The Old Man  
  

      It was morning.  A new day.  The sun rose, the stars faded, the sky turned blue from black.  In the big picture of things, the earth spun on its axis and time passed.  Life was conceived in places and passed on in others.  Another day that would turn inevitably into another night, endlessly. 

      She stood in her kitchen, looking out the window over the sink full of dishes.  Through the window and over the hills gulls played in the morning light.  White specks flocked and spiraled on the bright blue sky.  A little piece, a reminder, of the bigger universe, life, nature, mortality and time were all there in that view. 

      Her robe hung half open in the privacy of her own home.  She was thinking about work and her kids, oblivious to her semi nakedness.  The kids had left home for college.  There was no one around to see her, to focus her attention on her body, to observe her expression.  There was no "man in her life," no stranger peering from across the street and through the big pine tree in the front yard like happened a couple of months ago, no overnight guest sitting at the table sipping coffee and chatting while she readied herself for work. 

      Later that day, at work, she sat at her desk and stared at the stack of files and papers that had to be packed away before leaving for the weekend visit to the old man's house.  She daydreamed about the coming weekend.  "What shall I wear .... its the first time we'll be together alone ... will he like me  ... what'll we talk about ... does he expect sex ... what'll I do .... how will I get my work done ..." she muddled through the papers. 

      She was glad she was going to visit him, the old man.  She hadn't been out of town for weeks.  "He's almost twice my age" papers flying across the desk top into ordered piles "we've become friends ... now what ... why complicate things .... what am I looking for ... escaping boredom, being alone ... comfort ... recognition and trust and communication."  She had met him through a friend, her best buddy at work. 

      Her buddy was a tallish thin middle aged man, like her, living a single life but wanting something more, at least every once in awhile.  They bantered back and forth across their desk tops as they plowed through the paper work each day; breaking the monotony of office life. Her friend had invited his father, his "old man," to the office a couple of times, "to break the old man's routine and get him out to meet and talk with people." 
  
      Her associate had introduced her to his father during those office visits, unsuspecting she would end up running into his father every once in awhile at the grocery store or on the street and end up developing a more personal relationship.  They had first talked at any length at an office Christmas party. 

      The old man was an artist in his retirement years, painting pictures of trees and the stream by his cabin-studio out in the coastal mountains.  She also painted a little and they ended up resonating and talking about their likes and dislikes, people, the past, how they felt, life, relationship issues, all the common stuff people like to mull over with each other. 

      The relationship was purely friendly, verbal and mental in its dimensions as opposed to anything physical, at first; even though she could feel his gaze when he surveyed her body with his eyes.  As the meetings went on they became more familiar and he invited her to visit, to meet together out at his cabin home.  It was a couple of hours from the town where she lived alone in the house she'd bought with the divorce settlement. 

      She had experienced a few relations with younger men or other middle aged men since the divorce but they were either too needy, or just wanted sex, or weren't compatible for one reason or another.  The old man filled an empty spot, a longing for some kind of recognition, security, comfort, unspoken or unspeakable motivations that were at the core of her being; the seed of desire or need that propelled her out of herself periodically to relate to someone at a more physical, intimate level.  There was always the vague hope that somehow life would all be fine, time would pass without pain and life would be full of joy and love. 

      She heard the old man's offer to visit and at first dismissed it, but over time decided to take him up on the offer.  It was a more or less intellectual decision.  She could use someone to talk to and relieve the isolation and boredom.  "I wonder how far this will go," she thought in the back of her mind, while she was calling him to get directions.  She was sure he would want her to visit, but wondered whether he would sidestep the whole thing.  She also felt that kind of anticipation and anxiety, that special kind of energy, when a relationship is developing to a more intimate and, possibly, physical, sensual level.  At the same time, her mind was indifferent; probably, she thought, out of a defensive reactiveness more than anything else, to the imminent potential of a sensual relation with him; something that could mean a radical change in their friendship. 

      She had called him a few days earlier.  After he answered the phone and heard her offer to visit he talked for a few minutes about the stream by the cabin and how they could walk around and eat dinner together.  He didn't say anything about staying the night.  It was clearly a possibility; actually it was inevitable, since it was a couple of hours drive to get there and it would be late if she spent the evening and then drove all the way back to town.  She was relieved by his chatter and still a little hesitant about it all.  Ultimately, he told her he was delighted to hear that she would visit.  She really knew inside he would be; even though her lack of self confidence and the experience of many past disappointments wouldn't let her trust and assume he would respond as he did.  She thanked him for the chance to take a break and get away from it all and hung up the phone, relieved that this part of it was over. 

      Finally, the last hour passed before she could leave work and drive out the coast road to the old man's place.   "Oh well ... just see where it all goes ...." she thought as she finished up her work and got ready to go back home and pack up her things for the trip. 

 

 
  

      The road to the old man's forest, streamside studio home was winding and long.  There was a symmetry to the distance between the city and his home and the difference between the bustle of younger "age appropriate" friends, and sometimes lovers, and the old man's quiet solitary place and age.  He was in his mid 70s.  She in her mid 40s.  "He's old enough to be my father ..." she thought to herself, ".. but he's good to talk to and bounce off of ... he respects me, listens ... knows how to pay attention ... need that once in awhile to balance all the bullshit at work and being alone." 

      "He's my friend ...  maybe, a lover" she thought, for a moment, not dwelling on it.  Against the backdrop of periodic loneliness and the fallow moments of what might have been depression she experienced, he held a place of respect different from what she felt towards the more demanding younger men in her life.  They were potential mates, the old man wasn't.  "He's safe" she muttered to herself "or safer."  "He's definitely calmer, and that's a plus, difference ...  he's still kicking around in his 70s ... that gives me confidence I'm not too old yet, I've still got a lot of good years left ... God, I'm over 40 ... can you believe that .... what am I doing going out to his house to stay?" her mind wandered.  "Maybe I'll stay for more days than planned, more nights.  I'm tired, my body is tired ... I could use a break."  The anticipation of the unknown outcome, of his comforting potential enveloping her in his energy, made the drive pass easily.  She had never been involved with anyone that much older and wondered about age, and life, and time and what she would feel like when she got to the last years of her life. 

      Going over the mountain passes, the Pacific Ocean lay stretched out forever before her, in the hazy autumn light.  She drove intent on spending time alone with him, secreted away in the trees, responding to his feelings and thoughts; "in the privacy of his place by the stream" she thought.  "I do respect him ... that's a plus ...  I can indulge him a bit without being afraid of competition or bickering.  Its not just the physical tension, the anticipation ... its more, important ... definitely deeper, soulful ... commingling of emotions thoughts, feelings, reminiscences — inner life, being."  Just meeting an older man, because of the difference in ages, was something new for her.  "It feels like making love when all I'm doing is just talking with someone who is so much older than me," her mind wandered around inside her head, straying from the ocean view and the potentially overwhelming natural beauty of the coast. 

      "Coming together ... two people separated by 30 years or more ... slowly, tentatively coming together, back and forth banter ... insights ... a few laughs ... we get along pretty well, I guess ... surfaces to inner reflections and back to the surfaces ... he is getting ever deeper into my private emotional space and ... my body is reacting at some kind of level ... I guess."  She rode down the coast highway for a few miles running next to the beach and waves in the afternoon light and incoming wind.  Her thoughts were silhouetted by the colors and the sound of the wind, the high hills on one side and the pounding surf on the other.  Eventually she turned up inland and the ocean disappeared behind her. 

      The anticipation she felt was deep and slow, appropriate for the difference in their ages, respectful, cautious, but still visceral and piercing, like good sex with younger men but "better" she said to herself.  "If something does happen .... will it be better because of his calm, his age? ... what's it like to be with an older man?  What's he expect, what's he like when we're not out in public?"  She remembered him talking about his isolation and sometimes loneliness.  He had confessed to her that he really wanted an older woman to relate to, to love and be loved, but hadn't found one; how he missed the fondling and sleeping with someone laying beside him.  So she would be a placeholder for him, too, maybe.  They would reciprocate in their separateness, reciprocate in respect and attentiveness. 
 

      She rolled up to the parking area, hidden in the trees.  She got out and took a deep breath of the clean forest air, stretched and looked around.  There were birds, and she could hear the stream.  It was autumn, the leaves hadn't changed color yet.  The trees were full.  She took another breath and was anxious and relieved to be there. 

      She headed towards the bridge to the old man's house.  It was on the bridge that for the first time she felt really good about visiting the old man.  There was something about the quiet, the sound of the stream flowing beneath her, the birds and the richness of the solitude of nature that carried her into the presence of this place; that made her feel really good about coming to see the old man, making herself available, like she was part of the natural order of the place, of time passing as they both lived out their lives. 

      When she walked down the path by the stream, like he'd told her to do, she saw him in the distance.  Like an old book, the smooth leather bindings worn and age softened, the old man sat resting in the corner of his studio looking out on the trees and the stream that ran beside it.  Looking at him in the light that flooded in through the walls of windows soothed her almost unnoticed fear.  "I'm really here ... this is a really nice place, like he said it was ... he's honest, I guess" she thought to herself before calling out to him.  Her voice carried through the air and the old man, startled, looked up, stood and smiled and waved her on. 

      He'd heard her pull up, through the trees the sound of the wheels in the gravel parking area echoed.  He went outside and sat, wondering what he was doing with her there.  After all these years, a woman in his place.  "Will we sleep together?"  He wondered.  What should he say, how should he act.  He went outside, to sit and think before she finally arrived.  He saw her coming through the trees and turned away.  Letting her watch him and trying to feel her mood.  His anticipation was intense for the first time, making him nervous.  She really did come to see him, he really was going to have a woman at his house, his cabin studio in the woods.  His mind rambled as he posed by the cabin, in the semi shade and waited. 

      She walked down the path towards him, he could see her now and knew they would touch, sometime, before she would leave.   He rose to greet her, feeling her nearing.  

      They hugged and he showed her around the studio.  They sat near each other in chairs he had made himself from twisted tree limbs, felled by the winter's winds.  The light sifted by the forest leaves washed the wrinkles and shadows from his face and hands as they talked, leveling the difference between her age and his.  They were coming together, relaxing, getting settled into the time and space they had taken, created for themselves to be alone together. 

      She found herself reacting to him without the kind of tension that enveloped her in the presence of younger men.  She was able to understand him, keep up with his rhythms, with a deep penetrating pleasure and without a sense of betrayal of her own significance.  She was pleasing him just by being there, he was happy just to have someone, a woman, to talk to.  A kind of deference to his age made it more relaxing to follow his topic, for awhile, before revealing herself, her own inner thoughts.  They were coming closer and he offered her wine and they smoked together, becoming even more peaceful and attentive. 

      Time was slower, little things were of less consequence, yet pleasurable.  Inside the old man's world time took on different proportions; actions required less premeditation.  "His feelings are less frightening, more comfortable ... easier to deal with" she reflected, stretching out on the futon sofa beneath a painting of the stream and next to the wood stove that was warming the early evening air.  She could hear the stream and the canopy of leaves enveloping the studio filled its many windows and skylights with green.  There was a slight breeze, come all the way from the coast, freshening the cabin and clearing the smell of wood smoke that sometimes backed up in the flue and puffed out the front of the stove when a particularly strong gust came barreling down the river valley shoving the smoke back down the chimney. 

      "Especially him, this old man I can get along with" she continued down the path of rambling inner conversation with herself "an artist at heart, with the attentive wisdom of mellowed desires ... His gaze is getting softer when he looks at me or off into the distance while he talks ... when he looks at me he is seeing, it's hitting deeper and home more .... my body is tired .... wonder if he minds me stretching out like this" she thought, rolling over on her back so that her head was propped up by a pillow and her chest rose and fell with her breathing.  "He's looking at me ... I wonder if I should ask him to rub my shoulders and neck ... what would happen if I did? ... what'll he expect?" 

      His gaze, she knew was penetrating beyond her clothes, every once in awhile, while they talked.  She knew his familiarity with her, could feel his awareness of her curves and shapes.  "He's already been through middle age, married to a woman and watched the changes ... the wrinkles, the sagging breasts ... could he sense her, does he feel the warming in my abdomen?" she wondered. 

      While they talked, she heard that the loss of his first wife was traumatic for the old man.  She felt his sense of separation and loss.  She also sensed his anticipation of coming closer to her now, in the present, she felt his touch in his voice and their togetherness.  She had been hurt and had lost too.  They understood each other.  The sensual communication, backdrop, was an extra, developing as the evening approached and day light passed, a very enjoyable extra.  It was time now for her to directly deal with whether she would stay the night.  She wondered if he would make advances to that end.  The light matched the mood as the sun waned.  They decided to take a walk before it got too dark; skirting the issue of sleep and beds and nakedness. 

      The sounds of the stream and birds filled the gaps in their conversation.  They moved through the trees, he showed her his place, its dimensions, and exposed his very being to her and she hers to him.  They were just people, simple, basic people seeking companionship, communication, relation, all those things that one way or another almost all of us know. 

      What he revealed of his present and past was matched by her, what he revealed of this forest retreat was matched by her feminine exposure of her feelings and self.  They held hands, after they accidently brushed together a couple of times, as they walked back to the old man's studio.  She was making herself more and more available, and was letting him know this, as he shared his place with her.  When they returned they ate rice and vegetables he had cooked up for them earlier that day; she relaxed and lay back on the futon again. 
 

      It wasn't just a matter of the length of time she was spending there, with him, that made her feel relaxed, it was the quiet certitude with which they were approaching exposing their bodies to each other's gaze and touch.  Little felt like it needed to be held back between the two of them as the time passed, the conversation exposing their inner thoughts and feelings to each other.  "I like talking with him, he listens well" she heard herself think as the candlelight, wine and the sound of the stream blended together into a quiet glow, mirroring the dusky light sifting through the trees.  Somewhere, far away from the streamside hideaway, out over the Pacific Ocean the sun was setting. 

      As the evening drew on, time rolled up and down the cabin walls, now lit from the inside by candle and kerosene lamp.  The light flickered, tentative and softening.  The room was full of him and she rode the subtle waves of feelings he invoked, wondering where she would sleep "since I'm obviously not going home tonight .... is he feeling like me ...  its time for bed or something more relaxing."  The smoke and wine, the conversation and the quiet with the old man made her feel close to him, comfortable and warm. 

      It would be easy now to just go to sleep, but she could feel the desire inside for his naked closeness, intimacy, more connection.  The anticipation was focusing, not because she thought about it, but because it was right, it was appropriate to the time of night, to the soft light reflecting off his skin, to his eyes looking into her and feeling her,  inside.  When he finally got up and asked her if she wanted to stay the night she was relieved.  The anticipation blossomed into a sensual openness, a lethargic fullness permeated her; triggered by the peace his age, their familiarity, the setting engendered.  At this point she just assumed they would sleep together and she lay there getting ready to eliminate the clothes that separated her naked woman's body from his view. 

      She rose, aroused some in her body, anticipating and wondering what would happen next.  She could feel her body, her breasts swayed.  She could feel him looking at her.  She could feel and see herself in his gaze, his eyes taking her in.  She was anxious ... "will he want me, will he like the way I look, what will he do next, what will he be like ... what does he expect .... will I satisfy him, will he satisfy me ... who cares," she thought at the very back of her mind. 

      As she removed her clothes, first revealing her torso as the blouse and bra fell to the floor, her nipples contracted from his gaze.  She felt her nakedness, exposed, and voluptuous in the candle light.  She removed the rest of her clothes and her nakedness felt both good and a little awkward ... "we should have done this a lot earlier" flashed in her mind "it feels good ... what is he doing " she looked at him "how is he feeling" she thought, as she walked towards the bed in front of him, letting him witness her naked fullness, a female body in his house, maybe for the first time in years, ready and available to pleasure him as they would choose through the night. 

      She slid into the bed between the sheets that were cool from forest night air.  He undressed in the candle light.  For the first time since taking off her clothes she very definitely and openly returned his gaze, as he hung his pants up by the wood stove, and by doing so she invited him to her. 

      He climbed into the bed and they entwined, her breasts rubbed against him all over she felt the age and a sensual energy in his masculine body.  As his hands discovered her she held his penis and massaged it towards erection.  She wasn't really thinking anymore, but feeling him physically caressing her, attending to her, experiencing her and she wondered if he was comfortable, happy, as relaxed in his arousal as she was becoming in hers.  She reveled in giving him pleasure, she looked for ways to make him more aroused, more happy, more full.  Her mind was lost in the experience of his individuality, his age, his sensuousness.  He felt her nipples and she felt their sensuousness, tingling, like a wind he was calling up in her.  He kissed and caressed her body and she his.  Gently she opened her legs wider, as her abdomen responded to his presence, and he felt between them.  She urged him on as she kneaded his fingers with her flesh in response to his touch. 

      By each stroke of her hands, with each kiss on his body and breath on his chest, she encouraged him to go further, to engage with her, to lose himself in pleasure — to become young again, entwined in sensuousness with her.  Her pelvis pulsed and moved.  She gave him herself and the difference in their ages was like a song.  His now erect penis brushed against her and she held him while he explored her private places, like she had his, with loving certitude.  She turned her head and watching his face kissed his stomach and slowly caressed his erection with her lips, eventually holding him in her mouth and feeling its softness and shape with her tongue.  He was stroking her and together they rolled and hugged, and passed the time.  Comforting each other, taking the sting out of their aloneness, for the moment. 

      Their passions were simultaneous; resonating by contrast with the previous experiences they had had with other lovers.  "It is so easy to be with him ... he feels safe" she thought as he pressed his fingers deeper inside of her.  She was younger and this made him feel full and reminded him of his more youthful, energetic years.  Sex was more athletic then, when he was younger, a race, a challenge, a sometimes fearful job.  She was middle aged and he facing the end of his life.  His fingers were inside of her, she pressed against them, grasped them with her muscles, she kissed him. 

      The force of his erotic energy, his arousal made her feel younger than she was the rest of the time.  Her breasts were sagging, but he didn't really care or notice, they were there, available, to be held and kissed, to be rubbed; the pressure of his tongue on her nipples made her pelvis pulse and move rhythmically.  She stretched and the movement of her pelvis made him press on inside of her, caressing her inside and out.  He trailed his fingers over the folds of flesh and she felt her own excitement, was aware of it, focused on and  was carried by it as he touched her most private and sensitive places.  She had opened to him and was conscious of wanting to please him, when she wasn't lost in the sensations swelling in her own body. Over and over he touched her with the familiarity that comes with age and experience of another's body.  Their bodies were symbols, the difference in age made them larger than life.  She was still not sure she wanted him inside of her. 

      His skin was unexpectedly smooth, but pleasing, sensuous.  She could feel herself and she could feel him coming closer, but still they were separate.  He did not roll on top of her or bring her to orgasm, like younger men would have done.  He did not try to enter her, like she had wondered if he would try to do.  He was reflexive, aware of something she couldn't feel except to know it was there.  Abruptly he stopped.  It was very quiet, she could hear him breathing.  He didn't move.  They lay beside each other and she knew it was alright, through the regret, but worried it might be something she had done. 

      Finally, as the candle light dimmed along with her sensual feelings he explained that making love with her reminded him of being with his wife.  It wasn't clear why this should make him cease his sensitive and aggressive love making, but she knew that he would not make love any more, at least that night, with her.  Tired and now aware of her self, self conscious, she felt like leaving — for as inexplicable but compelling a reason as he had ceased making love.  She hugged him and explained she would drive back to town, made up some excuse, and he hugged her back before she dressed.  They hugged again before she left to walk down the path by moonlight and flashlight.  The stream burbled in the background, unseen.  The birds slept, except for the stream and a few leaves falling beneath the stars it was quiet. 

      The distance back to town and her bed was great, but she did not want to try sleeping all night next to him if they were not going to consummate their closeness; especially if he was lost in thoughts of his wife.  Maybe his reference to his wife made her feel like a daughter, instead of a lover, in any case by his reference she was clearly no longer herself, no longer present to him.  Something had become confused, his memories and longings had exchanged her for his old life.  The pages of the past and present had become commingled in his mind, and like an old book, laying open on the painting table outside the cabin door, the pages of his life fluttered before him all mixing together and he had lost her and returned to his past. 

      She saw him on a couple of occasions after that, they never really talked again.  There was an awkwardness, a kind of frustrated familiarity, a mutual desire to avoid going over the details of what happened.  She went out one time, to his place, to see if he wanted company.  It looked like he was still there but no one answered at the studio door.  She left her phone number on a piece of blue paper stuck under a painting on an easel that was set up in a sunny clearing near the stream.  He never called her back. 

      Maybe she will write him, one of these days — she is getting older too.  She wondered sometimes what it might have been like if they had spent the rest of the night together, or the next few days and nights; how would he have compared to the younger men, how strong would her feelings, attachment and desire to be with him have been.  Maybe it wasn't really his memory of his wife, maybe he was afraid of his age and not satisfying her, maybe he was afraid of her reactions.  Time goes on, she doesn't think about him very often, but when she does its always the good she remembers and not the disappointment or the long drive back to her reality, to her own private bed and life. 

      On the road back, by moonlight, the whole world was different.  For the first time since she set out to spend time with the old man she felt she was herself again.  She was alone.  It was a familiar feeling and she reflected on the events, got lost in remembering his face in the candle light and the sound of the stream.  

      She turned into her driveway and the engine stopped.  The lights off, she opened the front door to her own solitary place and took the first real steps towards the recognition of the coming of another day, another moment in her life that would invariably take her by surprise, and she slid off into a deep, dark and comfortable sleep while her body yearned for the old man to envelope her in love and lust and deep inside she missed the full feeling that could have been.  Through the kitchen window over the hills the stars hung in the now dark sky and nature and time and her mortality were all caught there ... for a moment ... in that view.