Aging
Blowin’ in the Wind
Against the wind
We were runnin’ against the wind
We were young and strong, we were runnin’ against the wind
— (Bob Seeger and The Silver Bullet Band)
Recently, my mother and I were trying to figure out how to get my step-father to the hospital for his vaccine. He’s 93. He’s frail and has COPD. The wind chill is, currently, negative twenty-five degrees.
My parent’s building is encompassed by a wind tunnel on the corner of a street. Even when it is not windy anywhere else in the city, there’s a breeze there. I think it’s haunted. Because it’s a university neighborhood, chock-full of Nobel Prizes, I think, that some disgruntled scientist, spun up some mad science around their building.
Maybe, some woman who lived in that building did him wrong. Maybe, he had a terrible childhood in that place. There’s something going on in that corner, and the wind doesn't let you forget it. Maybe one day the science experiment curse will expire and that corner will become still.
But not before Sunday. Sunday is the day that we take my stepfather to get his much-needed vaccine.
