“Eventually, everything in the body becomes unreliable,” my neuro stated. It’s a hidden truth of nature. In our teen’s we laugh at it. In our twenties, any notion of time is philosophized over during bartender’s last call. In our thirties, the term slowing down was bantered watching old geezers struggle playing softball at company games. In our forties, we begin to struggle when a few kick the bucket, usually due to cancer or maybe a car wreck. It hits home in our sixties when were told we’re the one dying.

“Your body is becoming unreliable,” I repeated walking to my car. “I cannot change that,”  I repeated to myself. Only then do you see the elders of yesteryear stare you in the face and hear the laughter. I swear I heard them. I swear I did. “Sucks to be you,” they snerted (a word my ex invented) at me as I drove drove home. Pulling into my underground parking space, I turn the car off. Pausing for a moment as my hands rested on the steering wheel, I reflected. I have no problem distinguishing the past from the present as Rod Serling narrates, ‘There’s signpost up ahead. Your next stop, the Twilight Zone!’ in my mind.

The Parkinson’s signpost has moments of honesty. Hair accessories are worthless. Any youthful notions of dying hair to retain a youth glow is gone. Rogaine is so 40ish. When you look at life behind knee braces, medication schedules, and factoing the limited amount of exercising that decimates kneecaps into painful spasms. At 62, there sometimes all I see is death. Maybe that’s all I’m expected to see. That’s what my neuro was hinting at. Get ready to be welcomed by the very geezers I once snerted at.

Since April, Parkinson’s and I have had any intricate dance. More so, when I think about it, Parkinson’s and I have settled for mutual, elongated dual. The tibia and fibula of both legs ache regularly. I tremble and drop things more often. I am weak and require arm strength to hold myself up against the wall. Sharp pains from a nerve or nerve root, ‘pins and needles’ radiates from a nerve or nerve root. And lastly, tightness in all extremities. It’s getting damn near impossible to hide it anymore.

Taking my hands from the steering wheel, “Shit. This is just double-f’n shit.” I have spent the majority of the past several years ‘passing’ for healthy. Sure, I lived with in fear of people finding out I had Parkinson’s. Contextually, I remember Woody Allen’s words (not that I choose to like what he’s done in his personal life): “There are three types of people: Those who make things happen, those who watch things happen, and those who wonder what happened.” Am I in any level?

In a strange way, I view things more nuanced. I now write with a level of understanding Never experienced. Still, I hide. And the number of people who know of my Parkinson’s diagnosis only numbers ten. On some days, I have the mental faculty with the difficult, nothing throws me; no person or predicament. Other days, I can barely type an email mistake free. Now, I mentally no longer spectulate or forward-think, as in what will I do in 20 years. More so, I ask, “What am I able to do with two?”

Michael J. Fox stated he has a sense of deliberation when approaching the day. Each second and each movement is a thought process. There are small snippets of sequential internal mini conversations intenally about the movement to be made. However, his movements are supported by a vast array of support. He has friends, family, neighbors and an assistant. And such support makes a better future. I have none of that.

Like many others in a smilar position, I understand the future is limited. Looking at my E-Trade account, I muttered, “More fortune than future.” Short-term, I will be ok. Long-term is something envisionable. Most likely, I will expire before seeing the cure of cancer (any cancer). Promising treatments for dementia and Alzheimer’s disease might be available for my niece and nephew, but not me. My body’s rigidity, muscle spasms and brain fog will likely drag me down. And down is summary of a life, whether it’s one either poorly lived or lived is small chatter. Rather, it’s the humanness of deterioration.

Deterioration? Ugh. It’s the new normal. My new normal.