Mid-life Crisis Veteran

Blog Post: Mid-life Crisis Veteran

I am preaching Sunday at the Roseville Church and was going through some old files looking for a sermon I am sure I wrote up at one point. I didn’t find it, but I did run across a letter I had written for the Opinion page of the Tallahassee Democrat on Thursday, September 23, 1982, thirty-eight years ago. Thought I’d share it:

It is titled “Midlife Crisis Veteran”.

I am 40 years old and an expert on midlife crisis. I had my first one at 18 and have had one every year and a half since. During that time I have wanted to be a doctor, a lawyer, short order cook, an entrepreneur, an emergency medical technician, a Marine Corps pilot, an FBI agent, an inventor, a computer genius, a high school social studies teacher, a large animal vet, a U.S. Senator, the Secretary of Health and Rehabilitative Services, a bunch of things I have forgotten, and a few I don't care to mention in a public forum.

I think that the most significant one was about 4 years back when I came to grips with the fact that all the gold in California is in a bank in the middle of Beverly Hills in somebody else’s name. I have no reason to believe that the last half of my life will be any different from the first in this regard. 

The one stabilizing factor in my life through all this has been my conviction, as Paul expressed in his letter to the Christians at Rome, “that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” If you think that's a powerful saying you should read the rest of the letter.

David May

Mild Cognitive Impairment

In October of 2018, a year ago, I was diagnosed with “Mild Cognitive Impairment.” They figured that out after I was interviewed and tested by half a dozen people over about two and a half hours. The way I realize it is as if the link between my awareness and my very short-term memory is sporadic. What I recognize about it most often is this: as I am a part of a conversation and have a thought I want to share, by the time there is a break in conversation the thought is gone. It will often come back to me later, but by then the conversation has moved on.

And it is hard for me to multi-task. I can’t really pay attention to more than two things at a time and often only one. Charlene and I play a game while we eat. I can do that pretty well by alternating tasks, but only because when I leave one of the tasks and then come back to it, my next step is obvious (e.g. the next bite of food or my next turn of the game). I don’t have to remember where I was. 

Charlene can do that and play another game on her phone at the same time. That would get me in such trouble. I really cannot pay attention to a TV show and have a conversation or try to write or read something on my laptop at the same time.

Slightly longer-term memory is also affected. Charlene will mention a place where we ate, and I will have no recollection of it. If we go back there, the setting might be familiar or not, but just from her description there will be no memory.

They are going to retest me in about March 2020 to see if it is getting worse or staying the same. For it to get better is fairly unlikely. 

I was tested because I asked to be tested. I was noticing the symptoms. I do notice a lot of older folks who seem to have the same difficulties I do but who have not been tested. I suspect the impairment is a lot more common than the diagnosis. If you want to follow my progress, stay with me on this blog and I will try to keep you up to date.

How old are you?

Whenever I think of God, I like to remind myself that to Him a thousand years are like a day (2 Peter 3:8). Said in another way, God sees all time at the same time. That has the makings for a great sci-fi movie, doesn’t it?

It is not just that God can time travel, that He can go back to 1776 or jump ahead to 2076 on a whim. God is always at all points in time. He is always at the time and place of your birth, when and where you met your spouse, at the scene of all your sins, of all your hurts, and of all your good deeds.

I like to think of it as Him being in a parallel universe. He is right here, right now, just a little bit out of sight. Jeremiah (1:5) says He knew us before we were formed in our mother’s womb and, at least for Jeremiah, he had plans for Him. But He was not only there then, He is there now.

Yet God says over and over that He will remember our sins no more. The Hebrew writer quotes Jerimiah 31:34 twice. In Chapters 8 and 10 he quotes the Lord as saying, ‘I will remember their sins no more.” He is still there, but He doesn’t “remember” our sins. That is delightful!

And God has been with us throughout our entire lives – including however much of our life still lies ahead. We have heard touching stories of how close twins can be, but we have a friend who is “closer than a brother (Proverbs 18:24)”