~ The Reaper ~

This is not meant to be negative.

I'm 63 now and with the lifestyle my friends and I lead there were often periods of years where almost constantly someone I knew and cared for passed away. I had 2 very close buddies, Scott and Jasper. My best friend Buddha (Scott K.) had drug related heart failure and Jasper passed from brain cancer. Neither one of my closest friends made it to age 60.

A woman who I loved dearly, we shared a home and our time together, passed away from a fentanyl overdose. And shortly afterwards I lost the one person who always showed me love unconditionally.... My mom passed from Parkinson's disease. And just this past Friday my stepdad David died after being diagnosed with cancer only recently.

While I only mentioned these, I can assure you that I seem to have experienced much more death than I have life. Every year, without fail, another one gone.

At some point I realized my own mortality. The next big event in my life that I know I can expect will be my own passing. And while I'm personally not afraid of that fact, I suppose to understand that I'll possibly die alone here in this apartment with no one really knowing until....

And please, this is not a threat of self harm. But after laying in here for weeks now and with the health issues I suffer from, without proper medication, and absolutely no one coming by I understand that it's a good possibility.

I guess I'm trying to say that no one wants to be forgotten or simply dismissed. Although I am an older person and I don't do anything particularly constructive for society, I am still a person. I was young once. I could run and play and it seemed like things had no real ending. Only new beginnings. But now reality is priority.

Look, as a side note....As old people we don't mean to be slow and to hold up the line and to get in the way. We're trying. If you get a little aggravated at some old person please try to understand that the burden of the years we carry is often a heavy one. And there's always the constant pain of a worn out body. We're trying. Please understand.