Anecdotes are the juice of everyday life and I had one when I visited my old friend – not in time but in age, he is fairly a new friend. Though he won’t like to be described like that because he is a young man of 85 years and just a day apart in birthday from mine, well sorry that doesn’t make me 85 years. It is just the birth date and birth month and not the birth year I am talking about.

Anyway to take the story further, even at this age Eustace has a remarkable memory. He is bedridden, almost blind in eyes, cannot walk without support, recently fell in his bathroom – lost his wife almost two years ago, does not have kids or any of his immediate family members and has only a domestic help to look after him. He has not stepped out of his house for 4 years. You think this is pathetic! No, it is not, he is a happy man and I get to speak to him every now and then . We share a bond of friendship and I feel good to give him company and listen to his life stories.

When I met him personally I felt I knew him since my childhood. He shared many of his stories and out of these stories came out a letter sent by one of his friends to him. It is wonderful writing with some interesting details which bring a smile on your face. With his permission, I am reproducing some of the contents of the letter.

In this letter his friend has written an account of a woman who is ageing which holds true for every woman but how she describes it brings out the reality in a funny way. This letter is proof of the writing skills of the writer.

So here I go with an excerpt :

Francis ( Her son ) who never fails to point a finger at my flab, walked in the other day and said: “Hey mom! You’re looking like one of those wrestlers one sees on WWF,” And I said: Thanks, son. That’s the nicest compliment you’ve paid me in a long, long time. Those females are gorgeous!” And he said: “ Mom, I wasn’t talking about the women . I was referring to the men!” I wished then that I were a wrestler so I could wring his neck.

My mother used to sing some song about Venus de Milo having no arms but a lot of charms. My case is vice versa. Too much arm, zero charm. So no more mirrors for me. I prefer memories. Memories are better than mirrors. They give you a younger version, a version of “ The way it used to be”. Leaner legs, trimmer torso, slimmer silhouette, more mane.

My changing has resulted in resultant changes in my wardrobe too. And, although the old legs are still very straight and shapely, but because the spider veins are crooked and crawly, I’ve shelved all those, short, short skirts and in my little room, there, no longer serviceable, twiddling their toes and staring sadly down at me, from the shoe rack, are the sleek, stylish stilettos I used to once swing in: and , Stoic, Spartan, and very smug, next to them, are the stodgy, stolid, staid shoes from Dr Scholl that I now shuffle in.

But, what if everything seems to be in the past? I still show off my body in the privacy of my bedroom to nobody! Only Ron ( her husband), good soul that he is, seems to notice nothing. That’s because the feni (liquor) he drinks makes him oblivious to everything that’s going on around him. Or maybe, he’s just being kind to the aged!

Happy Ageing!

Contents produced with permission

@Rekkha