Fighting the flow against time

I knew a horse once who was named “Side swipe”.  Nice looking Dunne, he was born to an older dam and he was not a small foal.  Foals tend to lay on one side in the womb so they develop longer tendons or more “relaxed” tendons and joints on one side when they are big, especially in an older less, elastic uterus.  When he was born, his owner recognized the issue and worked very hard to strengthen his off side. 

Looking down at my self as I age, I began to realize that I had started depending on one side of me more than the other.  It is normal, we are left or right side dominate and the older we get, the more we lose on the side we don’t rely on.   

Dick Van Dyke said as he aged, “I moved in my 50’s to keep it up, I moved in my 70’s to stay able, I kept moving out of stubbornness.”  The point here is; aging is work.  If you want to live on, you must work at it.  I’m not old by some standards but I am not young anymore and I have to keep reminding myself that if I want to live into the projected life span, I need to work at it. 

I want to keep creating, enjoying my family that is kin and friends, seeing new places.  I need to commit to the work.  Yoga, Tai Chi, Hikes, physical training; all of it.  I’m not good at it but I must keep trying.  Keep your eye on the ball and remember, as Side Swipe aged, chances are that his weak side stiffened back up.  Time does that, catches up with the aches and pains we have been fighting off. Okay buddy, I’ll get back to tai chi.