The Memory Shelf

I saw a young man running up the street this morning. He glided along effortlessly in a steady pace up the steep grade in front of our house. I thought how I wished I could do that again. I was hooked on running for many years, and then about seven years ago back surgery derailed my ability for that activity. Walking has become my substitute for running, and occasionally when I’m out walking I begin thinking, ‘I believe that I might be able to jog down this hill.’ I take off attempting to regain that stride and form that once was so easy for me. After less than half a mile I realize that what once had been a joy for me would become an experience of burning agony and bitter defeat if I continued.

Age is the culprit that causes us to reluctantly give in to the voice of better judgment, and discontinue doing things that we are no longer capable of doing. Little by little we place activities, relationships, traditions and all sorts of other things that become past experiences into a mental album and store them away in our mind’s library on the shelves where fond memories rest. The older we get the more often we go to our  memory shelf, pick up that memory album, dust it off and recall some event with a friend or a spouse, but most likely we just sit by ourselves during those lonely moments and wish for just one more time that we could glide along in a steady pace up and down the hills and valleys still having many miles to go.