For forty-nine years one or more of the senior Wilner men would tell me that in life we play the hand we are dealt and that wishing for better cards won’t work.
“Life isn’t fair and if you don’t like it you better work to change it.”
Now I am the senior Wilner man and if I so choose I can respond to complaints from children and family members with those very same words.
I just wrote about a very difficult and painful experience and I am not sure if I am angry, sad or happy.
Maybe I am all of them.
Dad and I spoke about this particular thing on multiple occasions. The most recent time he gave me a smile I was well acquainted with.
It was the play the hand you are dealt face along with a comment. “Worrying won’t help. You can’t fix this yourself or do more than you have done and you have done quite a bit.”
I asked him if he were in my shoes if he would feel any different than I do and he laughed, “Nope. Just trust that you have made it possible for things to improve and they will.”
He was one of the few whose opinion I trusted on this matter so I relaxed…a little.
Growing Up
The boy in the picture turns 18 in a few months.
This morning we talked about carrying his grandfather to the proverbial final resting place.
It was a very steep hill that we walked down and I asked him if he ever worried about dropping dad.
“Not then, but now I sort of wonder.”
I smiled and said it must happen and that I shouldn’t laugh about it, but it was kind of funny to think of.
“Can you imagine if you accidentally dropped the casket, tripped and hit your head on it. Hell, you could drop your relative and manage to kill yourself in the process.
That would be a hell of a thing. People would ask how you died and someone would say you were killed by a dead relative.”
It was ridiculous but the two of us laughed hard enough to make our sides ache.
****
I didn’t worry about his ability to carry dad any more than I worried about my oldest nephew.
Those two are almost as big as I am and rapidly putting on muscle.
They have no idea how easy it is to do so at their age nor how jealous I am of a metabolism that destroys calories.
I miss those days, but I miss the ease with which working out came.
Maybe that is vanity and ego, but damn it took so little effort to make my body respond compared to what is required today.
There are chips in the armor today that never used to exist. Bumps and bruises appear because in strange places and in a manner that never would have happened before.
Add the crazy responsibilities that come with this moment in time and I’ll tell you that sometimes growing up sucks.;)
A Cure For Most Anything
That scene from A Night At The Opera is one of my favorite movie clips, it is a cure for almost anything.
It never fails to make me laugh as does this one.
There have been moments where laughter and silliness have left me, but they never go for very long.
Though I am far more somber and serious in my old age than ever before. I sometimes wonder who it is I am becoming and whether I’ll like him.
Guess if I don’t I can always change…maybe.
Hell, let’s face it we are always evolving and always changing in some way or another.
Who I used to be isn’t who I am now and who I am not isn’t who I will be.
Now if that isn’t profound nonsense I don’t know what is.
Guess I ought to look into getting some shut eye because this three hours a night isn’t working for me.
