Backstory

Did I get this right? You took back the travel trailer you only owned for four months? That’s weird. Why’d you give up so quick?

I couldn’t lift the hitch.

Huh?

The hitch – the piece that connects the trailer to the truck. I couldn’t lift it. Well, I could, but it was really hard.

So what? Couldn’t your husband lift it?

Yeah. But what if he died? I thought about that. What if we’re out at some campground and he dies, keels over (maybe from lifting the hitch), then what?

Isn’t that a little fatalistic?

Fatalistic or realistic? We’re at the age when people keel over. They’re fine, they’re normal, and then BOOM, they’re a mess, wreckage, broken hips and walkers, heart attacks and stents, the object of helpers discussing transfers, someone else doing the wiping. Jesus.

Maybe you could’ve lifted weights, you know, build up your strength. Did you think of that?

Yeah, for about thirty seconds. Like at age 74, I need to find one more thing I need to improve? Fuck it. I could have lifted weights. But I decided against it.

Are you saying you were too old to have a trailer?

Yeah. That ship has sailed. It wasn’t just the hitch. The learning curve on all the “systems” arced from here to the Gobi Desert. And then there was the backing up. The hideous combination of Dante’s Inferno and Groundhog Day.

That’s pretty grim. But isn’t that something you should’ve figured out before you bought it?

Maybe. I’ve made it a habit to overestimate myself. A lot of the time I rise to the expectation. Not this time. I’m not the tough old broad I think I am. I carry grocery bags one at a time and hold the railing when I go down the stairs. I was out of my mind when I signed the check. Imagined myself to be another person – somebody younger, invincible, strong. Ageless.

This is making me feel sorry for you.

Oh, please. You’re feeling sorry for somebody who’s facing facts? People get old. That’s what happens when they don’t die tragically young. They get too old to lift the fucking hitch. It’s not heartbreaking. It’s life. You live and learn.

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Photo by saeed karimi on Unsplash