Where Did They All Go

I was sitting in a meeting, last night .... There was one young person ... Couldn't have been a day over 55. And no one was beyond their 91st year. D was missing; he's late 70's and can't walk the path to the venue. B hadn't been at a meeting in a couple of years. S & I had something of a kerfuffle, last month. S is about 90 and maybe I did him in by my harsh comments. M is just 65 or 66 and her car broke down on Turnpike; so much for Ford Hybrids. And K seems to forget or, else, she has other stuff to do. Add to that all the ghosts that we each carry ... While the group meets to discuss problems of childhood, by now and as far as I know, everyone is an orphan.

Not popular to describe Older Adults as orphans. Who was that English child actor (Freddie Bartholomew, maybe) who played the poor orphan in 1940's films. I looked around the room last night and could almost picture the dirty faced kid characters played by him ... Dickensonian types. As far as I know, none of us grew up with a lot and all have lived comfortable lives ... married or widowed, homes with the usual trappings, kids, grandkids who visit ...

So what's the problem? Maybe there is no particular problem Playing in the Last Quarter. Choices have been made. Can't give those kids back and there's no repeating a 50 year old marriage; the math doesn't work.

And, yet, as I listened to myself talk at the meeting, I could hear a stridency ... old soldiers drawing out their swords. I complained about something we were reading. 'Why hadn't the authors cited a conversation that RMB had with SF in 1912? Hadn't that covered these very same points.' I was a little embarassed inside myself driving down a curvy road as I realized that I had not turned on the headlights. Tooling down the road in my two seat convertible ... What a sight! Cantankerous aging fellow railing at the world that is and mourning for a world that maybe once was? maybe never was? ... with his headlights off!

Didn't hit anything! Lucky.

Funny! Who/What turned this man to lore?

Arrgh!