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Rita Iton Posts: 325 Joined: 28th Jun 2009 Location: USA | quotePosted at 19:02 on 30th June 2009 My Essay. That won me two tickets to the Opera end of 2008. Aging, particularly in the later decades, is a drawing-in. Encounters with the outside world diminish for many reasons, not all of them to do with fear, negligence, or lack of energy. The solitude of getting older is often pleasurable. I sometimes think a pleasure similar to those described by converts to a religion. There is peace, a sense of the present--- if one has been awakened to new possibilities---rather than the past or the future, a looking within to discover, as many religions urge us to do, inner wisdom.But conversion, either religious or personal, is not universal in old age: loneliness and a sense of meaninglessness to one’s life in contrast to the life in the work world, the whirring world, are far to common. Many of us can, at various harried times in our life, feel alone and assaulted by the meaninglessness of what we are doing. But, at such times, we are doing; the problem is not a lack of activity with a point, but rather questions about the point of the activity. These latter malaises are not only ordinary, but also difficult to parry or to change.The world outside neither cares nor offers attentiveness, except occasionally. If one ventures out to meet others like one self, the conversation is predictable, the discussion repetitive, shared hopelessness may rescue one from the sense, of a uniquely empty destiny, but it hardly comforts.Which brings me to e-mail.Above all, it is the instantaneous quality of e-mail that is so appealing and, in our world, unique. One need not telephone and catch people unready for conversation or, far more likely these days, leave a message whose receipt is hardly certain. One need not search for a pen, postage stamp, or mailbox, or depend on the ever-more-uncertain post office, whose precarious and delayed deliveries have become known to users of e-mail as “snail mail” One simply sits down, boots up the machine, calls up the e-mail dispenser, and shoots off a message that, with its immediacy and lack of deliberation, is probably more direct than anything written by other means, and therefore very likely to inspire a similar response.I hope it is now obvious that e- mail is especially suited, as I have found, to those of us no longer revolving our days around the working world. It reaches out into our privacy without invading it, an astonishing accomplishment; it connects us to those with whom the possibility of connection might have remained un-expected; it offers us welcome without the necessity for social arrangements; it inspires us to confidences and the practice of wit. I trust we will meet again on this journey of writing. Class of 2008. |
Peter Evans Posts: 3863 Joined: 20th Aug 2006 Location: UK | quotePosted at 20:46 on 30th June 2009 Thanks for sharing this with us Rita. I like it. I just wish I could write. Lol |
| Peter Evans Posts: 3863 Joined: 20th Aug 2006 Location: UK | quotePosted at 20:46 on 30th June 2009 Pleased to meet you by the way. And a big welcome to POE. Edited by: Peter Evans at:30th June 2009 20:49 |
Ruth Gregory Posts: 8072 Joined: 25th Jul 2007 Location: USA | quotePosted at 03:33 on 2nd July 2009 Very nice, Rita. I think email is a lifesaver for a lot of people. Especially the homebound. |
Debbie Adams Posts: 2043 Joined: 8th Mar 2009 Location: USA | quotePosted at 03:37 on 2nd July 2009 Great stuff Rita, you are very talented !;-) Thanks for sharing.. |
| Rita Iton Posts: 325 Joined: 28th Jun 2009 Location: USA | quotePosted at 17:51 on 2nd July 2009 On 2nd July 2009 03:33, Ruth Gregory wrote: Hi. Ruth.Thanks for taking the time to have had a read of my essay.I have always believed in developing the mind and body. I am a senior now, and retired, so exercising is very important to me, and I now have a personal trainer.My nutrition is as follows.High proteinLow carbohydratesLots of fruit Force-feeding veggies. I call my trainer “Marquis De Sade” and claim that he is a certified sadist, because he pushes me mercilessly to do more every time. Exercises
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| Rita Iton Posts: 325 Joined: 28th Jun 2009 Location: USA | quotePosted at 17:55 on 2nd July 2009 On 2nd July 2009 03:37, DEBBIE ADAMS wrote:
Hi Debbie. Thanks for taking the time to have a read. |
Ron Brind Posts: 19041 Joined: 26th Oct 2003 Location: England | quotePosted at 18:07 on 2nd July 2009 And I've only got to lose 4 stones in weight in six months.......phew!! Fruit and veggies Rita? I've told Anna not to come too close to me with anything sharp for fear of me being punctured. I also told her to close the windows because in the event my body is punctured, the gas will escape at a rate of knots and it'll probably project me into the clouds never to be seen again!! Perhaps I could tie a label to my arm or something, you know like they do on balloons; perhaps with my address on it or 'Reward for getting this guy home'. |
| Ron Brind Posts: 19041 Joined: 26th Oct 2003 Location: England | quotePosted at 18:08 on 2nd July 2009 BTW just to keep this thread on track, I enjoyed reading it also Rita but where would we be today without emails? |
| Rita Iton Posts: 325 Joined: 28th Jun 2009 Location: USA | quotePosted at 19:30 on 2nd July 2009 On 2nd July 2009 18:07, Ron Brind wrote:
Fruit and veggies if that's what it takes. Think of how much better you are going to feel when you are doing your tours. I will leave you with this quote. Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life? -Mary Oliver. Anna will help. No pain No gain so true. |
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