What changes and what doesn’t?

The answer to the first is pretty clear – the whole aging thing: kid, teen, young adult, mid-life, senior. Different tasks in each phase, different challenges and joys.

But what of Bruce has stayed the same?

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I still need comfort, to be held lovingly by life. Today it often comes in the presence of a friend. Or in meditation. Or the covers pulled up to my chin at 3:00 pm.

When I was young, it was my teddy bear. I’d hold it to my heart and suck my thumb. I kept Teddy until its head fell off. I sucked my thumb until I was 11. I remember the groove that my teeth made.

Woh! As I wrote the last two paragraphs, I realized that I still have a teddy bear – Turner Brown. I wrote about hugging him a few days ago.

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I still need adventure. Back then, I roamed the back alleys of my neighbourhood in Toronto, wearing my toy guns, searching for “bad guys”.

Today the adventures are still alive …

Writing this blog (feeling the words come unbidden)

Conversations with dear ones about what’s real (times of immense contact with human beings)

Being overwhelmed with the beauty of the moment (seeing the hearts of people walking in the street)

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I still need to make music. In the early 1960s, I bought my first record album – The Buddy Holly Story. My parents bought me a little turntable. I stole a wooden spoon from the kitchen and rushed upstairs to my bedroom. Out of my mouth and onto the spoon came the song …

If you knew Peggy Sue

Then you’d know why I feel blue

About Peggy, ’bout Peggy Sue

Well, I love you gal

Yes, I love you Peggy Sue

Today I sing at open mic sessions in a little café. The words still have to flow from my mouth.

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The kid is still here