Being almost out of time

Another Skagit Valley landscape

 I took so many pictures when Lily and I went off to the Tulip Festival, and I think I can scrape up a few more to use as decoration for my posts. This is one of my favorites that I haven't used yet. I like the layers in this one; the field behind the muddy spot has in previous years been filled with tulips or daffodils. Apparently this year it is in a fallow state. Maybe next year there will be more flowers, but not this season. 

The only thing I can be assured of is that if I am still here on the planet and not gallivanting around in other spheres of existence, I'll be able to take pictures when I visit in another year's time. There is only one more week to visit the tulips this year and then we will enter into the month of May. Everywhere I look here in town there are blossoms, flowers abundant in gardens, tulips, hyacinths, crocuses (almost all gone now), and others just beginning, like the lilacs and cherry trees. It's a profusion of delightful scenes. In some ways I wish my nose worked better, so I could smell them, but alas, only a few make it from my nostrils to my brain. It's a mystery to me why I can smell some roses, but not all, and cannot seem to smell lilacs at all. I remember the smell very well, but it's only a memory these days.

I remember when I became aware that I couldn't smell things that other people could: on hikes when someone might comment on an aroma they noticed, and I couldn't smell anything. I learned that a blood pressure medication that I took for years was probably the culprit, and in the years since I stopped taking it, a few smells have begun to return. Unfortunately for me, certain soaps and perfumes are all too easily picked up by my nose and drown out more subtle aromas. I'm very happy to know that I can smell smoke, car exhausts, and other rather dangerous odors.

I finally finished the book on quantum mechanics, and now that I'm done, I sort of miss pondering about all those intriguing speculations about why it is that we can actually manage to perceive some elements existing in two places at once, why observation changes the microscopic environment, and other mysterious "spooky actions at a distance" (quantum entanglements). I don't know why it has captured my interest so completely, but it has. There is still so much we just don't know about the universe. I find that exciting.

What I am going to tell you about is what we teach our physics students in the third or fourth year of graduate school... It is my task to convince you not to turn away because you don't understand it. You see, my physics students don't understand it. That is because I don't understand it. Nobody does. —Richard Feynman

 When you order a book through Amazon, several others are suggested to purchase in the same vein, and I've taken the time to read samples from other quantum physics books. I like knowing there are plenty more books to get lost in, should I choose to take that path. Right now I'm taking a breather from the subject, though, and reading a book of essays by Margaret Atwood (Burning Questions). One thing about ordering Kindle books is that I don't get a sense of the size of the volume when choosing it, and when I was in the bookstore the other day and saw how enormous this volume is, I realized I would be reading it for a long time to come. It will probably become one of those background books that I read and lay aside for awhile as I make my way through some less weighty novels. It's how I prefer to read.

 Which reminds me: I must cherish my eyesight and give thanks every day that I can still read books, drive myself from place to place, play on my laptop, and enjoy the beauty that surrounds me here in the Pacific Northwest. The AMD I've been dealing with for years now is progressing, but it still has not caused me to have to give up anything much, nothing I can't deal with by changing my habits, at least. Reading on the Kindle is much easier on my eyes, as I can change the font size easily as needed, thank goodness. Once I can no longer see well enough to drive, I'll be taking the bus even more than I do today, and relying on family and friends to help me get around. It's a gradual decline, not sudden, so it gives me plenty of time to adapt.

But I don't kid myself that it will suddenly get better. It is traveling in one direction only, the same one as we all travel: towards infirmity and dealing with continually aging bodies. As I've said before, there doesn't actually seem to be any way to avoid it, except through dying first, and who wants to do that? I don't want to miss any of the adventure, after all. Treading right up to the edge of eighty is a journey all its own. My dear partner is already there, and my friend John is 82 and still hanging in there. He suffers from COPD and sometimes sitting next to him in the cab of his truck, his struggle to breathe is audible. He uses an inhaler and is hoping that a visit to his pulmonologist will find some way to help him breathe easier. But it comes with the territory of aging, just another reminder to appreciate each day and each moment as it comes.

None of us knows how much time we have left, but I am aware that it no longer feels limitless. When I was young and I would use the phrase "the rest of my life," it wasn't just around the corner but felt quite a distance away. As I've traversed all the other stages of mortal life, in looking back it seems to have been so quick, just a lightning flash and here I am, now looking ahead to months and years, not decades of life left to live. Yes, I know there are plenty of vigorous people in their nineties, but I really don't think I'll be one of them. So I'm taking each day as it comes, happy for it, and happy for the health and vitality I still possess. 

Being able to write and compose these posts is also a gift I cherish and enjoy very much. It connects me to my other blogging friends, and as I read about your own journeys through this precious life, I find inspiration and joy, as well as reminders of the trials and tribulations that we all face. It's nice to have a community of like-minded souls to share it all with, don't you think? I certainly do. 

And with that, dear friends, I think I'll wind up this post with a quote from a dear person whom you will most likely recognize. His journey through life was an inspiration to many.

Friendship is the hardest thing in the world to explain. It’s not something you learn in school. But if you haven’t learned the meaning of friendship, you really haven’t learned anything. —Muhammad Ali

Until we meet again next week, I wish you all good things. Don't forget to count your blessings and hug someone or something, which I am doing right now to you, giving you a virtual hug. Be well.