A vacation in Ireland can teach a guy a lot. It’s an ancient, wind- and rain-swept land, kicked around for centuries, sometimes bowed AND bloodied. It retains a wild beauty, both rough and compelling, and its people are funny, thoughtful, hard-working and earnest.
What a trip to Ireland gives one, is perspective.
In my mind, I’m 25 years old, in my physical prime, ready for anything. I’ll speak now in metaphors: some of my generation grew up in Athens. I grew up in Sparta. There, as a child, one’s worth was measured by strength. How far can you hit a baseball? How many “hard nucks” can you take without crying, even as your knuckles bled? How fast can you run the 100 yard dash?
In my mind, I’m 25. But in the real world, I am many decades older. In recent travels, my pace has slowed and, in Ireland this month, my pace came to a standstill, for I could no longer walk more than 1/4-mile at a time, without enduring excruciating pain.
Across from Trinity College, in a lovely home furnishings store, on a cool and damp day, I broke out in a sweat and nearly fainted. I told my wife: “I need to take a cab, get to the hotel, put my feet up, and gobble some NSAIDs.” We were to leave the next day and this was our gift-giving time, as well as a time for independent exploration of Dublin.
I knew I deeply disappointed my wife, who loves to linger in stores and select the perfect gifts for friends and family. I also knew I had to get off my feet.
The knees, the knees. I’d had knee problems since I was a teenaged football player and baseball catcher. The pain and locking and popping came and went over the decades. Shortly before I left for Ireland, and after an idiotic visit to an Internet medical site, I was convinced I was having a clot in my right leg, which was causing my right knee to swell and lock.
Days before departure, we went to the emergency room at Lenox Hill. Tests were taken. No clot. I was told: “your problem is orthopedic.”
And so I made an appointment with a knee guy — a “very good man” — for the day after our return.
We came home from Ireland and the next morning went to see my new orthopedic surgeon. X-rays were taken. Both knees were bone on bone. I will eventually need replacements in both. For now, a cortisone injection in each knee, while I get my head around my fate.
Naturally, upon returning to my computer, I went back to the Internet, like the jerk that I am. Here’s what I found about the knee replacement process. Take a look, if you dare:
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Now this.
I come from Sparta, and I never stopped playing sports, but bit by bit I’ve disintegrated. Now I can barely walk. I remember as a young man, walking alongside my aging father, who told me in his gruff way: “Slow down, this is as fast as I can go.” And I remember thinking: “I’m not even walking very fast.” We’d zoom up the hills of the west Bronx, us kids, never a thought to cardio fitness. We walked everywhere.
Now, not so much.
But, back to Ireland. As I waited for a cab, I sat outside in the mist, near the Trinity campus, I was joined on a bench by four American women older than me. We began to talk. I complained about my pain. They, too, were resting. “I used to be able to….” I started.
One lady interrupted. “‘I used to’ is in the toilet,” she said. “We ALL ‘used to…’ something.”
And then, the light bulb went on. These women were well-on in years, and still travelling. They had a cheery attitude. They did not try to dress “young” but their outfits were attractive and contemporary. They were out there in the world, comfortable in their own skin, smart as whips.
Comfortable. That’s the key. I need to become more comfortable in my own, actual, age. Not give up, not by any means. But simply admit that there are things I can still do, and things that will be more difficult. So be it.
I need to be more like Ireland. Have I told you? It’s an ancient, wind- and rain-swept land, kicked around for centuries, sometimes bowed AND bloodied. It retains a wild beauty, both rough and compelling, and its people are funny, thoughtful, hard-working and earnest.
Yes, I need to be more like Ireland.