At 75 I was alone. My wife was dead. My brothers were dead. After retiring from work either all my friends were dead or had drifted away; it happens when you leave a culture. So I went back to school. Majored in trying not to be lonely. I would take a science class or a geography class; last semester I even took a women’s studies class just to be a letch.

I enjoyed everything about it. The campus, the bustle, the learning that I would never use, the excitement and vitality of youth that surrounded me. I was still lonely, but not quite so alone. These kids are no different than the kids when I was young. More toys, more stuff, but the same basic dreams and hopes and angsts and all that you feel when you are feeling for the first time.

I’m still here, but things are starting to change. I forget I’m old. I don’t see my wrinkled face more than once a day and I forget not everyone’s knuckles are torn and bent and scarred. So many of the kids look a lot like kids I went to school with 60 years ago. Sometimes I forget that they are not those friends until I get close and see that they don’t look exactly like them. I know my doctor said to expect my memory to go more and more as things take hold, but it is still eerie.

In the mornings, I park on the far side of the campus and spend the time before class walking around the campus searching for memories that won’t surface anymore. Sometimes I remove my glasses and walk around in my nearsighted and myopic haze. It removes those slight differences between these kids and my friends. As long as I’m careful to not call out to them, I can walk with my schoolmates.