Eventually, we all get to an age where we begin asking ourselves a question: “Can I still do that?”
For women (or womxn if you prefer), this nagging doubt might begin to complicate simple decisions. The internal monologue when purchasing a blouse in your 20’s was ‘Hey, that’s cute!” whereas in your 50’s the stream-of-consciousness resembles a bleak novella.
“Is the cut too young? Who am I kidding! I can’t wear THAT! Does it make my boobs look droopy? Is that purple or is it lavender? Oh no! It’s amethyst! I can’t wear amethyst! Is the neckline too slutty?” etc.
For us men it’s even more basic — it’s about muscle — we begin to doubt our ability to exert force. Not just to punch some ruffian in the face (because he’s ogling my wife’s slutty neckline) but to climb up that hill.
All of which is a tl;dr introduction to what we (men) can do about getting older.
We can make life harder.
For me, that means regular fitness checks that ask the question “Can I still do this?” So it was time to return to the river.
I’d packed my 65L Osprey the night before, and was eyeing the pile of little extras I’d left out. Batteries, snacks, the sort of ‘little extras’ which guarantee I’ll never get my ultralight scout badge. I stuffed them in and hefted the pack into my car, too excited to play the game of grams.
I’m going camping!
Like all things ill-conceived, my midweek adventure was all last minute. “I might go camping tomorrow” I announced mildly to my wife. Anaesthetized by episode 98 of Love is Blind she muttered something about Alex not disclosing his dwarfism being a really bad idea, which I took to be a yes.
Fast-forward twelve hours and I am walking by headlamp along Faulconbridge Ridge Trail looking for the start of the Grose River Track. After an easy hour in my new Hoka hikers, I drop into wet sclerophyll forest and disappear from the world.
Shit gets real.
Most accounts of the Grose River Track don’t acknowledge the fitness level of the hiker/writer, but I am convinced that only elite athletes write tracknotes, because by the time I got to the bottom of the GRT I was absolutely effing #rekt.
And had lost half my bodyweight to leeches.
But mostly it was the shoes.
Hoka Kaha 3 GTX is a sloppy boot. There, I said it. Should have stuck with my tried-and-tested Salomons. If not for the rocky scrambles (jack-jumper ants, funnelwebs, brown snakes) I would have thrown the fuckers away and gone barefoot.
“Can I still do this?” had segued to a proper anxiety attack: “Can I climb back out in shoes this painful?”
At camp I was so fatigued and footsore that I had to doze in my hammock between tasks. It filled the afternoon nicely: collect firewood (nap), spot of fishing (nap), make dinner (nap), fiddle with camera settings in an effort to ‘stop water’ to capture whimsical riverscape (nap).
At 7pm I had a swim in a deep limpid pool, thinking about coffee and a tilt at night photography, but then (nap) didn’t wake until 7am the next day.
Semi-revived by the swim, an easy afternoon and excellent sleep, I slipped on my Hoka’s with trepidation. But luckily they proved better uphill. Now at least it was old muscles rather than new boots which were letting me down.
Climbing out, I stopped a lot.
It helped to divide the exfil into chunks bookmarked by familiar trail markers. The last cliff climb (stop), the forest glade (stop), the bracken hollow (stop), the antechinus’ treehouse (stop), and another stop where I recorded a lyrebird’s repertoire feeling stupidly pleased that it didn’t include the sound of passing cars, chainsaws or barking dogs.
“I can do this,” I realised.
Two hours after I left the river, I reached the trackhead. The remaining 5.4km walk out was a doddle. Climbing gratefully into my car, I felt a giddy pleasure in what I’d achieved. For two days, I had made my life one thousand percent more difficult than it needed to be.
And I survived.
While I have no way to rate against other 56 year old men, what I can do is rate myself against myself at 55.
So I say put aside the saying “The older you get, the better you were” and focus on the infinitely more statisfying conclusion that “Yes, I can still do this.”