Retirement: the land beyond time

 

I swore i would never retire. Ah, but at 80 maybe it’s a different story. Like all my friends who have retired i would have to find a new life. My identity as a fire lookout has served me well. It astounds the common crowd ho believe fire lookouts disappeared long ago. And it confuses foreigners who find the very concept bizarre, belonging only to Tibetan and Chinese monks. Other than in the quest for enlightenment, why would anyone sit on a mountain top, alone for months at  a time?

Now, i never dreamed i might live on social security and savings. Until i discovered i could in Mexico. And more than that, Mexico has revealed the deadness of life in the USA. By than i mean, in my home town the streets are empty. People drive the block to the corner grocery. At the most they walk their dog around the block. In Mexico, where there are only small shops, the sidewalks are full most all day. There are common markets with many food stalls and places to eat. 

Maybe it’s the difference between Catholic and Protestant, the churches of the former crowded with saints and paintings, the churches of the latter almost totally lacking in color. The Protestants believe in individual salvation, the souls of others left to make their own way. The Catholics extremely social and community driven. You can get to heaven by helping others. Of course, there is a price to pay. The dogma driven into little kids with a hammer. It’s truly tribal. 

Expats don’t have to abide by these rules and can live appreciating the bright colors  and peaceful parks. Street musicians appear everywhere, not driven into oblivion by rules saying you can’t sit on the sidewalk or raise your solitary voice in song. True, the language is foreign. And I’ve barely exerted myself in that direction, feeling I’ll be dead before i could hold a decent conversation. I enjoy the company of expats and travelers, the common language English. 

I’ve met so many people who’ve spent most of their lives on the road, backpacking through India and bicycling all over Africa. I thought i was something, having been in 40 countries. And that fellow has been in 90 and that fellow 117. I feel like I’ve wasted a good bit on my life on security and habit. And what now? Yes, if i retire, i will enter the land without time, as long as i don’t seek stability. Deepak Chopra says feeling old depends on two things: the view of people around you and the despair of so little time left.  If I can ignore others and imagine i live in a place where there is no time i will be fine. 

“Falling, falling, falling.” Alice

Having fallen twice in the last several weeks, the first time flat on a cement sidewalk, i don’t even want to think about it. PTSD i suppose. Just before leaving Mexico City, i met an Argentine woman in hostel who had no front teeth. A drunk had slammed her agains a wall. Now she was terrified of everything. She couldn’t even get on the plane to return home when relatives sent her the ticket. Her hands like claws, they seemed to be convulsively clutching  a life-raft.

Now i understood her condition. Yes, a couple of kind Mexican woman handed me Kleenex as the blood dripped from my face, a fellow helped me up, had me sit down and insisted i wait till the medico arrived.  I waited half an hour, then walked dazed several blocks back to the hostel. The landlady bought arnica for me and i smeared it on the goose egg by my left eye. I flopped on my bed and slept for 12 hours.

If i were 20 instead of 80 I probably wouldn’t have taken seriously. They say you feel old when you have a permanent injury. Would i be crippled for life? The face wound retreated, but it took several weeks for the muscles in back and chest to stop aching. Then two days ago, i fell entering an air shaft to dry pants i had just washed. Was i getting senile? I’ve always been in too much in a hurry, trying to correct mistakes after they happened! If only i could go back in time.

So far i seem to be recovering again with a sore shoulder and elbow, a glitch in my hip. Still, i’’m feeling fragile. No wonder our basic fear is of falling. Ah, the poor child learning to walk. And what must Alice have thought, falling into wonderland? Of course, it was a return to childhood. And for me a look at the coming decline of age. I’ve sworn i would never let it happen. No, better to fall on my sword. The trouble is: I’m enjoying life more.

Yes, I’m seriously thinking of settling in Mexico, where i can live on my social security. Covid 19 has made everybody in the United States a little crazy. ‘Normal life’ has crept under the carpet. Sure, the vaccines in process, but will a life with masks retreat from consciousness? However, the real question is: as I enjoy living more can i let go of it as easily as last summer, when i felt like jumping off a cliff every day? Only time will tell. 

The gods must be crazy

Or i must be! I know perfectly well what i have to do to escape a virus: boost my immune system. No TOBACCO. ALCOHOL. SUGAR. Plenty of sleep, exercise, vegetables. Lower my stress in every way possible. Stay out of bakeries. Take VITAMINS A, D, B, and ZINC. Research everything i can about the immune system.  YouTube has a wealth of information. Sure, people contradict each other, but i try to use what little brains i have. What is the unhealthiest country in the world? That’s a no-brainer. 

OBESITY

I know I need to lose weight. Why don’t i do it? I like being the weight i am. If i gain, i feel bad. If i lose too much i look like a scarecrow. Who was it said, “if human beings weren’t vain, they’d have nothing to talk about?” Of course, I’m a disgrace to the species. Wealth has ruined us all. If i were a hunter-gatherer I’d be lean and tough as nails. 

Yes, I’ve drunk too many lattes, resided too long in coffee shops. Read too many books. Grown too old, a prime target for any self-respecting virus. “We can’t let this guy go. What would they say back home?”

And it feels there’s no place to run to. If the USA is bad, Mexico has the highest level of diabetes in Latin America. (Yes, stay out of those wonderful bakeries.) And to be good, you have to live in a country like CANADA, where people being barricaded inside their houses, or AUSTRALIA, where police rounding up people on the streets. In other words, I’d have to be pleased fascism is saving my life, so I CAN sit at home and stare at the wall. 

Unfortunately, I’ve been raised as an individual and will sneak around as best i can to find nooks and crannies of normality. Somebody’s got to do and i believe it is my duty and sanity. 

Always carry a backup phone when traveling!

 I look down at my shirt pocket, AND MY CELL PHONE IS GONE1 A moment of absolute panic. Here i am in the huge airport of Brasilia, Brazil. I can’t believe it. I run down the stairs to the last place i had it, a booth of the airlines. No one in line has seen it. I run back up, trip on the escalator and dump food all over the place. A the information booth the woman speaks little English. She calls for another, who does. I find out Find My Phone won’t work here. She can’t call a number out of country. I moan and beat my head. Then a call comes. A security guard has found a phone. I wait in a state of suspended animation. Yes, it is my phone. He found it hanging from a luggage cart.

How dumb. The chain tangled itself in the cart. It’s usually  around my neck, but I’d been taking pictures. So much for this nightmare. I ate ice cream and drank a cappuccino to calm down. I have a backup phone and didn’t  bring it. Okay, there’s the experienced traveler totally losing his cool. Here in Mexico City I’ll search for an older phone. I know where the iPhone store is. At the same time I’m totally exhausted from the 20 hour flight. I dragged my bags all over on a six hour break. Not only that after the telephone fiasco i tripped on my bags,  raisins all over the carpet. Later i find I’ve  sprained my left wrist more than I thought.

Okay, i did sleep almost sixteen hours before sitting down to write this. There’s something not so good about having my mind befuddled. I’ve paid for two weeks at the Selina Hostel to get me through the holidays, waiting to see if i brought back Covid with me. I doubt i have. No symptoms. And i just checked with my hometown. Nine more people died, so far I’m better off and I’ve had some very unusual experiences. Better than  lying in a bed in familiar surroundings , the grim reaper haunting my dreams. Of course i used to think, “Make good memories and you can die happy.> ah, that illusion has been dispelled forever..

I flew off to Brazil on invitation from a young woman I’d barely met in mexico last winter. I hesitated. My friend Lucas said,” you might as well have an adventure in Brazil in the warm air instead of a sitting here waiting for winter.”  his words took hold. And a wild time it turned out to be, though nothing I anticipated. We cycled through lovers, mates and friends in one week, the fastest complete relationship I could imagine. We left it at friends i hope. What’s odd is we had more in common than two people have a right to be. Born in Brazil, she moved to Germany at 19 . Studied dance and theater in Holland. We knew all the same names and places. At thirty two she gave up dance, to become a therapist astrologer  traveling around Brazil, learnng kite surfing and giving ‘readings. It just proves having a lot in common doesn’t mean being soul mates. 

A cat separated too soon from its mother

 Well, now i am embarrassed. I had an astrology reading from a woman, Kay Taylor, and afterwards i felt very unsatisfied and told her so. Partly this was due to my phone not recording the session. I couldn’t listen to the session again, and that’s when i learn the most. She had recorded it. And when I listened again, it made more sense.

What bothered me was it was so gloomy. Betrayal. Distrust. Fear. In fact she said my chart dominated by the last. She said my recent past life came from a death just before WWII. My birthday May 5, 1940.  I’d always felt I’d been Jewish. She said I’d been betrayed by the community and had troubles with trust.

So be it. I’m prey to pain attacks which I never had when younger. In fact i had a bad one early yesterday morning. It took the whole day to shake it off. And now I’m very conscious of how fearful i can be. I hope i can say with Georgia O’Keefe, “I’ve always been afraid and I’ve never let it stop me from doing anything.” 

This morning it occurred to me i act like the black cat i shared an apartment with briefly after leaving the lookout. The landlady said it had been separated from its mother too early. It kept kneading pillows for example. I just looked up the characteristics of such a cat:

From a mental or developmental standpoint, kittens who have been separated too soon may not be as easily socialized, whether that is with their people or other animals. They don't know what they are. They don't know what normal cat behavior is.

Kittens who have been separated too soon can have physical as well as mental problems. In terms of physical problems, they may not have good coordination or understand how to stalk prey and how to translate this behavior into appropriate play with their human. They may be aloof, wary or fearful of touch.

The more i read, the more sense it makes. My first grade report card:  He doesn’t play well with others. And my mother saying “You played alone so much I never thought you’d have any friends.” My sister born just a year after me. I was dethroned! I became a real pest after that. I did everything i could to upstage my baby sister. Poor girl. She too had a rough start.

The astrologer gave me one piece of good advice: pursue pleasure and happiness. I’ve never been good at that. 

The horrors of travel

 

Yes, yes, i could have stayed home, stared at the wall with everything in town closed and continued to be suicidal. Instead i decided to fly to Mexico City where people wearing masks and NOBODY SOCIAL DISTANCING. So it may be a form of suicide yet! Mexicans do not have the luxury of Americans. They can’t stay home. They have to work. Everything open - except a few of my favorite museums - the streets and subway often crowded. I’m taking chances i would never take at home. If this is goodbye, have a sweet time with the rest of your lives.

I am discovering again why i like to travel. I walk all day, then in the evening I go to bed early and do nothing, like read, watch YouTube videos about people traveling in other places like turkey and Serbia, and daydream a lot. At home i have to always be doing something. Just lying around not my style. Only in Greece years ago could i lay for hours on the beach, soaking up the sun. Travel puts me in a different space, brings out the idle human being. Jung once said, “Don’t underestimate human laziness”. Ah, what a pleasure it can be!

With no paintings to look at, I’m wandering the streets and discovering new places. One is a market area near where I’m staying. I sat in a little square with a semi-circle of smiling and laughing metal heads on pedestals. Memoirs of poets, singers, goofy politicians? I never did figure it out. One fellow in the spiffy dress and big mustache of another century plopped himself down next to me. As i said, social distancing doesn’t exist, except by me. I moved to another bench. 

I have never seen so many chopped up chickens, wings being bagged up, breasts piled, feet discarded. This definitely a foodies paradise. One huge market held traditional foods from all over mexico. Mouth-watering, to say the least. I bought prunes at a specialty store, a hundred spices in jars. Yes, I’m having trouble with my plumbing, the opposite of what you’re supposed to expect in mexico. I am afraid of eating street food, exactly what every guidebook on mexico raves about. This city considered a heaven for gourmands. I need to search out some of the vegetarian restaurants. I know they exist.

Here comes the sun after four grey days. It makes a hellava difference. The city rather grim without the blue sky. Yes, it’s true. I’m just biding my time until leaving for Brazil next week. I’ll be joining a friend for three weeks travel in the northeast of the country. According to the web, that area has few cases of Covid. At least I’ll have someone to get me to a hospital, if i need it. I loaded up on travel health insurance before leaving. Alas, i have to get where i can use it first. Wish me good luck. As my brother said, “If you’re afraid, you will never travel anywhere.”

U

How can i escape my age?

 i grew up being told, "You have to watch the news. You must know what's going on." alas, i learned the news bad for my health, physical and mental. the reason: it really has nothing to do with facts and everything to do with SPECULATION. what i'm given on the boob tube is never what is happening but what may happen, and it's always scary as hell. like everyone, i like to drive slowly past a car wreck, looking for blood and bodies. and yet, to have it in my living room every night makes me bolt the door and crawl under the covers.

once i get there, i know what to do. read a novel, about life in another time, took at art works, listen to classical music, in other words, desert the information age for the age of stories, of episodes in history having meaning, perhaps simply by being purified. i need to experience love stories, happy ending or not, epics of bravery, even if the hero killed. i ride on the wings of song like a magician on a magic carpet. underneath the blankets the world becomes bearable. even tragedy lifts me up. i can face the violence and stupidity of our age by visiting that in another and knowing civilization survived.

as for my own age, of course, death is the only solution. sooner or later my decrepritude will subsume me. and in the mean time, all i can do is escape into exercise, fiction, conversations, travel, hoping when the time comes i will still be able to master my own fate. alas, the general population doesn't want to pay taxes for the arts. everybody enjoys them. in this period of being house-bound, what sustains them but music, movies, books, adventures in fictional time?

 

and now i watch the election results with horror. RED means i will not pay for the society i live in, hospitals, schools, symphonies, traffic lights, asphalt to fill the potholes. I WILL NOT BE A PERSON OF MY TIME. what irony! what good has all that news done but make misers of the voters, they grasp their pennies as if they would save them from global warming. avoiding the public good, they put themselves in danger. how do they not know it? maybe human ignorance is bottomless. staring at the screen, i see a vast void behind it. 

at the same time i can go back to old stories, old pictures, and find hope. other ages have been far more disastrous than our own. peter the great leveled whole cities and massacred the population, attilla the hun didn't do much better, and the romans raked carthage into the ground. we survived the middle ages and recent terrible wars. not that we're in the clear. still, it helps to know history. that is news that stays news, as ezra pound said about poetry, the news people die from not knowing. i always speak for the arts. they really need no reason. yet i have to say something to keep from going mad.