How to Grow Old Gracefully When Everyone Else is Doing It Wrong

When I discover who I am, I’ll be free.

- Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man

Even now, in the evening with the hot water running over my hands, I am half asleep. Given to daydream, I use the wand with soap in it to scrub away at the dirty cups and bowls, to push- I think to myself- my kid’s own DNA down the drain. Such metaphors running wild in my head, it’s no wonder I abuse them/ use them way too much. It’s not easy being disciplined. It’s tricky learning to write/ or imagine/ when everything seems both attractive and repulsive at the same exact time.

I look out the window above the sink and I can see the dogs laying there staring at the back door. They never want anything else but to come back in the house. That alone must indicate some kind of colossal failure on my part, don’t you think?

I mean, what kind of dog would rather stare at the door to the house than the woods in the other direction?

Even now as I try to reconcile with myself about who I am and what exactly I’m doing here in this life, I am forced into corners I didn’t ask to be forced into by creatures like dogs. Or other people. How much do I owe them all? What was I supposed to be acting like when you were staring at me like you were? I’m a mess about it all, I’ll tell you the truth. But I laugh it off, smile at myself. I make a strange twisted face, a horky sound. To revel in a moment/ any moment/ is all there is/ all there ever was/ and all there ever will be. In the sliding shadows of a new dusk coming down, I hear the cries of the dead mingling with the laughter of the living. I hear my name being sung slow and bluesy in the spigot water’s gush.

In my hands, last night’s wine glass.

And no one knows but me.

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