Autumn

It's not that I'm getting slower. Well, yes it is.

It's that I can't hear as well, so I have to work harder at figuring out what you say. I can't see as clearly either, so I'm straining more to discern the little things. Those things you just glance at and don't have to figure out? I'm figuring them out. That takes time.

While the world moves farther from me, I find I'm less visible now, to others. Long ago, or so it seems some days, I was avoiding the second glances, closing my ears to the catcalls, cutting off my long hair to be seen as a person, not an object. I guess it worked. Now I am invisible.

For the first thirty years of life, we believe we can change the world, shake down the establishment, change the mistakes we've made. I am at the beginning of aging, just the turn of the season, yet I can see the obstacles that are looming. They cannot be moved; I must navigate around them. Will I do that gracefully or with the impatience of my younger self? As the occasional aches become constant, will I respond with forbearance or with bitterness?

This is why aging starts slow. You can, in that time, learn how to summon new strengths to move with the tide, instead of believing you must change its direction.