"Forget me at your peril"

On remembering the fact of my eventual decay

There’s a sleep-inducing process that sometimes works for me, learned from the Feldenkrais Method.

You become aware of the skeleton, bone by bone. Gradually you sense into how your skeletal structure is arranged, starting with your skull on the pillow and moving down its length, ending with your feet. By which time you might be sleeping.

A soothing Australian-sounding voice helps with the sleepy factor. But the process can theoretically be done without the audio.

At some point while attempting the progression on my own recently, I got distracted by the thought, I am going to be a skeleton one day.

It’s so easy to forget! Even with all the skeletons showing up in my Halloween-obsessed neighborhood. A fitting place for me to land, since I was born on el Dia de los Muertos.

Actually some of these skeletons stay up all year. There’s a giant one towering over a front yard two blocks from my house that gets dressed up for special occasions. Right now it sports striped leg warmers, tinsel hair, a bisexual pride cape, and a rainbow miniskirt barely covering its bony nether regions. Oo la la!

A regular life-sized (death-sized?) one sits year-round on a bench on another neighbor’s porch, decorated only by a festive series of hat changes. Lately s/he’s joined by a smaller skeleton perching on the back of the bench.

There are also three unadorned ones down the street from me in the grassy strip between sidewalk and curb. One sits in a lawn chair with hand outstretched as if caught in the middle of an uproarious knee-slap, and the others lean coyly against trees, facing the street. (I’m not sure if this is intentional, but I suspect it is—they’re pointed in the direction of the big banner I wrote about earlier.)

But back to the only bones I own: For decades I never really gave a thought to my skeleton. I didn’t think about the fact that under my flesh was one of those ghoulish things meant to frighten young children. There’s a literal skeleton under my skin!

I suppose I did know it, in the vague way that I knew that teabags are filled with tea leaves grown on some distant plantation.

Which is to say, I didn’t really know it.

When did I first become aware in any embodied way? Maybe it was a few years ago, while lying in savasana (corpse pose) at the end of a yoga class. I felt my eyes sink back into their sockets. In 2019 I wrote about how at this moment I thought, I have a skull.

Or maybe it was the day I took a class with somatic educator Abigail Rose Clarke, and the experiential learning made me realize that my pelvic bones extend much…higher up?…than I realized. Even having cracked my pelvis in 1999, having seen X-rays, this fact had escaped me. “Pelvis,” to me, meant “sex organs,” or “hips.” Not “bony parts at my waist a few inches below my ribcage.”

Or maybe it was the day in 2021 that a bone scan revealed early-onset osteoporosis. “Forget me at your peril,” saith the skeleton.

What I mean to say is: I don’t want to forget the fact of my eventual decay.

I want to remember that someday these bones will be all that’s left of me.

Corollary thing to remember: Everything can turn upside down, in a blink or over months or years. Life can and does, in a split second or so slowly you don’t see it happening, turn into a smaller version of itself. Even a nice long life generally involves a body’s decline. Till eventually it’s over.

I don’t think this is a morbid train of thought. It’s a reminder to live fully.

Aging, and loving older people, makes me want to live every moment in a state of appreciation (if that were possible) (and maybe for some it is).

I’ve had a few recent reminders of life’s sweetness and shortness in roundabout but oddly synchronicitized ways. I was listening to an audiobook called Here We Go Again (and I’ve had this infernal Abba song stuck in my head ever since, since it’s part of the novel’s gay-playlist road trip soundtrack).

The story is a queer romcom with depth, the kind I like to read, the kind I hope I’m writing. Much of the heart of the story comes from a secondary character, Joe. He’s a former teacher of the would-be lovebirds, who are childhood best friends-turned-enemies.

Facing terminal cancer, Joe gets the duo to take him on one last epic road trip from Washington State to Bar Harbor, Maine. Teasingly, they call him “old man” and tell him “No Tuesdays with Morrie shit.”

He’s all of 60.

That’s eleven years younger than my dad was when he died of mesothelioma. Five years younger than my wife is now.

And three—more like two, because here comes another Dia de los Muertos—years older than me.

Mortality much?

Cancer and infirmity can happen at any age, I realize that. As can any number of debilitating things. I should know, since I spent a good decade infirm. Much of my thirties were a blur.

But the older I get, the closer the end is for me and my aging band of misfit beloveds.

I won’t say too much about what happens in the book, except that Acadia National Park is mentioned more than once.

I also overheard, coincidentally, discussion of Maine at our recent get-out-the-vote meetup, including a woman saying: “I can’t hike anymore, but I’ve always wanted to go to Acadia National Park.”

Did I mention I’ve long wanted to hike Acadia myself? Judy and I have yet to get around to a long-talked-about Maine trip, even though she has a standing invitation from an old friend.

I’ll take all this as a nudge. While my wife and I still CAN hike, we should get the hell over to Maine. Putting Bar Harbor on the 2025 list. These bones aren’t getting any younger.

Practice Space

There’s so much strife in the political scene right now. My guidance system is telling me to stay focused on what I want to create—in myself, in my work, and in the world—instead of drowning in the noise.

Might be time to finally download the WeCroak app to get five death reminders a day! Apparently the secret to happiness, according to Bhutanese lore, is keeping the end in mind. Maybe so, or maybe not—but the reminders should help attune my focus to what’s really important.

And boy, was it bliss to foreclose any possibility of Facebook during our Canada trip. I set up a repeating social media blocker and didn’t feel the lack, except a slight hankering to see Judy’s daily recaps of our adventures. (“Pass that phone over here, honey.”)

Now I’m back, and the overstimulating platform is once again right in my, well, face. I’m experimenting with a mindfulness technique to mitigate the ol’ knee-jerk. It involves a few therapist-approved questions:

Do I really NEED to go on there just now?

If I do, will it bring me ease/joy/wonder?

Do I want to do it? (To be asked whether the answer to the above is yes OR no).

When I remember to do this (or choose to do it?), it seems to prime a shorter interaction with the platform, if I go ahead and engage with it.

Otherwise, even if I decide to “just check real quick,” I might find myself losing a good chunk of time to scrolling.

And I just can’t imagine thinking, with my dying breath: “Wish I’d scrolled longer! Wish I’d read more comments on some stranger’s post! Wish I’d gotten angrier because of what the algorithm showed me!”

Savorings

More wildlife sightings! A painted turtle (I’m pretty sure) stuck her snout up at us from the creek when Faith and I paused on the bridge. At least it seemed like she was looking right at us. Faith was entranced, head through the slats and staring down, till the turtle swished back under the shallow water.

Also: Two fox sightings on the golf course. So lucky!

And maybe I should mention…I took a spill when Faith ran smack into me at full speed Monday morning. I am rejoicing in the fact that I came away with minor abrasions. No shattered elbow or cracked pelvis. Hey bones! Thank you!

Also, she is fine, though I landed right on her and terrified us both for about three minutes until she caught her breath and put weight on her front paw again.

So I’ve been savoring lots of yummy stretches and restful “somatic listening,” wherein I tend to sensations in the body. I’ve been savoring walking and moving with minimal stiffness. I’m feeling so grateful for resilience (Faith’s and mine) and for every single thing I’ve done to help my bones over the past few years.