Stumbled across something that reminded me of my first apartment and worked on trying to pull the thread of memory from the closet and away from the memory blanks.
Put on Doll Parts by Hole and listened to Courtney Love sing about aching like she aches and remembered the guy two doors down blasting this from the second floor day after day.
His name was Brian and he was 31. He lived with Emily, they had a platonic friendship. She was 29 and had a Jack Russel dog named Monroe who was the scourge of squeak toys.
I was 24 and they seemed to me to be so much older but they never made a thing of it.
About a year after I moved out I heard that Emily had a massive asthma attack and died. I don’t know if she made it to 30, but even though she seemed far older I knew her death to be a tragedy, a woman taken far too young.
Don’t know what happened to Monroe, but I suppose he has been gone for years now given that I was 24 then and am in my fifties now.
Strange Developments
Weather app says it feels like 27 outside which makes me snort. That apartment had horrible insulation so the apartment resembled whatever the temperature outside was.
I remember it feeling pretty damn cold but I’ll bet it was never below 36 or so and only briefly.
My favorite memories are of hot summer days, floating on a raft in the pool with three pitbulls and the assortment of characters from that second floor corner.
The dogs belonged to the neighbor who lived between Brian and myself but I loved them because they were friendly and their booming bark sounded like it was coming from my place. No one was going to break into it.
Flash forward to the present and there is a zoom birthday celebration for my father-in-law’s 75th.
It set me off a bit because Dad fell just short of making it to 75.
He would have told me it is ridiculous to be upset by this because no one did anything to me and he would be right. I am not angry with anyone, just irked because it bothers me and rolling with it.
Still can’t help but occasionally wonder if genetics will lean towards Mom’s side which gives me ample reason to expect to hit close to or past 100 or if I’ll get that part of Dad.
What happens if 75 is the mark?
Am I really down to less than a quarter century of life?
I am working on doing what I can to prevent that and I expect to, but what if I am wrong. If I had control over genetics I’d change a couple of things, but that option isn’t available now.
So what if this is the last third of life?
What then?
Not freaking out about it, really not because some of that is outside of my control but then again how I respond is something I can manage.
So I have been thinking about it and acting on a few things because if that is how it goes I don’t have endless road so I might as well be active about some things.
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