I will be 80 in ten weeks time. I can’t quite believe it, given what my body has been through during the past nine years. In May 2015, I was diagnosed with pulmonary fibrosis and the prognosis was that I probably had three years left, five years if I was lucky, and at the same time the doctor who confirmed my pulmonary fibrosis also picked up that I had a heart problem too! So, I think I can fairly say that things didn’t look good, but here I am, about to reach 80. I have been living close to the edge for a few years now and I could fall off any time. The good news is that it doesn’t feel as if I will. I have been though a bad patch, but I feel better now than I have for a long time. The truth is I am looking forward to being an octogenarian for the next ten years, then seeing what life is like as a 90 year old!
Here I will write about life as a Middle England male octogenarian. We make up 1% of the population where I live and across the United Kingdom as a whole. There are about three women for every two men in the 80-84 age group. Little has changed since 2020. I hope to entertain and inform.🐰
I will continue to post my paperbag stories to https://paperbagstories.substack.com
My ‘Body Map’ of lifetime surgical procedures may amuse. I stayed in hospital for ten days following open heart surgery and one night after part of my left carotid artery was replaced.
Me wearing an early 80th birthday present from Susan my wife. It is a scarf from the London Transport Museum with the same pattern as the moquette seat covers on London Transport Routemaster buses, which entered service in 1958. I love travelling by bus. Always have.
Robert, I love this! My next ooetry collection will be similar to your body map. It's tentatively entitled "My Body of Evidence," and the poems are about the evidence on my body of my life's events. Seems we octogenarians sometimes think alike, eh?