In some ways I have never been better. I am comfortable in my own skin, though the bones and muscles beneath it increasingly demand attention. I have few distractions, and the voice in my head has grown kinder, more accepting of life's perils, having been tossed about and bested on more than one occasion.

I love the gaze of my teachers as I use a poet's voice to frame the Buddha's path as Thich Nhat Hanh, whom his students called Tay, teacher, would have.

He died on the 22nd of January; my Norma on the 17th, the same day my mother passed seventeen years before. I smile and say, "Thich didn't want to live in a world without Norma and followed her into the Bardo."

From this new vantage, with quiet mind and more patient eye, I see the gauntlet that age sets out and question not the journey's merit but the wisest path to follow.

In the past, this would be the moment I'd stand befuddled by the choices to be made, and I would turn to her as she had turned to me, and together we would wrestle it to the ground, or, more often than not, close our eyes and throw the dart.

We would wake to find what karma and chance had wrought. And now, hearing only the echo of my own voice, I question not the distance but the direction.

With intentions to contribute to Tikkun Olam, and at the very least to do no harm, I set one foot in front of the other along the Middle Way.