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Sunday 6 February 2011

Oh Dear I'm Getting Old!

Came home from a rather nice "All age" church service or Family service this morning.  After changing out of choir robes I tend to grab my coat and run.  Not because I have anywhere in particular to go, but because I am basically shy (yes, even at my age), and hate hanging around to see whether I've enough courage to launch myself into one of the groups drinking coffee and chatting.
This time I needed to pick up a couple of items from a shop, or no breakfast tomorrow.  Still half of my mind on the anthem we had just sung, I handed the cashier my library card instead of my bank card.
Laughed, apologised and headed for the bus stop - only one every half hour on Sunday - (buses not stops).
and realised I had a ten minute wait.  Very windy but dry so seemed an easy prospect.  Pulling on my glove it flew out of my hand and set off to fly down the High Street.  Without a second's thought I tore after it only to have it dance ahead of me, stop, then fly off again three times.  Finally trapping it under my foot I retrieved it to a round of applause from two people who were at the bus stop.
Red faced, breathless and worse, my hands shaking I realised this was probably the first time I've run for about ten years.
At home, having sat down feet up with a mug of hot chocolate i switched on the TV started watching goodness only knows what, and woke with a stiff neck two hours later.
Now, I don't sleep during the day (and not much at night), so this really alarmed me.  Never one to cat-nap it would seem a corner has been turned.  Oh dear, the slippery slope.
At what stage I wonder, is it ok to just give in and sleep when it seems unavoidable, or should one fight to the last to remain conscious?
When is it alright to be old?

6 comments:

  1. Give in, enjoy it and learn how to have a snooze without a stiff neck! If you can run after a glove in the wind you're doing OK. Every Blessing

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  2. Thanks Freda. You had to be there! Oddly enough I now feel (too much oxygen), as if I could run a marathon.
    Fear not, even I am not that daft.
    Blessings to you also.

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  3. I have a brief (15-30 minute) catnap when I find my concentration flagging, then return to the fray full of beans again. And I am still in my forties. I highly recommend naps--a great way of getting two days for the price of one!!
    Anita

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  4. It sounds a good idea Anita but I have never been able to "choose" to sleep, either day or night. For me it has always been insomnia or coma nothing in between!

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  5. This kind of reminds me of what I said to the nice lady in the Runnerway shoe shop in Saffron Walden, when I commented that, at 60, this might be the last pair of running shoes I needed.

    "Nonsense," she replied, "I go running with my mother, and she's 70."

    I thought of this when staggering up a gentle hill on my sixth training run of the new season yesterday. "If a 70-year old can do it," I said to myself, "so can I."

    Actually, though, that is not necessarily true. What a difference a year makes!

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  6. Thanks John, I think!
    I'm not sure where that leaves me, perhaps the answer is to buy some running shoes; not with the intention of running, but should it prove necessary..............no, it would be easier to stop wearing gloves1

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