I woke up this morning overwhelmed with grief … at being old.  Hours later, I’m in Izy Coffee and Bryan Adams is singing “Cuts Like A Knife”.  Yes, that fits.

In bed I felt into the aspects of my life that are touched by this despair, by being 76.  I won’t go there with my words.  I will face the sadness and walk towards it.  In its own time, it will leave.

I’ve mentioned my grief face-to-face with four people this morning.  They’re kind folks.  Each of them searched for something to say that would make me feel better.  I understand, but that’s not what I need right now.  I need to express what is true.  I need to feel the flood inundating me, and in some strange way to welcome it.  The journey is long … we humans get to experience it all.

A wise woman named Barbara Marx Hubbard asked us before her death to reframe “becoming old” as “becoming new”.  My mind senses the truth of that but the recommendation feels so far away right now.

A few minutes back, I asked myself if I was swimming in “Poor Me”.  The answer came back “No”.  Something deeper, something universal, has taken me.

Three hours ago, my Music Theory class started at the Poel school.  I dreaded going.  And the amazing thing was that I was able to focus into the precise thinking of rhythms, the intervals between notes in both the treble and bass clef, and the major and minor key signatures.  “How is this possible?” I uttered to myself as the black continued to descend.  I don’t know the answer to that question.

All these rapid-fire tasks were expressed in Dutch, where the key of Ab Major is known to my mind but “la mol groot” is in the realm of “Huh?”

Now it’s cappuccino time, and there are specks of white in the black.  I have no idea why I’m smiling.

And so I am immersed in the Mystery

I’ve just spent an hour sitting with Leslie and John from Colorado in the USA.  They live on a mountain surrounded by forest, with their nearest neighbour a kilometre away.  So far from my home on the Oudburg, with its flurry of restaurants and bars.

We’re all in our 70s … and all loving life.  Our conversation flowed among the peaks and valleys of living in the world.  It was a delight.

John’s American football career brought me back to a skinny, 115-pound, acne-covered teen.  I know him well.

It was Grade 9 in 1962, the first year of high school.  I wanted to play football, and was accepted onto the Bantam team.  The Junior team was Grade 10s and 11s, the Senior was Grade 12s and 13s.

During one practice after school, the coach (in his dubious wisdom) decided to have the Bantams scrimmage against the Seniors.  For those of you who know the sport, we young-uns were on defense.  I was middle linebacker. The quarterback across the line of scrimmage called a draw play.  This massive fullback got the ball and ran straight ahead.  Our defensive linemen were brushed aside, and the giant was sprinting right at  …

Me!

Oh, God.

What happened, you ask?  Did I make an heroic tackle, à la David and Goliath?  Was I crushed underfoot?  Did a teammate rush to my rescue?

No

I ran away

(Sigh)

I don’t remember what happened next, how people reacted to me.  Thank God.

***

Isn’t it lovely how one image flows to the next?  Step back only a few months … June of Grade 8, the last year of my time at Bedford Park Public School.

It was Track and Field Day, a celebration of the body (at least for some of us).  Still in the realm of dubious wisdom, the teachers decided it would be fun to have a 100-yard race featuring all of the Grade 7 and 8 students.  If there were three classes of kids in each grade, with 30 of us per class, that would have been 180 would-be-athletes in a long line.  (We had a very large schoolyard.)

The gun went off.  I sprinted, at least my version of the word.  I gave everything.

And I came …

Last

Once again, the mercies of memory have erased what followed.  I can imagine …

Every Grade 7 girl beat you, Bruce!

Yuck.

John, Louise and I laughed at my foibles

They have a few themselves

We human beings are so … human

Here you see the meditation hall at the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts, USA.

Since 2010 it’s been a home for me, offering the teachings of the Buddha.  I’ve been to several week-long silent retreats, and two that were for three months.

In the fall of 2022, I attended what I thought was my last IMS retreat, since I was about to move to Belgium.  I said goodbye to all my favourite spots, inside the building and out in the open air.

A few days ago, I felt the pull to return.

I looked at the IMS schedule and found this for August, 2025: The Sure Heart’s Release: Insight and Metta Retreat.  “Metta” means lovingkindness, also a lovely word.

We’ll explore the steps laid out by the Buddha that lead to the sure heart’s release: the purification of conduct, the purification of mind through concentration and insight, the understanding of absolute and conventional reality, and the stages of insight that lead to nibbana (liberation).

Held in Noble Silence, the course will include instructions for sitting and walking meditations, teacher talks and guided lovingkindness meditations, Q&A, and group and individual practice discussions with the teachers.  Instructions will include the four foundations of mindfulness, with emphasis on the relaxed practice of mindfulness of mind.

I want to go home. 

I want to silently love the other 50 or 80 participants, although I won’t be talking to them (except for the very beginning and end of the retreat).

And I want to stand in a particular spot.  The IMS building is a former Catholic monastery.  There’s a stained-glass window that long ago entered my soul.  The disciple John is gazing lovingly at Jesus, and touching him.

So many times I’ve stood in front of this image and bowed to the love.  During all my retreats except the last one I chose to not take a photo of the window.  But when I was experiencing last time in 2022, I gave in.

During the summer of 2023, I took the train from Belgium to London.  In a pub a fellow stole my phone … and all my pictures.  I hadn’t backed them up.

John and Jesus disappeared

I want them back

***

In the Evolutionary Collective, we touch each other with eyes and words.  Both will be missing at IMS.  But the touching will continue …

If I go

I sat in Izy Coffee yesterday morning and watched a dad with his 12-year-old daughter.  They were both on their phones but there was a tiny line of light joining their faces.

At one point, the girl rushed over to dad to show him an image on her screen.  She leaned over with a hand on his shoulder.  His was on her waist.  I smiled … and sighed.

Jody and I decided long, long ago to not have any kids.  We would travel instead.  It’s one of the few things I regret.

I have a friend who’s in her mid-twenties … Lopke Bruylandt.  The only challenge I have with Lopke is pronouncing her last name.  Her first name is easier (Lōp-kuh).

We talk easily, roaming around topics of the heart.  When I meet someone, I want them to say what’s important to them, and to tell me stories from their life.  Lopke does that, and she’s curious about what moves me.  Our conversations are curved – no straight lines, no sharp edges.

We met months ago at a “Talking Donkeys” open mic session at Minard.  I had sung and Lopke came up to me with words of appreciation.

A week ago I said to Lopke “Oh, I wish I had a daughter!”

She replied “I’ll be your daughter.”

My mind wouldn’t let those words land … and we drifted on to the next exploration of life.

But later, maybe days later, Lopke’s words were scattering my brain cells, splattering me on the sidewalk of my mind.  I was stopped.  I was stunned.  Me?  A father?  At 76?

Lopke is young and pretty.  Thoughts of sexuality come easily to me.  But those thoughts are outshined by other words:

My daughter

My child

Father

Dad

Oh … the immensity of this.  Revering a woman who somehow “comes from me”.  Wanting her to be supremely happy.  Cheering her on as she creates her life.  Knowing I would fall under a bus to prevent her from doing so.

I tried out these words with Lopke:

“You are my daughter”

I started shaking.  My eyes were flooded with something growing.  It was an unknown and blessed world.

And as for the sexuality?  Next lifetime.

***

I have an image of Lopke’s wedding day, if she chooses to marry.  I get to walk her down the aisle towards her beloved.  The thing is, Lopke has a real dad whom she loves very much.  If the day comes, that walk will be his pleasure.

I just reread the last paragraph.  Perhaps Lopke’s father and I are both “real” dads.

Love is love

It happened two days ago but the feeling lingers.  I wonder what it means … perhaps nothing.

My dear wife Jody died at 54.  My dear friend Jo died at 70.  And here I am – in a new country with new friends, immersed in the Belgian cycling culture … and still waking up every morning.

I cherish the days when there’s nothing physically wrong with me.  How strange that sounds.

I cherish this, sitting in Izy Coffee writing my daily blog.  Jetpack tells me that I’ve tapped out a post for 132 days in a row.  I’m allowed a “Wow!” about that.

I’m singing at open mic sessions, I’m struggling to become a true cellist, and I’m meditating.

Plus The Evolutionary Collective is a family to me.  I love our meetings on Zoom.

In Dutch, alles is goed

***

I remember photos on school walls of students who died so young.  I remember a loved colleague at Lethbridge Community College who was killed in a car accident in her early 20s.  I remember a fellow life insurance agent at The Mutual Group who committed suicide, age 32.

And I’m still waking up every morning.

My friend Lydia insists I will live till age 104.  I’m willing.  Maybe I should get a start on things and buy my walker and anti-dementia pills now.

Or … I can keep flying, keep loving, keep smiling.

I prefer Door #2

A phone call this morning … and an invitation.  My friends Chris and Marie-paule were in Gent and wanted to go for coffee.

“Yes!”

We sat upstairs at Panos Langemunt.  I tried to pay with my Basic-Fit membership card but Chris was too fast for me.

We talked about the challenges in families when mom and dad no longer love each other.  So sad.

Then somehow the conversation moved to meditation.  I remember now – Marie-paule asked what I do during my days.  I’ve meditated for 17 years.  My friends wanted to try it.  I gave them simple advice for starting: watch the rhythm of inbreath and outbreath, and let the inevitable thoughts be there. 

How about if I meditate for five minutes while you two keep talking?  I’ll hear everything you say and it’s unlikely to distract me.  Unless you yell!

So I did.

As I sipped my cappuccino afterwards, I wondered whether to share with these newbies what has emerged for me in meditation over the last year.

“How can they possibly have the ears to hear?” I thought.  Is it fair to their minds to paint a picture which would be foreign to them? 

But then I felt my own need … to tell someone what I was experiencing.  So words bubbled up:

Usually my mind goes quiet quickly.  I welcome as friends the thoughts that come.  Almost always there emerges a soft and slow throbbing in my eyes.  It’s gentle.

It used to be that it took twenty minutes or so for the throbbing to disappear.  What is left is stillness, no movement at all, a tiny horizontal line.

Recently the twenty minutes has become more like ten.  Only when a thought intrudes does the emptiness move back to throbbing.  If I’m at peace with the thought, it floats away, allowing the stillness to return.

It’s rare for the supreme quiet to not come at all.

***

I spoke.  They listened

Did they get it?

I don’t know

But I said the truth

Let’s just say this isn’t my usual writing style.  I speak of heart matters when I write here.  But for the last few weeks I’ve had another audience: Belgium Immigration.

Every year, from February, 2023 to February, 2027, I have to prove to Belgium that I’m a good person to live here.  If Immigration likes what I write, and the documents I provide, I get to stay.

So I’m focusing on detail, and on saying things in a way that an Immigration official will understand.  Precision, please.

In the paragraph above, “CPP” stands for Canada Pension Plan, one of the three pensions I receive.  Belgium needs to know  that I won’t become a financial burden on the country.

Yesterday I sent ten e-mails to my lawyer Amira, each with attachments.  My “Visa Renewal Notes” file guides Amira and the government through the information I’ve sent.  If she doesn’t think that a certain sentence will “fly” with Belgium, she’ll ask me to revise it.  “Speak to your audience.”

I’m proud that I’ve accomplished this.  Well, 95% accomplished.  I await two documents from the Government of Canada, coming by physical mail.

I’m a determined human being.  I will get the job done, with correct grammar and spelling.  I will stay in Gent (my home) until I die.

Speaking of which, today is my birthday … 76 years on the planet.  I intend to make good use of my visa for the next 20.

There’s a lot of life to discover

I’m fresh from my Music Theory class at the Poel school.  The teacher introduces concepts that feel beyond my awareness.  I stare at the white board, often lost.  I look at my classmates and sometimes they too shake their heads.  Plus for me the teaching is in a language that skirts around the edges of my knowing.

And all of that is okay.  I’m home in Gent.  I’m where I want to be.

After class, my fellow student Jan talks to me about ChatGPT, the AI site that will answer every question under the sun.  Jan suggests the app will help me with incomprehensible Dutch.

We were still in the classroom and Jan took a photo of a picture on the wall, showing two women.  Then he talked to ChatGPT: “Make up a story about these two people.”  Thirty seconds later … voilà!  A story of several paragraphs.  I was shocked.  Has technology really left me this far behind?!

And here’s the kicker: Jan asked ChatGPT to change the wording of the story as if William Shakespeare had written it …

Lo and behold, there appeared a new version, festooned with words such as “betwixt”, “o’er” and “mirthful”.  Huh?

I remain astounded.

***

Today also brought other wonders:

1.  As I sat in The Cobbler for breakfast, I watched my server Sévrine carefully choose little pieces of red currant, blueberry, apple, pineapple and grape for my little jar of wonders.  There was such care in her hands.

2.  I walked into Panos on Langemunt and said to Eric “I’d like to speak to someone more intelligent than me.”  To which he responded “Of course, how may I help you?” 

Yes!

That’s what I’ve been waiting to hear

3.  I waved and smiled at Paul from the street as he worked inside The Press Shop.  He did the same.  How simple and profound … “I see you.”

***

And so my day unfolds

Magical in the telling

I just had a fine conversation with Paul, who manages The Press Shop on the Langemunt.  He talked about a friend of his who does good works anonymously.  The fellow’s kindness made me smile.

I turned to leave with a wave goodbye.  And I walked into the street.  A minute later I noticed that the smile was still there.  Lovely.

Now I’m in Izy Coffee, cuddling my cappuccino with a dash of cinnamon syrup … thinking.  How one moment gracefully bleeds into the next.

I wonder if it’s all cumulative, if the sweetness keeps building through the day if our hearts are open.  And … can the world feel what emanates from me when I’m swimming in goodness?  For most people passing my way, the answer is probably “No”.  But there are a few human beings who see me.  I’ll hang around with them.

Is Paul still with me as I look out at the world through the big windows of Izy?  Yes.  Will I carry the warmth of Izy and the smile of Paul as I head home soon to work on my visa renewal application?  Yes again.  So my morning moments will help me continue to live in Belgium.

***

The events of my day aren’t contained in boxes

They flow from one to the next in the heights of the air

Mud dominated the cyclocross races yesterday but there was so much more … people, for instance.

1.  On the train from Gent, I researched how I was going to get from the Dendermonde station to the race.  I could take a bus for awhile and then an hour’s walk.  Not the greatest, but so what?  I was going to watch my heroes give everything.

I heard some young men talking about “Wout” in Dutch.  I approached them and asked how they were getting to the race site.  English smiles came my way … “Come with us!  We’ll show you.”  No generation gap here.

2.  When the bus arrived at the station, we crammed in.  Most of us were standing, with scarcely room to breathe.  I looked past the standers to three men.  They took up two two-seaters.  Their backpacks were piled on the fourth seat.  I watched them talk merrily away, apparently unaware (or unconcerned) about the press of humanity standing.  I sighed … sadly.

3.  Google Maps had given me the wrong info.  Turns out the walk after bus was thirty minutes or so.  Yay!  It was me and a flood of cycling fans.  The humbling news was that hundreds of them passed me on that half-hour walk.  “Oh well,” I muttered.  “I’m still a happy human being.”

I did pass one person.  He was limping.  I made sure to say “Goedemiddag” (Good afternoon).  He smiled.

4.  During the men’s race, I could tell when Wout van Aert was approaching.  The murmur of the crowd became a crescendo.  Then it exploded in raucous decibels as Wout rode by my spot.  What a rush!  The man is an icon in Belgium as Maurice “Rocket” Richard used to be in Canadian ice hockey … revered.

5.  The funnest spots to stand during a race are on a hill, where you see the athletes grunting upwards, near the end of their reserves.  Sadly for spectators like me, that’s also where the footing is uphill or sidehill.  Yesterday I knew that me standing for hours hurts a lot, and if I add a tilt to that, I’ll never last.  So I chose a flat bit of ground to call home … and ignored the Bruce protests about advancing age. 

And so I had fun.

And isn’t that what we’re all supposed to be doing?