twang and the Bo-Dangles.
That Other Gal is definitely giving me a run for the money. I get back up on that ol’ proverbial nag and then realize That She has once again taken the reins and I’m barely hanging onto the back of the saddle. She really is a nasty piece of work.
What you described with the man and his dog shows is exactly how I feel with my friend. How do I reconcile the fact that she looks fine with the tiny tank tracks of stitches that are holding her head together? How does one share tea and coffee together while discussing chemo plans?
Nothing is as it appears and what you said is the truth, ‘how we humans go on with this kind of foreknowledge is a miracle, truly.’
I just wish That Other Gal would give me back the reins…