When Did I Get Old?

Several things happened to me recently that made me ask myself this question. When did I get old? When did life speed by and leave me in the past? My daughter asked me to volunteer and help the Kingswood Ski Team setting up the race courses the other day. In a previous time I would have been to busy to be bothered with such mundane stuff, but in recent times I have realized how important it is to be able to do the small things with your family and friends. So I told her to tell the coach I would help. We got to the ski area and I rushed to get my equipment on, and proceeded up the mountain and with a special “wrench” in hand I proceeded to screw down the gates for the slalom course. It didn’t take to long for me to realize I am not as young as I used to be, my legs ached from standing on skis on such a steep incline, my shoulders ached from turning the wrench to force the screw on the bottom of the gate into the frozen snow. I wondered when the task would ever end as I looked down the mountain at the long snaking line of gates running to the finish line. I realize I am not as young as many with children my age as I was in my early thirties when Khrys was born. Later that day I was skiing down a black diamond with my daughter, I was at the top of the trail and Khrys started down the hill, I followed behind her watching her carve a line down the mountain. I believe I blinked once, and when I looked down the mountain she was gone.

I realized how that is with our children. We raise them and think they will always be there, but when we blink, and our eyes reopen they are grown and gone starting a life of their own independent of us. All we can hope is that we raised them properly and equipped them to live a life that would make us proud as parents. I remembered this little girl at my side when I was first teaching her how to ski. She held my hand and looked up at me with trusting eyes, as we waited for the chair lift to come around and take us up the mountain. Like most protective fathers, when the chair came around and hit me in the back of the calf, and forced us to sit in the seat, I reached in front of her to make sure she didn’t slip from the chair, as I brought the safety bar down. I took her down the mountain prodding her to remember her turns instead of barreling straight down the mountain. She was the headstrong one, and she tried my patience as we worked our way down the mountain. I then realized that I should put her in lessons. She was little more advanced than a straight beginner, but not yet up to the next level, so I sprung for private lessons for her, but being the protective Dad I hung back behind the lesson and watched her listen to the instructor and do as she was told. When her lesson was over I talked to the instructor, and he told me that this little girl with wide blue eyes had a natural talent when it came to putting skis on her feet. I remembered that as I looked down the trail and saw the graceful curves of her trail going down the snow. She is a natural at life, she takes things in stride, and moves on with pride and determination that she is going to make her mark on life in her own way. She is no longer that little girl that holds my hand and trusts I will make everything okay and safe for her. I realized then that I had grown older, and was no longer the required leader I her life, but in many ways a bystander, standing back watching her meet life head on. In many ways I realize she still does need me, but I also realize that I have to stand back and let her make her way in life.

I then look at my own fallibility and frailness as I reflect back on slipping on the ice and giving myself a concussion, with the headache that accompanies it. Then I was told by my wife that a friend of the family had passed away form a heart attack in his garage. I realize how short life really is. Earlier in December the music director from the high school’s life ebbed out after a battle with cancer. Time is short and we grow old and deteriorate, so take life one day at a time, and enjoy each and every moment as if it could be your last.