(This is the kind of meandering post I get when I just mull things over. It always seems to end up in a series of questions, and so I almost deleted the whole thing, figuring that it wouldn’t be a worthwhile read for anyone. But in the end I decided not to, just in case there’s anyone else who thinks over these kinds of things.)

I would have been leaving this morning on a six-day trip with my sister. But she and I agreed that the timing just wasn’t working out, so we’ve postponed it till late July. However, I found that my head was still stuck in “I’m leaving on a jet plane” mode, so since I hate to try to change channels on my brain — and since I had been telling my clients for a month that I’d be gone on Wednesday — I decided to go off on vacation just for today.

So I loaded up the computer, some food and books into the car and took off. The rules are:

1. to keep it as cheap as possible. That’s more a matter of expediency than personal choice. Have I mentioned how fun, fun, fun it is to work for yourself?
2. to do something that is hard work (no sitting around in Barnes & Noble all day. Not that I’d mind that, but you get into mental vegetable mode in no time, so we’ll have none of that.)
3. to do no more errands than the two I had planned.
4. to make up the rest as I go.
5. not to come home before 6pm.

I think things like this are the reason that I get looked at the way I do sometimes. I don’t know whether to enjoy the fact that I’m not trying to be weird or not. I’m actually looking forward to my dotage, because my mother, who’s very much like me in the kinds of odd things that just come into her head, has informed me that the fun of being elderly is that when you do the same kind of things you’ve always done, you suddenly get credit for being spry, eccentric and vivacious. Can’t wait.

For now, though, there’s no one congratulating me on what a kooky offbeat oldster I am, so I better get on with this so I have some of the day left. Okay, what have I done so far?
10:30 am - Left

10:35 am - Pulled into the gas station because of course I was out of gas. Phooey. Spent $1.14 on bottled water, but then I saved $5 by figuring out that I didn’t need to wash the whole car, just give the windshield a workover with the squeegee to eliminate dead-buggage and bird-crappage. Feeling mighty.

11:15 am - Donated books to the library. This was one of my two designated errands. They get brand new books, we get a scintilla more bookshelf space — everybody wins. Plus, I found out while I was there that the library has free wi-fi. A—HA! So my philanthropy pays off. Exxxcellent.

11:30 - Pulled into the McDonalds parking lot (which has shade trees). Drank my bottled water, ate an apple and figured out the nearest fun hiking trail in a book of fun hiking trails that I have NEVER used. Yes, it’s true — the hike fulfills my obligation to do some hard work. I don’t know if that’s cheating, but hey, they’re my rules.
12:25-1:30 - Hiked at the Watkins Mill State Park. I went past a lake, by a pond, through a forest and around a meadow. I don’t think I’ll expound on it at length, because I’ve noticed that when I do, it diminishes the experience a little bit for me (though I gain a little longevity by sharing and can look back later and recall). And I’d rather keep this one to myself. Suffice it to say saw many, many birds, including a brightly colored orange one I’ve never seen before. Also squirrels, cyclists, dragonflies, a jogging woman pushing a stroller and a band-aid that had been purposely stuck down right in the middle of the walkway. Don’t know what the story is with that band-aid, but I think that every good walk in the forest should include a little mystery.

2 pm - Stopped by the grocery store to get some more fruit. And I picked up a thing or two for dinner. It wasn’t till I got in the car that I realized that that made this an errand that wasn’t one of my official two errands. Rats. Well, at least I got some good peaches. Cost: $4.49

2:30 - Arrived here at the Panera, where I’ve hooked in and am making the most of their free wi-fi. And because I don’t want to be a sponge, I went ahead and bought soup and a soda. Cost: $5.49. Darn. Although in the end, they probably lost money on me, because they kept coming around with samples of their new pizzas.

So this is still where I am, but I’ve been mulling over what I started thinking about on the walk, and that is: getting older.

I knew that would be something that would be on my mind. The intended trip with my sister came about in part because we were both feeling, you know, “up there in years.”

So here we both are, getting toward those years when you have to start having colonoscopies and getting mail from AARP, (not sure which one is worse) and what’s it all about? What will it mean to get older? It’s not so much whether it’ll be a bother to be old, because of course it will. But will we go into those years with some kind of peace? Will we find some sense of usefulness? Or will we have that snappish, calculating quality that some seniors get which always makes me think that things in their life just didn’t work out the way they should’ve?

A while back it occurred to me that since the Orthodox (among others) think that life is measured out in cycles, maybe you can make comparisons between one cycle and another. Maybe your life goes the way a day goes.

And how do most days go? Well, I start off well. I love my morning time — I feel like I could do anything. And though I have a bit of a fight getting to work and usually start later than I should, I manage to “come online” in time to make a little money, please a few clients while appeasing the dog, doing laundry and trying to get Greg not to just eat M&M’s all day. I sometimes have a major lull in the early afternoon, which I try not to let slide into a nap. I get a second wind around 4 or 5 and head into the later work session determined to make up for earlier laxity (success depends a lot on whether the dog can adjust to my unbelievable rudeness in not taking her on a walk or not).

And then it’s evening. I make dinner, we try to find something on. We both get on our computers. It’s not a thrilling end to the day, but then when Greg’s out of town and I’m doing for myself, I’ve come to notice that evening is the hardest time to get right. Because it seems like there’s this strong, strong feeling of there being something good and satisfying to do, something that makes the day turn out just right but which, almost always, I can’t discover no matter how hard I try. Often I end up staying up late just because I can’t accept that the day has ended in this unsatisfactory way.

What bothers me is, suppose that’s how life feels when you get old. What will I be able to do about it then?

And that mystical, magical “something” that makes the day seem well spent, will I ever find out what it is?

I’m getting to the homestretch of my day out — what was I “supposed” to do today? Was it this blog entry?