Remembering When We Were Young

Good morning. It is two- thirty in the morning and I have slept most of Sunday. Saturday we held a writing event and it was great fun, but today I am tired from helping set up the room and taking a car loaded with stuff down to the library. Now that it is over, I have a car loaded that I have to unload.
 

In my mind I can do anything I want to do. I forget that my body sometimes refuses to do what my mind wants. I forget that it takes longer to do the simple things I once did without thinking.

If you are of my generation or if you have disabilities, does it frustrate you that what once seemed an ordinary feat, now is a major effort?

I have great ideas, I'm told, but I need a company of hired help to accomplish those ideas. When I had my other half of me, he took on the physical chores and I was confident my plans would be completed. We built a bridge and a small storage house on our lot in Georgia. We even cleared the wooded lot ourselves. We were in our twenties. We could do anything! But the years go swiftly by and that energy dwindles away.

We had great vacations when we were young. I will share a poem I wrote about my first skiing trip – in fact, my only skiing trip, when we could tackle 'most anything.

I almost died from the altitude the first night I arrived, and was a little light headed the next day when everyone hit the slopes. I took lessons from the most handsome young instructor. The brochure for the resort used his picture on the front.

He was not gentle with me. In fact he laughed at my clumsy attempt at skiing. You might have seen this poem already, but it is one of my favorites because it brings back memories of that delightful trip to Colorado with Barry, my brother Rex, and his wife, Mary, so long ago.

  

High in Colorado         
By Glenda Council Beall
 
He poses, hip cocked in red and blue,
sun-glistened face of Eros turned to me,
a fledgling atop the icy slope. My
breath quickens in foolish adoration

at the sound of my name from his mouth.
Knees bent, I push on poles and slide
down to him, past him, racing for the edge.
Sit down, Glenda! My legs collapse,

long shoes shoot sidewise. I try to rise,
but can't. He twirls, zips toward me,
digs in. You know a mogul is a South
Georgia girl who falls and can't get up.
He laughs, his teeth like sparkling icicles.
Giddy Aspen air heliums my brain,
overflows my heart that dances in triple time.
He yanks me up, skims powder to the lift.

At sea level, snow dreams
melt into arrogant soap bubbles
as his smiling face yellows
on a faded brochure beneath my ski apparel.

Have a good week and I'll be back next weekend.