December Song

It would appear that any recovery from surgery impacts heavily on the aging process. Imagine not one, but two surgeries in less than half a year. My beard is shaggy, but it is not so much that unkemptness that distresses as I look into my bathroom’s mirror.

Four score and seven years ago, Myrtle Rosenzweig brought forth, upon this continent her first son and right now, I am looking every hour of that epoch.

“It all begins to turn to shit at 85” might well be true for most folks, but add a couple of years to that, plus those two hernia operations, and the doctor one might most want to seek out has a PHD after his name rather than the more ubiquitous MD. I mean, c’mon, old folks have egos too.

So far it seems that surgery number two went much better than number one. Of course, it is early yet, and I reserve the right to further recovery and more follow-up exams in four or five weeks.

The Doc says I may drive now, but I am inhibited from doing so by the huge car cover I placed over my car just before my operation10 days ago. Lifting, bending, employing a “core muscle” are all on the not-to-be-done list. Hard to remove a car cover without doing quite a bit on that list of the verboten.

My granddaughter’s holiday open house to show off her new LA apartment beckons. The 11 steps that lead up to the front door give me yet another item on my list of why I don’t like Christmas (as if I needed one).

Friends threaten to drop by for a visit. I discourage them. My kids and grandkids are different. I figure I always looked old to them.

Given the weeks of discomfort and pain prior to surgery number one, then weeks of minimal recovery, followed by my month-long cross-country drive before discovering I needed to go under the knife all over again, we are talking months of non-activity and being totally sedentary. This has led to a disquieting time for my accountant due to the higher than usual volume of queries he receives from my “sick bed” as well as a prolonged period of unemployment for the physical therapist whose mission seven months ago was to get me back onto the grass tennis courts of Fisher Island. Take it from the source, that ain’t happening. Just a return to my Island Paradise is at least a month away.

When not bingeing on the Academy channel for the latest “for your consideration” movies… and, honest, the attendant reviews of those flicks are coming, but as a helper for your holiday list, here are some recommendations: Do see Maria, Babygirl, A Complete Unknown, The Count of Monte Cristo, Saturday Night, and My Old Ass. Do not see: A Real Pain, Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl, Queer, or Here.

Besides the movies, I am doing some correspondence, reading the very clever Allow Me to Retort: A Black Guy’s Guide to the Constitution by Elie Mystal, and… for me, the really good news: I am spending at least a couple of hours a day on my latest tome, Life Without Cagney & Lacey. Unlike its author… that never gets old.

 

Barney Rosenzweig