Aging…again…

I’m shocked to discover that it has been two weeks since I posted anything here! It doesn’t seem that long to me…but then again, I suppose that’s a feature of age: time is either too long or too short. What on earth has been filling my time?

My activity has been curtailed by two factors. The local pool, where I do all my workouts and swimming, has been closed since the beginning of September. The pulled muscle in my back has restricted my daily walks. The pool opened this week, so that routine is getting re-established. The nagging muscle – actually appearing to worsen – has kept me from walking the distance I’d like to keep up the heart recovery. A 40-minute stretch is all I can manage.  Hopefully, this will begin to change soon. My impatience shows here, big time.

With time on my hands, I’ve made a couple of trips to Red Deer recently – 45 minute drive away on a four-lane highway, filled with people going somewhere very quickly. I was back this afternoon, to pick up my car with a new rear bumper, the old one having been damaged in a very minor fender-bender a week or two ago.

(I just discovered, and posted, an entry I made a week or more ago, which didn’t get posted. I remember that day: my Internet connection was not working. So I left the post on the desktop and went on with other things…promptly forgetting about until I discovered it today! Late, but there anyway.)

I was in the pool this A.M. at 6:00. Managed to swim 14 lengths, one at a time. It is much easier and faster to do it with flippers on my feet. I virtually fly! I am grateful for the pool manager suggesting this to me. Whether I actually do more work is questionable. But I do have a greater feeling of accomplishment.

At long last I had a call from the office of the surgeon who did my heart surgery back in February! On Tuesday next, I have my “follow-up” appointment. I suppose so he can finally sign of on the job and file it away. It has been a long wait. I actually thought they had forgotten it; but no, I’m on deck Tuesday. I will proudly report my recovery activities!

I have mentioned previously the increased level of anxiety I feel from time to time. More than “from time to time.” One of the matters over which I obsess is the state of my country, politically. I tend to be moderately left wing in my political leanings. Our current government is hard right, somewhat akin to the extreme Republicans in the US. One of their activities over their years in office is to quietly remove one democratic institution after another. They have shut down quite a number of research stations whose reports give them information about climate change. They do not want to hear about information like this, so they block it out. In the House of Commons, their MPs are only allowed to speak with the Prime Minister’s permission, and that is only given to front bench members. Anyone else who speaks has a prepared text, vetted by the PMO. There’s a lot more, but you get the idea.

I find myself obsessing about this ‘fascist’ tendency in the government of a supposed democracy. I lose sleep over it; I wonder what kind of a nation my grandchildren will inherit. It seems never to end…my anxiety, I mean. I write letters about it, and I will vote. I feel helpless to do anything else. The anxiety is of concern to me, because it is pointless and unhealthy. I share it because I need to let others know. I feel that this sort of thinking impedes my recovery.

So, as you can see, I suffer from two of the effects of aging: existential anxiety borne out of an increasing sense of helplessness in the face of a changing world, and the slowness of the body to heal even minor injuries. Sigh…I don’t suppose I’m the only person who deals with these things, but I am the only one who has to live inside this skin!