Coming Alive At Sixty-Five
....by Donald Grant DeMan
We inherit nothing truly, but what our actions make us worthy of. - Chapman
And right at the top of the mark this full-moon Wednesday I'm lying, for it is now May 9th, 2001, I've been working all the night long for I cannot stop painting, writing, and moving the world out there in my vicinity. Something has taken hold like some terrific wind, and it has been happening for three months now.
Ahh...morning! Ben Franklin once remarked: The morning hour has gold in its mouth. Or A. B. Alcott: Not a day is lived, if the dawn is left out of it, with the prospects it opens.
Thoughts come and go like magnificent trains bound for where I cannot tell, but it's someplace good, for I feel now as if I have arrived. Diane feels it too and her work has taken off as well as the love we share has deepened - something I thought not possible.
To think that a year ago I wrote this little stanza:Beyond the sunset time our life be shorn
Tomorrow when we bond our light with Him.
His marble castle bursts in splendorous morn
The final day we shed both earth and sin.
On golden wings unto His world we're born
Leaving footpaths of light where our earthly soul has been.Donald Grant DeMan...February 1st, 2000.
During these past two years we have taken some serious body blows along with our successes, something that happens to dim the lights like a major power failure along the line. I made up my mind to take the undeserved punishment in stride for all around me I see the remains of those who rehearse their disasters, all to no avail, bringing further calamity in one way or another.
Yes, I am determined nevertheless to leave footpaths of light. Most shall not see them, perhaps, though they are place there now as we go along this trail of life that has sees end. Awareness may not be the very essense of life, but it's certainly up there with the finest attributes of living and loving.
At sixty-five - this end of a life of self-abuse - I expect one of these days to lay my head down and rise no more here. And somehow this does not at all worry nor distract me from the goals I plan, day to day, month to month and for years to come. I ask myself continually, "Can this be normal? Can this be real, or when the deadly crisis hits will I fume and fuss and carry on so?"
I have no answer, of course, we shall have to see what I shall do.
Constantly I seem to be changing batteries and bulbs around my home, and this brought to mind that some folks save the old ones just in case and try them time and again, hoping for some magic shall bring them miraculously back to life. They hope and pray for a return also to the good old days when everything worked out somehow swell like when they got lucky as a teen in the backseat of their old hot rod, making the same old moves that failed them ever since over the years without success. "It once worked. It's gotta work again sometime, just one more go at it and I'm sure!" I hear them cry and fail time and again.
"Throw out those old dead batteries and dim bulbs!" I shout. Boldly go forward with new regeneration that you summon from inside yourself and not from others nor situations nor place nor time. Now is the time. Perhaps there will be no other. Don't be a shoulda coulda kind of person for this is your one life which has precious time for regrets and recrimination. Do not rehearse!
Get on with it. Love your wife - Diane - even more than you now do if that be possible. And show her...show her how much she means to you with every gesture. Go visit your neighbors with a smile and a "Howdy!" Do all your jobs and chores now, and give the mundane more than it's due in attention and time and that shall make you so much better at the things you say you want most from life, the spirited arts of life.
Yes, I'm talking to you, a man already convinced of that truth. I know it's directed in the Bible somewhere to give your all to every task assigned you with good cheer and thoroughness. And if you do that I guarantee that all that you do, both seeming onerous and ordinary, and those that would normally thrill you to the bones, shall become as one, and your joy will come as rain from Heaven - ever abundant, and never-ending as a torrent does. Treat, as well, those who hate you as though they were the ones you love. This may be difficult at first, but shall pay off in the end with all kinds of wonderful unexpected results.
Once upon a time I took English Muffins to a man who claimed he wanted to kill me, and he sat me down shook hands and poured coffee to accompany the muffins we shared there that afternoon.
Do not evade your responsibilities, but grasp them with a vice grip of love. When you make a mistake admit and correct it as far as is possible. I find this hard, so I shall have to get up my courage for that one. Whew!
One of my darling's favorite sayings is "Without work and without love there is neurosis."
I know such a man who spends time alone worrying about all sorts of things, a pitiful person who refuses to pick up even a broom and sweep his own home. He remains a good example to me of what not to be.
And right next to him there lives a woman who charges ahead on a project with all the gusto she can muster, involving all about her in her plans and initial drive. Unfortunately she seldom completes one single thing she tries, and becomes depressed with it all - the broken promises, the change of mind, the disrespect of other's time and property are all a part of her being. She of course is one such other example of a path I refuse to lead, if I want a life of joy now I am sixty-five.
That brings to mind the old song, Help me find somebody to love. Well, of course, I love Diane more that I can possibly express, but those who do not have a true love can certainly go out, reach out and love someone else this very day. It's just a matter of doing it. No need to worry about those who would take advantage, because with your feet firmly planted you realize that love doesn't mean giving in to just any request that comes your way. Does it? What are those five "F's" aimed at dealing with others.
Friendly - Fair - Firm - Frank - Faithful.
Something like that. Offer your hand in welcome and give the other person a fair chance to reciprocate, leaning a little in that direction. Be firm in what you have to offer and what you expect in behavior - take nothing but the best and return the best, of course. Be honest about how you feel about the association in every way. Do not flatter nor manipulate. And make your word your word at all cost. Honor the other - make no idle promises - expecting them to do the same, and accept nothing but that in your choices, for life is too short for trifles and games. Indeed.
Preaching? You betcha! Take that friend Donald Grant!!!!!
Yes. I'm talking to you Donald Grant DeMan. Listen up to your inner ear now you are alive, for you shall need every bit of stuff I'm saying to you.
Mostly shed the dead wood - the losses, the pain inflicted, the missing times, the dim bulbs, the tired batteries. Peel the snake-skin of hurts and wounds, for these will hold you back, make you dead to the needs of life, the joys of the present and what incredible celebrations to come. I find one misses the possibilities of life when one is clouded in the regrets of yesteryear.
Not "in a minute" but now is the time to shift gears, repair the leaks and dents, shore up the levees and dikes, and move to the next plateau of being. Inch by inch, anything's a cinch. Old saw? You bet! I just finished my very best painting ever, one that I've been groaning over for years. Am I excited? You betcha. Inch by inch - applied time and concentration little by little, no waiting on some elusive muse, it's done. And so enthusiastic had I become that while I was doing it I met more folks with a smile and created on a much wider scope than I've done for years.
Perhaps ever!
Now is the time for gratitude, for those who I owe, or feel I do. Tops - by the distance to the moon - is of course Bill Loeppky my Victoria mentor and friend who took me by the hand one day and led me into a world of wonderful folks who write and perform other art, whose lives have now become so very integrated with mine. From Bill with nothing but love...from Bill we all learn about love and respect and mostly conscious dedication to duty and the task at hand, for Bill when ill is worth a thousand "maybe types." Bill is pure gold. Bill lives with a plague he never asked for and never wanted and Bill does his work... Nevertheless.
We may be poorly, sad, bone tired and cranky, handicapped beyond the realm of existence...but according Bill's ways we nevertheless shall do what we set out to, well, and without complaint nor remorse nor hesitation. We fail continually as we go along with our peculiar afflictions, and, having suitably sat down and cried for a spell, we take them in stride then go ahead and complete the task. Nevertheless.
That's Bill. We work night and day - day in and day out - with only the reward of our own courage and abilities coming to the fore. That's Bill's way. We enjoy people to the very end and height of their being, instinctively knowing what they need and giving giving giving. The train according to Bill is the one I want to ride, and am determined to do so.
It's the right road to take. That's why.
Right this minute I picture Bill Loeppky reading this and saying, "I cannot ever live up to this. I too have feet of clay for all the world to see." My word, of course you do Bill, as have all in nature. The point is however is that you already have, a thousand times over, lived and breathed all that I make of you and so much more as well. You can relax my Buddy. Sit down, my Friend. You have nothing in the world to prove, for you've done and been it all. To me and to so may others that they are as countless as the stars and grains of sand.
My dear mother Pearl said, "Your friends are the ones who see all your warts and love you still." For most this is few indeed. For the chosen there is Bill Loeppky who even loves us for our warts, perhaps mostly for them. Shall we then knock him for a freckle? Or two?
And where in the world would a guy like me living on the edge of a rain forest on Vancouver Island ever run into my really good friend, Rockaway John Clennan, or Kathryn Jennings-Hancock, or Margaret Karmazin who gave me help galore and talks of angels and meetings and such? Tell me how I could, without Bill, debate in jest with Kimit Muston and Richard Koss and Joe Infranco, and many others, sharing their joy and trials? And who but John Horvath could send me to the moon with his high-flying existentialism while I remain in my room? I think. Hope Forrest shares her daily chores with bright humor, while Edith Weiss lays me low with her shenanigans and then brings me to the top. The lows and highs are there, part and parcel of me too, thanks to Bill, thanks to his Inditer family.
It was on the Inditer that I met Ian Wolff, the comedian with a family that passeth all understanding.
For some we must reach out a little more in prayer - Caileen, Charly, Rick...Richard...Frances....and Bill, always Bill, our rock, our man!
Yes, we know you're there, Sam Person, who lives baseball and wants us all to have a happy retirement, as does he. Thanks Sam. Ann Pottle Dolin, now there's a name and a writer for sure! And Dee Walmsley who takes her animals seriously and writes like a storm on the subject, rightly nagging us to care for the world.
I now am friends with Soph Shauna of Baltimore, Nancy and Beatrice, Ed and Farzana and as close as cousins with Glenn Brucker, just the greatest illustrator I have ever seen, and a guy of merit in every way. And pray tell me who else but Bill could put me nose to nose with a musicologist and historian as Jeffrey Dane from the Alamo through Beethoven? Caroline Zarlengo Sposto...who can forget Morry? Or an old 1928 Model A? Smiles. The Power of Frances Alt. And more and more and more as I tire here, sure that I've temporarily forgotten one of my favorites of Bill's Folks.
If so, please remind me Friend, and I'll know you at once. You are part of our world now, inside our heads, thanks to Bill Loeppky, you know.
Mostly I have fallen in love with Rosemary Bowery, her countryside, her beltway, her Old Man in his Hillbilly Swimming Pool, and stories that make me cry with joy. I remember the first time I wrote her she fell asleep over her keyboard reading the letter...I think. I'm tearing up here now.
You are all welcome to join me now at sixty-five. Though I have met absolutely none of you face-to-face, I know you far more than most of my neighbors, more than half my acquaintances, and I radiate with gratefulness for your kinship, your fellowship and love.
You may never read this, you may not be there now. I may not send you this, but you will certainly feel it.
What's it like to be me at Sixty Five.
Well, what does it look like, sound like, feel like to you?
Just coming alive at Sixty Five.
Yippykiyiyay!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
'Vox Populi', get started! Send in your comments and critique on
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