Pureed Horses

No matter what you say about me (and please, say something!) it cannot be denied that once I latch onto something, I never let go. These blogs are a case in point. I have several basic themes which I return to over and over again, to the point where even I am tempted to say "Okay! I get it! Enough, already!" But in my own defense, I truly see myself, having travelled so far down this pothole-filled road we call life, as something of a tour guide, saying, "Watch out for this!" "Be careful of that!" and, particularly "Appreciate what you have while you have it, for you won't have it forever!"

This latter caveat is particularly true in the case of mind and body. While a 20- or 30- or 40-year old cannot possibly be able to really understand what lies ahead for them, the strange thing is that they may see it clearly in others older than themselves.

Tell a typically healthy 20 year old who jogs every morning that the day will come when the mind may want to jog, but the body won't do it. It isn't because the body won't do it so much as it can't, and though mind and body have been a team since birth, there comes a time when they begin to go their own separate ways. It is, for many, a disturbing and often terrifying realization. We all pay lip service to the fact that one day we will be "old," but we don't truly believe it. As someone accurately said, "old is twenty years older than you are." You may one day be shuffled aside by society for being "old," but I never will.

I've always loved my body. Not because it was beautiful or really outstanding in any way, but because we fully understood one another, and we worked effortlessly as a team. What the mind wanted, the body was, for the most part, both happy and willing to provide. But very slowly things change for all of us, and you realize that your mind wants things your body cannot so readily deliver as it once did. And this gap grows wider with each passing year.

I tried running for the bus today, and shudder to think what anyone who saw me might have thought. I ran with the grace of Frankenstein's monster--clump-lurch-clump-lurch-clump--, who I see myself as resembling more and more strongly as time goes on.

I've bored you to tears, I know, with the piteous tales of what tongue cancer and the radiation that eliminated it did to me, and how precipitously my life had changed as a result of it. The fact, though, is that it merely accelerated the process.

Before attempting to run for the bus, I thought of stopping in to my local Kentucky Fried Colonel for an "extra crispy" breast. I love extra crispy breasts. But I knew full well that if I did get one, it would not taste as good as my mind told me it would...having no saliva to process flavors is a real downer...and that I would eat perhaps 1/8 of it and put the rest in the refrigerator where I would run across it in a month or two and pitch it. A waste of money, and a waste of food, and I hate wasting food more than money.

Why do I insist on beating you over the head with all this stuff? Why must I not only beat a dead horse, but puree it? Because it is human nature to accept the things you have and to assume that because you have them now, you will always have them. I am a poster boy (though I both realize and appreciate how many blessings I still have, and I never discount them) for taking things for granted. I go over this same ground time and again not as a bid for sympathy for me, but to make you stop and think just how lucky you are to have what you have.

I was blessed most of my life, and I never fully appreciated everything I had until I no longer had it. I don't want you to make the same mistake.

New entries are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Please come back...and bring a friend. Your comments are always welcome. And you're invited to stop by my website at http://www.doriengrey.com, or drop me a note at doriengrey@att.net.