Providence wields a powerful, creative and, as time goes on, a cruel chisel.

Nature, to keep this reflection as secular as possible, is a Janus-faced force. In our young years, the mighty chisel it wields, composed, primarily, of genetics (nature) and environment (nurture), chips away maladaptive behaviors (if we are lucky) and sharpens the behaviors that are socially acceptable and that will bring us success. The tool deftly crafts the inherently self-interested and vain animal that is man and teaches the inner beast that drives us all to use reciprocal benevolence to advance both ourselves and our species. We learn, hopefully, that when we help others gets what they want, we will most likely receive assistance from others in obtaining what we want.

Nature’s chisel also works on our young bodies. It makes us strong in order for us to perform physical labor and sharpens our mind that we might think and reason. Since the work we do in our early years is, for most of us, often strenuous, nature gives its greatest strength and endurance to the young body. It makes our reflexes quick and our senses keen so that we might avoid danger and perform at our fullest capacity. Our minds mature under nature’s tools and we develop varying degrees of control over our emotions, our sex drives and our decision-making faculties. We are, in brief, socialized.

As we enter our "prime" - the years of what are usually our greatest productivity - we are well-tuned machines. Adaptive to change, malleable to social circumstances and with seemingly boundless energy, we are - between the ages of, let’ say, 21 and 45 - strong of both mind and body and well-prepared to face whatever the world may throw at us. We are as nature intended us to be: functional, productive and confident that we can defeat the obstacles that the vicissitudes of the world may lay in our path. We are unconquerable, invincible and "bullet-proof" - if only in our own eyes. The effectiveness of nature’s brainwashing of the truth is manifested in the foolish thrill-seeking of the young where risking life and limb is called "extreme sports" and is thought (at least, by those who participate in it) to be no more risky than walking up a flight of stairs or washing their car. After all, the bumps, bruises, lacerations and the occasional fracture will, eventually, heal. They are unbreakable.

But, as I mentioned at the outset, Mother Nature is a cruel mistress. She grants us many wonderful gifts in our early years and, as if to further taunt us, makes us believe we will always be thus: strong, supple, resilient and immune to decrepitude. We get regular glimpses of what can only be called genetic aberrations: men and women in the 70's and 80's (and beyond) completing physical feats that most teenagers or twenty-somethings can’t. Sub-three hour marathons, ascending 20,000 foot mountains, skydiving and all manner of physical endurance and strength in the aging Baby Boomers (and even their parents!) lend substance to the fantasy that youth, unlike love, endures. Sly, diabolical and, at times, downright vindictive, Mother Nature would have us believe that we will all live to be 100 years old and die, quietly in our sleep, after a day of 36 holes of golf and a night of raucous sex with our fourth wife who, though she is but 27, married us because she really and truly loved us and because "the sex was fantastic!".

I write these words with no small amount of anger and bitterness toward the Great Dame, Nature. I have lately watched what is more often the reality of her perverse scheme for "paying the piper" for the tunes we joyously danced to in our earlier years. Mother Nature - and I do not say the words with any trepidation or fear - you are a venomous and evil bitch. I hate you with every fiber of my being and with every ounce of passion in my soul. And, whatever you have planned for me, I don’t give it one thought or care. You have already done your worse to me. For you have declared unrelenting, merciless and cruel war on the one man whom I love more than life, itself, and show no signs of accepting surrender or granting leniency despite the agony he is forced to endure. For that, may you be damned for all eternity.

No one ever enjoyed life more than my father except, perhaps, Benjamin Franklin. And, for dad, it wasn’t the luxuries of fancy cars, fine wine, a grand house or silk suits. For this simple man, it was merely the joy of working with his hands - building bird houses with his tools or a wall shelf to hold some pictures in his den. He had no greater joy than his own independence: pulling weeds by hand from his yard, cutting and edging his own grass or cleaning out the gutters on his own house. He loved to travel - overseas when he was younger but settling for group bus trips to Branson, Missouri as he got older - and the sense of freedom he mysteriously savored when he could just drive he and my mother out to eat once a week or to his local Sam’s Club twice a month for groceries. He never asked or expected much but enjoyed simply being able to "do for himself", a trait we Albrights all share.

Just a year ago, he did all these things and, other than an occasional ache or pain, he had little to complain about and seldom did even when he should have. But 2008 has been a very different year. The heartless chisel has begun to do its dastardly work. As we discovered this spring, he began to have "mini-strokes" (T.I.A.’s or "transient ischemic attacks" to the cognoscenti). He would become confused and unable to speak coherently. They would resolve but the sequela were evident to those who knew him. He wasn’t as lucid as he once was. He told the same stories as if they were the first time anyone had ever heard them. He would easily forget things, sometimes in mid sentence. His mind, sharp as a razor for almost 8 decades, became perceptively duller and processed information more slowly.

The most tragic aspect of Nature’s onslaught was that he became more unsure of his footing. And with that unsteadiness, he became less active. He didn’t go for his walks with my mother and, due to muscle weakness that followed, he would take 3 or 4 sessions to cut the grass instead if knocking out the whole job in an hour or so. He would need to use his arms to raise up out of a chair. His day went from being busy with home projects to sitting and watching television. No longer able to focus on tasks, no matter how minor, his mind began to drift even more.

Over the past week, he has deteriorated further. That painted harlot, Mother Nature, has been not happy with just chipping away his mind and his strength. She fiendishly sought more. She gave him pain. He has unrelenting pain in his right thigh that takes away the one thing that allowed him to escape from the cold reality that he was dwindling away: sleep. The pain she brought was constant, like a toothache - a gnawing, omnipresent cramp that was always there. To add to her perverse entertainment, she made the pain worse with lying down so that when he did try to go to bed, perchance to sleep and to dream of better days, the agony would grow to the point that he was forced to return to a chair, any chair, for relief. Sleeplessness, as we all know, fuels confusion and irritability. Just so with my father. His mind grows worse, his thoughts more morose and his mood is without any joy.

The unforgivable irony of all this is that September 22, 2008 was my father’s 80^th birthday. I had planned to take the old man who had given me so much and never asked a thing in return to a nice dinner with my mother and daughter. Mother Nature would not even allow that simple celebration of a life well lived. He had neither the strength nor the interest in any festivities. He felt he couldn’t walk to the table without being assisted and, for my father, this was no way to present oneself in public. The truth was that he would be in too much pain to enjoy sitting for a meal and he didn’t want to spoil everyone’s evening should he be forced to leave early or, even more degrading to him, have to be assisted to the levorotary. He has little of his former self left but he still has his immense pride.

I despise the bitch that has whittled my father from a tower of strength (as he always was in my eyes) to the wretched, bent and wasting old man he is today. I curse her waste of strength and painless mobility on the young. I wish she could grow old and withered and spend sleepless nights in pain with no other thought on her mind than "When will it all end?". Why must the old suffer so? Have they not withstood all that life has thrown against their hopes and dreams and survived to reap some reward? Instead, they must, seemingly, be punished for escaping premature death. Having run the cruel obstacle course of life, they must now face the horrors of watching and feeling their own bodies fail them. That is no reward for a warrior who has conquered the battlefield of life.

Perseus conquered Medusa, Odysseus defeated Scylla and Charybdis but no one defeats Mother Nature. And, haughty, overbearing and disdainful punisher that she is, only the lucky few ever escape her toll. In no way is it fair but, tragically, it is the path we all must tread to our own end.

Dad always told me: "Life’s not fair, son." This is precisely what he must have meant.