3 old guys, 3 kinds of old. Each of them was s-l-o-w, a bit stooped and very focused. One guy put on his glasses and leaned precariously forward peering intently at the dials. I don't mean to suggest he was so blind he shouldn't be driving, tho perhaps that really is the case, but he was searching the buttons with a keen, but doubtful look; which one is the cheapest?
Another shuffled in a near crawl over to the pump. Tiny steps creeping forward, careful not to trip on the pump hose dangling in his walkway. He was rather bowlegged and had a battered, weather beaten face; old.
And the third man? I saw more of the top his head than his face. He had a scraggly, thin beard dangling nearly to his waist and was stroking it with a quivering hand as he got out of his car. That's when I had an ah-ah moment; a sudden insight, not of inspiration, but of realization. I too may be an old lady scrutinized by a younger person who is curious if I should be driving, of how I am handling aging.
There comes a time when we must confront our own aging issues. When do we become too old to do the things we have done for as long as we can remember? Do we have to give up things for our own safety or for others? It is so easy to live in the mindset that I am 45 and not 65. I mean, I want to be 45 and there is always the adage 'fake it til you make it'. Is that what those old guys were doing, just doing what they always have done.... filling up their car with a 65 year mindset? Or were they defying age to keep on, keeping on?
In the harshness of reality, my body reminds me of my age, I am fully aware of the number of years I have lived. I don't want to be one of those old people, tottering around my car trying to fill it with gas. It probably takes them as long just to get out of the car as it does for me to fill mine! I am not criticizing, I am astounded that it took me this long to embrace the idea of my own aging. I can blithely say, no one lives forever and we all die. But that is far different than accepting my body's inability to keep it up forever.
And there they all were, standing rooted, attempting to motivate their bodies to move. 3 old men needing gas.