It's just the Way of the World.

As I keep telling my daughters, and as my father used to say to me (accurately, as it sadly turned out), at the rate I see my diasporic children, I may only see them a few more times before I die.
Or more likely, in my case, before I slide quietly from mild to severe cognitive impairment.

But, to quote John Martin, that's just the way of the world.
Children grow up, leave their childhood home, and make lives and families of their own.


I saw my GP yesterday to get the necessary injections to avoid giving my granddaughter whooping cough or influenza, and happened to mention to him, in response to a token enquiry about my well-being, that I was as fit as a mallee bull apart from my powers of recall, which were not quite as legendary as they had formerly had been.

He promptly gave me a pathology referral for, amongst other things, syphilis antibodies and HIV serology.
He must have mistaken me for Freddie (perfectly understandable).


So I've got this referral for syphilis testing with "worsening memory" written in the Clinical Notes section, and I'm thinking: "Shit. There goes my chances with that nice little receptionist in Pathology."

(I forgot to get the tests done.)