Tag: ageing

Treasure in a coffin.

lizaaitken

A coffin would usually measure about 84 inches in length and be 28 inches wide so with you inside it, however slender you are, there won’t be an awful lot of room for treasure.

The word coffin derives from the old French word cofin, meaning basket or cradle. It seams funny and a little strange to me that we arrive and leave in the same vehicles. I’m wondering if it because each time we travel we are being born in one place and saying goodbye to another.

Although any box used for the dead is a coffin, the word casket is also widely used. It’s interesting that a casket was originally a box for jewelry. I think perhaps we are the jewels in this case and our value is measured by our deeds on earth.

I think what I’m getting at here, you have to stay with me, as I write to formulate my thoughts. Anyway what I’m saying is that we can’t really take anything with us, it will not stay along for the ride. We won’t wake up in the hereafter with the wealth we have amassed on earth any more than a baby is born with a healthy bank account and pots of gold.

So why do we spend our lives building our individual empires, with dreams of wealth being some of the most prominent. Why do we pray for a lottery win over health and happiness and why do we find it so hard to let go of material possessions when there will come a day we have no other option.

I’m as guilty as the rest, I’m a magpie, and I like beautiful things around me. I like things to shine, I polish taps and shine sinks. I bought my car as the tan leather seats went with my handbags. I weigh more on the bathroom scales than I actually should, because of the silver jewelry I never take off. I’m working on this and I will continue working, as I know the treasures we have on earth are nothing more than fool’s gold.

If we could only see each other by looking at the beauty of each individual soul without the material possessions or lack of possessions. I think we would see a completely different picture. We would truly see each other for who we really are by what we give out and not be swayed by falseness. I wonder what colours I give out, I hope they say something good about me.

Lately I have being seeing the natural beauty in nature, the flowers and the colours, the sounds and the smells. This is new for me, I’m a town girl and always busy and on the go. I’m giving myself more time now, I have slowed down, I’m watching and waiting.

I am wealthy in friends and loved ones, I have beautiful people around me but I won’t be taking them with me, nor would they want to come. I know I will die with the people I love around me but that will be as far as they go. I travel alone and the only treasure I want with me is the love of those I hold dear. I know with all certainty that the only treasures I will count as I leave this place are the people I love.

I’m thinking about this today and I’m going to keep thinking about it because I don’t want to forget. The wealth I have now and any wealth I have in the future will be measured in any kindness and love I’m able to give out. The treasure I will take with me will be those memories and achievements. I think they will fit as they will be sewn into my spirit and travel with me.

What will you fit in your coffin with you when they carry you out of this lifetime?

Old Bones

lizaaitken

My bones ache, it seems they have had enough activity of late and are trying to tell me the only way they know how. I got up today and my bones didn’t want to get out of bed with me, they had no choice, my bladder was the victor.

I think back to my youth, when I could spring from the bed and into the shower with one bounce. Today I creek as I take the steps down the hall towards the bathroom. My legs are bent at the knee for those first few steps, shaped still as they have been in slumber, defying any messages from my brain to straighten up and stand tall.

My legs are like bananas today, they are not doing what they should. Oh how I once loved to walk, walking was my life back in the day. I was going to walk from John O’Groats in Scotland to Land’s End in Cornwall, downhill as I saw it. I was going to take a month off of work to complete the walk, but my retirement came and I saw more of my armchair and slippers than anything else.

I look down at my feet, its little wonder my legs are not up to much having to rely on those feet as their foundations. I have bones growing out of the sides of my feet now, my bunions ache today, it must be raining outside.

When I was young it was wet hair that told me it was raining, now it’s my feet and the joints in my hands. I wonder to myself if Noah had bunions when he built the arc. I suppose, to put a positive spin on things, I don’t have to get out of bed now or turn on the weather report to know what the weather is doing outside.

We never think the day will come when we are young, when our bodies automatically do as they are supposed to, that anything will change. We are invincible and believe our bodies will go on forever. How I thought the old were a different species back then. If only I had taken a little more care of myself, kept up with the cod liver oil and maybe considered a few less little treats.

I search around for my glasses, running my hand across the side covered in news articles I still have to read, in search of them. There they are, I prop them up on my nose and head for the kitchen.

I make up my muesli and pop a couple of prunes on top. I think about the days of doorstep sandwiches loaded with bacon and how much that would play havoc with the constitution now.

Outside I see the world busying itself for the day, people running for buses, children skipping to school. I turn back to my home and head for the sitting room. I switch on the morning TV to see what is happening in the world, the world I find so alien now.