“Sports do not build character. They reveal it." - Heywood Hale Broun1
It’s a mix, though, isn’t it really? Paul: “… [W]e also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope; and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.”
Elder care. Aging in place. Family roots and branches. Circle of life, baby.
We have a baby coming to visit in a few weeks, and we spent much of yesterday in the grinding gears of the medical aka “care” establishment. The aging part of the circle, which I once again realize we’ve been doing since the ‘90s: A brother (ALS), mother (congestive heart failure), dad (Parkinson’s), mom (COPD), dad (lung cancer). Before and during that, some we missed: depression/medication/suicide, cancer, stroke, lung cancer, and brain cancer. Still, we have spent a lot of time in a lot of waiting rooms.
So why was I sitting in a doctor’s office without a book? Let’s slide quickly past that dumbosity. Every time I’ve failed to be there feeds the effort to be there the next time, and that includes inattention and multiple miniscule opportunities missed even while being there, all the times.2 Hanging in there with old people is a bit like soldiering (long stretches of boredom punctuated by moments of terror), yet once you relax into it, it can be more like sailing: stretches of uncommon ordinary living — not slogging through X to get to Y or narrating the story in your head that you’ll edit to tell others later but living X or Y or the story itself — with some work but lots of beauty and peace and certain memories created along the way, punctuated by lightning and the deep blue sea, aka moments of stabbing, ripping, shredding grief that you hold inside as someone you love wanders through an anecdote for the 42nd time, in the existential grip of total awareness that one day, soon, you will never hear it again. Caregiving is not a good descriptor.
I’m sorry for missed chances but not sorry my misses have intensified intentions to miss out on fewer future family obligations. I’m sorry all ‘my’ old people have passed but grateful to have learned a few lessons that keep me on an even keel, more or less, in the waiting room with a dozing uncle and overly chatty aunt. In my mind’s eye, my dad is working on his Sudoku and my mom is looking around brightly at the others waiting (so we can talk about it later), and I find I don’t need a book.
Yes, I still miss Usenet. This quote was a staple in my stable of .sigs in adfp.
A podcast I like asks its interviewees whether they are “thrill of victory or agony of defeat”. I am Michael Jordan with a backpack of every missed three-pointer AND every opportunity to have taken a different shot. Not the person I wish I was, but we go to battle with the materiel in stock.