Does anyone feel old and useless with age?

And, how are you, Ray ? I know you would be an interesting friend. Those people are just missing out, don’t you know !

"Warm" greetings, Ray (@ray666) ~ Are you wishing for jacket weather, too?
It seems (to me, anyway) that you might be asking just a tad more of yourself than you could, given the traumas you've endured in the 3 short years that I've known you via Connect. Let's see -- having an incurable condition (PN) upend a career you really enjoyed, dealing with some scary and life-altering months of Sepsis, moving, and then the shock and loss of your life partner, which hasn't even been a year ago yet. I'm not saying you shouldn't have goals or work on the healing that your wonderful counselor is helping you through. Quite the opposite. I find myself panicking at some of the same invitations that you described, and I opt for Zoom meetings almost exclusively even when the in-person gatherings are right here in town. I know my limits and what's safest in the long run and I'll gladly accept a ribbon for participation. Besides, it doesn't take up any room on the trophy shelf and can double as a bookmark, thereby cutting down on dusting & decluttering, and finding a use, as well. Two birds with one stone - at least! 😃
You have built into a bunch of lives here, all with recuperation and recovery in your own. No need to wait till next week to claim that gold and at least bronze.

Cheers, Ray!! 😄 ~~ Barb

@bjk3
Hi, Barb

We're enjoyed some jacket weather right now. And along with the coolers, some bursts of rain. We could use many more bursts. This drought is something fierce.

What's it like where you are?

I respect and deeply, deeply appreciate your saying I needn't be too hard on myself. However, I doubt I'll change, not much, anyway. The way I am with myself these days is pretty much how I've been with myself all of my life, for so long now that I don't really feel that I'm pushing myself too much. It'd be silly to do it, but let's do it anyway: On a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being you're like a wet dishrag, and 10 being you're your own Marine boot camp drill sergeant, I'd guess I'm about a 7, easing back to a 6 every so often, but crossing over into being an 8 when circumstances call for an 8. 🙂 I'm happy. And if I can say that honestly, especially considering the things that have hammered me in the past 18 months, I'm probably not doing myself much harm. (At least I hope I'm not!)

It's so delightfully cool here again this evening that I'm going to use my oven and mae something good for supper. Since it's been so hot, I've cast good sense aside and been miking (mic'ing?) frozen dinners––but this evening I'm going treat myself to something oven-cooked. (See? On a scale of 1 to 10, that's me being more like a 4, maybe even a 3. 🙂 )

Cheers, Barb!
Ray (@ray666)

@dederickve
Hi! Me? Am I the Ray you're asking about? Guessing that I am, I'm 81. A happy 81. And since the topic is "Does anyone feel old and useless with age?" I should answer "Nope." 🙂 A while ago, I was asked for my favorite decade, and I said, "This one." And despite my neuropathy, I really meant it. (Fingers crossed I'll continue to mean it. 🙂 ) ––Cheers! –Ray (@ray666)

@ray666
Micro-ing, maybe? Lol !

We've had rain for part of every day or night for a week here. It's been so humid, and still is, that you could wring out the air if you could capture it. It's the only August I can remember where lawns and trees look like springtime. We're finally supposed to see 70s sometime on Wed. Yay!

Your post is an "upper" -- yup, fluctuations happen but most of us can probably conclude that given the state of the world on a whole, we have little to really, really complain about.

That said, cheers to you and to all!

Barb

@bjk3
Hi, Barb

Micro-ing? Hmm? Yes, that might do. Thank you!

Thank you also for saying my reply was an "upper." I try always to post "uppers," even when, on a morning like this, I'm not feeling particularly "up." I can hear some say that, when I'm not feeling "up," I needn't think I have to pretend that I'm "up." You see, though, it's not pretense. Nor is it denial. I know from a lifetime of experience that if I can only "imagine" myself as being "up," in half an hour or three-quarters of an hour I will genuinely be "up," and with luck (and good stiff tailwind) I'll remain "up" for most of the day. I suppose you might say that it's a way of tricking ourselves. In the theater, we called it using a psychological gesture. The first time I came across psychological gestures I was playing Algernon in "The Importance of Being Earnest," and my first entrance onstage required that I be "bursting with life" (the director's words). Well, I didn't always feel like I was "bursting with life." The director suggested that I try a psychological gesture: while waiting offstage, fill my lungs and throw my arms skyward, fill my body with "Hurrah!" and envision myself as just having won gold in an Olympic marathon––NOW come onstage! I realize that's a rather grandiose way of explaining why I always try to be "up," but heck, what's wrong with a little grandiosity among friends? LOL

So you're getting the rain, but not the cool. And you've humidity to boot. You've my sympathy. Even when we've got high 90º and 100º days, we don't have the humidity that you have. Among the many reasons who as a young man I fled the Bronx was the Eastern seaboard humidity. I can still remember those childhood summer nights when the sheets on my bed were so soaked with sweat it was like they'd been taken from the washing machine before the final spin cycle.

I wish you LOW humidity, Barb!

Cheers!
Ray (@ray666)

@ray666
Psychological gestures? That's s GREAT! All the years we were raising our family we had cats - Siamese, Balinese. They raised those psychological gestures to a whole new level, appearing sometimes to want you to do something to serve their self-centered (but adorable) interests. But, no! It was a ruse, a theatrical trick as if to prove they could make us think one thing while reality was another. But today I have a dog, and when he casts those ever-sincere, longing eyes in your direction and you make eye contact, you are in the presence of genuine relational truth that is out there for anyone and everyone who cares to watch. I love BOTH cats and dogs.

But -- ahem -- all I really intended to do was endeavor to say, stay in charge of that psychological gesturing when it comes to your balance (no pretending to be brave, in control, and steady as a marble pillar). This is no time for theatrics, especially since you're probably not on its payroll anyway. I realize I harp on staying safe, but we PNers have to stick together - in all kinds of weather, even when the 100% humidity drops below 50%.

Break a leg! ~ NO, NO, NO! I meant, Cheers!!
Barb (@bjk3)