I Don’t Have to Do That

AS EACH FLEETING WEEK swipes another physical ability and leaves a fresh pain in its wake, I’m comforted by the mantra I summon: I don’t have to do that. It’s not belligerent. It’s a gentle reminder, obedience to which keeps me free of ache and frustration.

For example. I’m six feet four inches tall, a height offset, particularly when viewed from a distance, by the bulges I wear in a horizontal direction. And I probably would measure up now as an inch or two shorter, thanks to spinal collapse and my general crouch, but I haven’t measured my height in years. I don’t have to do that.

That height, combined with what I assume was a pleasantly accessible mien, often inspired shorter fellow-shoppers to ask me to reach items down from high shelves. I happily obliged. Now my shoulders are shot – I blew out both rotator cuffs by hammering a stage platform into being – and I can barely reach to the height of my head. Should someone ask that favor now – well, you know where I’m going. Of course, they don’t ask, because that accessible mien has also gone away.

Which means I’m merely a grumpy old man – I’m 68 as I write this – who becomes one of many trudging a grocery cart through a checkout line reminiscent of Cold War-era photos of GUM store queues. This makes me a target for the complainers which, despite my infirmities, I am not. “How long are they gonna make us wait here?” might go the opener, or “Can you believe that parking lot?” (Are we questioning its existence?) or “Whoever heard of paying five bucks for a carton of eggs?” My tactic is to first pretend I’ve been startled out of a reverie and ask the questioner to repeat the query. Then I shrug – a shrug can be a focus-grabbing gesture – and respond, respectively, “I’m in no hurry,” “It’s a beautiful thing,” and “I wouldn’t know. I have hens.”

I understand that the ice-breaker is an attempt to pursue human connection, to bond, as it were, with a fellow-sufferer. But I don’t have to do that. I am content in my own cocoon of silent misery.

As a parking-lot aside, I must confess to another form of behavior of which I’m not necessarily proud. Because of my worsening walking ability, I was issued a handicapped-parking tag a couple of years ago. From the first moment that I eased into one of the blue-bordered, close-to-the-entrance spaces, I discovered that cadre of busybodies seek assurance that this designation was earned. I see them, faces scrunched as they peer over their carts, studying the agility with which I ease my feet to the ground. I don’t know what humiliation awaits should I prove to be hale, because I always wobble and limp far in excess of my infirmity’s limitations, but I suspect it would be on the order of the late Donald Sutherland’s film-ending howl in “Invasion of the Body Snatchers.” (See above.)

Picking things up. Carrying things. Also not current agenda items. My strength has ebbed, which I put down to laziness more than age, and the shoulders won’t let me schlep an item like a tray that requires both arms, elbows bent. Am I frustrated by such limitations? Sure. But here’s some compensatory comfort: I don’t have to do that.

Outside of an unprecedented number of medical visits, I have few appointments to keep these days, and those that are needed I schedule in the early afternoon, allowing me to sleep late. Which is a good thing, because it’s gotten more difficult than ever to fall asleep. I don’t physically tire myself, and my body seems to desire a 36-hour day. Nevertheless, I ardently wish, as I lie in bed and the book I’m reading slips from my fingers and smacks my face, to ease into sleep. So I turn off the light, flip my pillow to the cold side, cover my shoulders with blankets and sheet, clear my mind of everything but that wish for slumber. And then that other voice intrudes: I don’t have to do that.