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Angell in Winter

Edgy MD
Apr 19 2014 08:33 AM

An astounding essay from Roger Angell about the being 93, happy to have whatever health he has left, and finding the humor and grace to ignore the constant winding down of his clock.

I’m not dead and not yet mindless in a reliable upstate facility. Decline and disaster impend, but my thoughts don’t linger there. It shouldn’t surprise me if at this time next week I’m surrounded by family, gathered on short notice—they’re sad and shocked but also a little pissed off to be here—to help decide, after what’s happened, what’s to be done with me now. It must be this hovering knowledge, that two-ton safe swaying on a frayed rope just over my head, that makes everyone so glad to see me again. “How great you’re looking! Wow, tell me your secret!” they kindly cry when they happen upon me crossing the street or exiting a dinghy or departing an X-ray room, while the little balloon over their heads reads, “Holy shit—he’s still vertical!”


Not a baseball essay at all, but of course Candy Cummings appears by paragraph two.