Dear Sandra,

Do you remember back when life was fun & fast? When we’d spend our days taking trips to the slopes and nights working for tips at the Whistlestop. Where you met Graham and even though I said he was bad news, you started going steady. I remember you two twisted together like a pretzel. Limbs linked in love. We’d all go to his basement suite when our shifts finished. Long after the nightlife had called it a night, we were still charged up, the lightning bolts we once were. Shocking behaviour. Blind drunk. Dancing through the dark.

But fun & fast don’t last. I could tell by the way his life was in piles. Piles of dishes in the sink, piles of clothes on the floor, piles of cans in the closet. He was a pile of shit; I’m surprised you didn’t smell it sooner. I don’t miss him, but I miss it. Our youth. It wasn’t as carefree as everyone always says it is. Life’s problems are there no matter what age you are. Even as a child you have issues. Age appropriate.

Now all my cares concern health. Visits to the doctor, the optometrist, the dentist, the pharmacist. These are the trips I take. The mundane prerequisites of staying alive. “To Do To Live” list. Draining the last of my energy. I feel slow & tired.

No longer a lightning bolt, I grumble and stumble, chasing the light. Maybe it will bring me to the past, or maybe my future. Old thunder thighs. Memories keep me moving. Crinkling my eyes when I remember the snow blowing into them. Stretching my lips when I remember the time you skied into a tree well and I had to dig you out. You were never much of a skier. Our abs were tightened by laughter born of long nights and little sleep. Now all I do is sleep.

You never think about moving when it’s easy. When it’s as natural as breathing. Then, when you can’t move like you used to, it’s all you can think about. And when you start thinking about breathing, how easy it used to be, well, I haven’t thought about it; I may not be fun & fast anymore, but I’m not there, yet.

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