THE AGING CHRONICLES, PART II

I know it's true, although I could fool myself into thinking my forehead is growing. I've gradually lost hair at my temples for several years. However, my hairdresser keeps denying it (she enjoys the tips). It's a plus that the rest of my head has plenty of hair, so it's not a significant concern.

This particular aspect of aging is only one small reminder that time keeps marching on. It's not enough that you awaken almost every morning with a new ache to add to all the other ones and hope, like heck, it isn't something serious. 

Then, there's your eye surgery after you realize you're replacing the prescription on your glasses every few months. It dawns on you that you might have cataracts. After you have them removed and corrective lenses are implanted, the world is suddenly more colorful and brighter. And...you can see at night instead of being blinded by the colossal glow surrounding the car headlights coming at you!

Another momentous surprise is when an employee managing the audiology department that reports to you notices that you are reading lips. It's not something you were even aware of, but when the hearing aids are inserted, you suddenly hear sounds you never heard in the past. After the newness of the hearing aids wears off, you realize that even though you may not have listened to what people said to you in the past, you weren't missing anything. You start leaving your hearing aids at home and smile when spoken to. It doesn't matter if people think you're an idiot and/or demented when they tell you something serious; your response is a big, shit-eating smile. Life is sweeter that way. My daughter, Marcy, has expressed concern that I might have some dementia, but I haven't told her yet that I just stopped wearing my hearing aids.

I was never warned that my role as a parent would be reversed and my child would act as my parent when I got older. Marcy has been telling me what I should be doing, how I should be doing it, and what I'm doing wrong more frequently as the years pass. Most of the time, I don't mind. After all, attention is attention. As we age, we long for more time with our children, no matter how it happens. Besides, she's probably right. I am losing it, bit by bit, or maybe I really don't care about the things that used to be vitally important to me when I was younger. It could be both.

Thank God we've got wigs for when we lose all our hair. We've got laser eye surgery to correct our vision. We've got hearing aids when our hearing goes. We've got canes, walkers, and wheelchairs when we can no longer walk. We've got medication to slow the effects of dementia/Alzheimers and various other remedies for age-related illnesses.

It's not a big deal that I'm losing my hair. After all, I'm not ready to entertain the alternative to aging. Not yet.


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