To Myself, at 63

from Kristina Wright

Hey there. I bet you hardly remember me, huh? The you of eighteen years ago, when your kids were still little. Sure, I'm middle-aged now-- and I feel it some days more than others-- but I'm guessing I probably seem young to you. Younger, certainly. Do you miss me? Don't. Your body has done some pretty amazing things so far and it's a good one. Not perfect, not even beautiful, but strong and resilient. Even at 63, I'm guessing.

Why am I writing this when you're 63? Oh, it seemed like a good age. At 21 and 19, the boys are mostly grown and they should be enjoying their college lives-- lives of their own that likely have little to do with you. Does that make you sad? Or do you feel liberated? I feel mixed emotions as I write it, but of course right now they're only 3 and 1-- such sweet little boys who need me. They won't always need me, will they? (It's okay, you can lie to me and say they will.)

Sixty-three is the age I imagine where I'll feel like I did pre-children, more free, more... me. I hope that's true. Is that true? Are your days built around your own needs and interests the way they were until you were 42? I'm planning trips now for you when you're at an age where you can go wherever you want and do whatever you want and not worry (too much) about the boys. I hope you'll go on some of those trips. Sure, the boys can come if they want. I'm planning some trips like that between now and then, of course. I want to show them the world. But I want to see more of it myself, too.

Forty years of marriage this year, right? Wow. Forty. Of course, sitting on this side of the screen, it's already been 22 years and some days that seems like forever and some days it seems like a few years that flew by in a blink. Forty years sounds like forever, but I know it won't seem that way when I'm sitting where you are. It was meant to be, it was the best decision you ever made. You two have always been so perfect together. Right. Forever is really all that makes sense for you.

I envision a writing career that is still consuming your time in the best possible way. I hear of writers who quit-- who wake up one day and don't ever write another word. That won't be me-- us, I mean. It's what I was born to do, and I know you know it, too. Maybe more than ever, now that the boys are grown and you've been married for nearly two-thirds of your life. Marriage, motherhood, a sense of family and belonging... they're wonderful, aren't they? But the writing... that's what sustains me. That's what will always be there.

I wish you could write me back and tell me what you're doing. What direction your life has taken, what you're passionate about in this current moment eighteen years from now. But half the fun in this life is the anticipation of finding out what's around the bend in the road. How the children will turn out, how your relationships will ebb and flow, where life will take you emotionally and spiritually (and certainly physically, as I haven't been unscathed by health issues)-- it's all a part of the mystery of this life. It's wonderful, isn't it?

I hope you're happy. I feel that you are, in this weird in-between place where past, present and future connect. I feel that you will always be happy, some days (and years) more than others, but consistently so. Stay happy. For me.

Remember This

By Lisabet Sarai

Dear Lisabet in the future -

How far in the future am I imagining? Ten years? Thirty? Fifty? Perhaps you'll revisit these journal pages more than once, at different stages in your life, trying to recapture this time of youthful discovery.

What will you (I) be like in a decade, or in half a dozen? I rather assume you'll be more confident than I am, less riddled with doubt and scarred by envy, more satisfied with yourself. By that time you will hopefully have realized the futility of constantly comparing yourself to others and finding yourself lacking. Obviously you will be wiser. I've spent enough time around older, even elderly, people to know that wisdom does often come with age and experience.

I worry, though, that too much experience may dull your senses and emotions. Will you lose the ability to feel the thrill of new insights, fierce revelations like those that overwhelm me almost daily during this crazy period in my life? Will you brush off the wild passion and transcendent pleasure I describe as merely the effects of hormones or marijuana? Looking back at your twenty-six year old self, will you shake your head in embarrassment and tell your friends, “I was such an awful slut.”?

Don't. You know more than I, have done more, achieved more, but still I have some advice for you. Remember this.

Remember the electrifying feel of first skin. Remember the exultation of being joined, the richness of emptiness filled. Remember the telepathic communication – don't shrug it off as mere fantasy. At least be willing to consider the possible existence of psychic links potentiated by carnal connection. As for me, I'm convinced that sex, God and magick are three names for the same thing. I'm not a slut. I'm a spiritual seeker.

Remember that love lies at the very core of your being – yours and that of everyone else. Even a stranger has lessons to teach, if you're willing to learn. Remember, if you can, how it feels to be open to it all, even the pain, to give and receive as part of a virtuous, outrageous circle.

Of course, you won't recall the physical sensations. Even now, just hours later, I can't conjure them here on the page. Sense impressions are ephemeral, impossible to capture in words. All you can do is hint and suggest, using analogy and metaphor, roughing out the shape of the experience and allowing the reader's memory to fill in the details.

I hope, though, that you'll remember the joy bubbling in your chest as you go about your daily business after a night with your lover. Remember the awe when you pushed past another barrier, connecting more deeply than ever before. Remember your amazement and pride, admiring the fading marks from his crop on your rear. Never forget the devastating flood of tenderness when you first pursed your lips around her trembling nipple.

The intensity will fade. Of course it will. In fact, sometimes I'm not sure how long I can bear it myself, one ecstatic day after the next. I'm too aroused, sometimes, to sleep. Poems pour out of me like blood. I gaze into the face of a lover and I see God. They say a mortal cannot bear such glory.

Keep the thrill alive, if you can, however you can. Tell the stories to your new lovers. Write them for strangers. Read this journal, page after page scrawled during the times when I'm alone, or while my lover is lost in dreams, and let it rekindle the flames of memory.

Passions become muted over time. Stories told too often ossify into stereotypes. Fight these trends, if you're able. I can't know what you will experience, as your body ages and your mind and heart mature. Tonight, though, if only for a moment, I'd like you to feel what I feel, know what I know – the awful, holy beauty of the flesh.

And even if everything dwindles to stale shreds of recollection, do not, at least, forget the truth – that these days, and these encounters, are a rare blessing. Old people become conservative, I've heard. Perhaps there will come a time when you're tempted to repudiate me, to label me as foolish, extreme, or even wicked. Promiscuous. Perverse.

Listen to your heart, Lisabet. Remember. You know that, no matter what society says, I (we?) did the right thing at the right time. I have no regrets, and neither should you.

By the time you read this, I'll be gone. I write, like the ancients, to share the knowledge I've gleaned with my descendents – you, the many Lisabets who may read this over the years. Perhaps you'll find my scribblings quaint and fantastic, myths from a lost past. I beg of you, don't dismiss my stories as the ramblings of an overactive imagination. Believe. And remember.