B O U N D L E S S

I heard her before I saw her. Everyone in the airport heard her, but once they saw her, I'm sure the image was burned in their brains for all eternity.  "Tracyyyyyyyyyy!" she sang out in her ear-splitting soprano. "I seeeeeeee youuuuuuu!" She was wearing a blue chiffon vintage bridesmaid dress that had seen better days. She often shopped the goodwill racks just so that she could wow me when she met my flight in the Phoenix airport. It was her idea of a practical joke. Every head turned to watch her as she floated through the baggage area like a blue cotton candy cloud.  "Traccccyyyyyyyy! I missed youuuuuu!" Meet my friend Anne.  In my last post, I talked about an aging equation, and I imagined my crazy math teacher self asking my students to solve it with a model. Well, Anne is one of my mathematical models.  If you asked me to describe Anne, there are many, many words that come to mind: Loud, boisterous, eccentric, neon, stubborn, nak...

"You have such beautiful skin," she said as she reached out to stroke my cheek. It took every ounce of my 14-year-old restraint not to jerk away. "Like peaches and cream," she purred, "so smooth."  Gulp. "Thank you." I muttered. What does one say to the fawning 60-something friend of your favorite aunt? I remember looking at her chin as she spoke. I couldn't help myself. She had whiskers. And while she admired my youthful hide and contemplated sewing herself a Silence of the Lambs coat out of it, I wondered why she didn't pluck those whiskers...or shave...or splurge on electrolysis.  The memory of that encounter has stayed with me through the years.  I can chuckle about it now, but recently, it has taken on more significance. There are things that no one tells you about aging. Or maybe they tried to tell me, but I didn't believe them until now. Now. Now they seem significant because they make me feel limited.  Those whi...