Stairway to Heaven

I was given a book by Rose Elliot, she of the vegetarian cuisine. It’s not a vegetarian cook book with beans and lentil recipes, it’s a book about change.
‘LIFE CYCLES’ takes the reader from their 20’s to the Knackers Yard. Each decade part of a life’s journey.
If we’re luckily enough to live into old age, there are certain rules.
Being over 70 requires purpose and passion.
Being nearly 80 requires peace and company.
When your life is coming to an end it reinforces the need to live each moment as fully as possible.
The problem that so many of us oldies face is lack of incentive, enthusiasm and commitment to ourselves. So many of us end up aimless asking the question ‘What’s the fucking point?’
Knowing the grim reaper is closer than ever, knowing death is just around the next corner, what is the fucking point of doing anything?
A question that young thirty year olds are now asking given the lack of optimism in the world.
The only point in doing anything is to do it. As Engels said ‘Everything is and everything isn’t’ so I say you might as well do it all.
The only point in planting a garden, knowing it’s going to need tending, or reading a book knowing it’s coming to an end, is the joy of NOW. I’m not saying anything new, but the temporariness of our existence becomes even more apparent when the light at the end of the tunnel either dims or shines.
If life has no purpose it’s aimless.
Getting out of bed is a waste of time, you’ve only got to get back into it later.
Eating is an extravagance since you re going to shit out that lasagne at the beginning, or the end of the day.
Doing anything is pointless since everything comes to an end and you’re going to die anyway.
It’s a short life; filling the bit between birth and death has to be a meaningful.
Pursuing life as a 24 year old is imagining the prize then keeping your eye on it.
At 30 it’s laying down the route to the prize.
At 40 qnd 50 it’s working like buggery to attain, and keep that prize.
By 60 your slowing down, and at 70, the rules change.
The cycle of life in your 70’s is tinged with the reality that you may only have ten, fifteen or twenty summers left.
If you’re lucky you grow old, dying young is the only other option.
A staircase is a good benchmark.
In 1975 I could run up those stairs, two at a time with enough breath to sing a scale at the top.
In 1987 I could breast feed my child whilst skipping up to the landing.
By 45 I understood the need for rites of passage and had as many parties as possible. People sprawled all over the stairs, wine glasses in hand.
At 50 I was invincible, walking up the metal stairway onto plane after plane. Travelling from one country to another, working, with loads of energy in tact, ny kidneys functioning and small printed books a good travel companion.,
60 was still glamorous with a birthday bash in the bottom of a Thai restaurant, friends relatives and work buddies, all climbed the steps into the restaurant on the side of the Thames. Not a walking stick in sight.
At 70 the dawter gave me a surprise bash in London. Into a restaurant that had been cleared for foreign guests and a good deal of booze. That was only six years ago.
Now at nearly 77 I crawl up the stairs on my hands and knees. I haven’t got a Zimmer frame, but I’m only a few paces away.
Going up and down stairs is a trial but if I want to shower, then I have to leave the living room and negotiate those thirteen steps. Unlucky for some.
The old git is 82 and walks up behind me on the staircase, poking his finger in my wrinkled old bum. Oh! What fun we have.
What’s the point you may say, after all my attractive days are over.I know I look ok for my age but Robbie Williams is not going to turn his head for me now.,
The only point is self preservation and finding thrills for the senses.
Beautiful art, mooosic and delicious smells from TKmaxx’s body washes.
Getting up for the dry cleaners and wandering round the garden may seem aimless to some, but to a septuanagerian, doing anything with ancient legs is a result.
I may have to think – for ages – about what I have to do next, but I still force myself to do it.
Sometimes even I think my life appears to be aimless; no job, no holidays, no Irish dancing, but climbing out of bed in the morning feels like a victory. A life filled with purpose, from writing to protesting, from breathing to walking, even if the steps are 10.000 less than last year,
Two firemen have just arrived to fit us with smoke alarms. They have climbed the stairs, easily, and fixed new noisy beepers upstairs and in the attic.
Both had huge muscles, tattoos and a wonderful bedside manner.
One of them asked my age. I told him I was 35 and the bastard laughed.
Before he knows it he’ll be leaving his ladders behind and staring at his wrinkled tattoos. Think on Fireman Sam.
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