In the mailbox, there is a catalog featuring freakishly well-proportioned young women in merino, silk and cashmere. I decide to look through it as a way to unwind from work, and by the time I have scanned the last page I am ready to place my order for everything it has to offer: silk, merino, cashmere, a new career with a stratospheric salary and, by the looks of the scene on page 6, a sexual encounter in the desert, with props.

In a drawer, a lace-trimmed camisole purchased optimistically in May remains unworn. My upper arm definition departed without saying goodbye, and tank tops that used to make me feel sexy are now just something to wear when it’s hot. Another one of life’s minor losses, and I think of that line in Fleur Adcock’s poem, Weathering:

Well, that was a metropolitan vanity,
wanting to look young forever, to pass.

And then I see the catalog with the walker on the front.

I am dismayed that the circling vultures of capitalism have noted my recent joint replacement. Still, I can’t help noticing that it’s a hell of a walker. A Ferrari. If I needed a walker instead of having just gotten rid of one, I might cut this out and put it up on my fridge in the hopes that someone would buy it for me for Christmas. This is a walker you don’t just run out and buy, it’s a walker you save up for. Its color is the lips of movie stars; its brakes suggest the tour de France, although the basket detracts somewhat from the concept of speed. There are gizmos on the sides like the ones used to adjust the seats of Land Rovers.

The catalog is Make Life Easier, and it tries to live up to the name with products like the Lift & Sift Cat Litter System, Front Pocket Wallet, (Divest an otherwise sleek fellow of the bump on his rump!) and a set of adjustable extenders that attach onto the waistband of your pants to give you an extra 1/2 to 2 inches when needed. Why aren’t these sold at Nordstrom? Page 9 has a phone with buttons so large your next door neighbor could see who you were calling, which is actually good to know - my back-up plan was to hold the bottoms of old wine bottles to my eyes. Somewhat oddly, Page 15 displays a stainless steel tool kit for removing blackheads and whiteheads, with eight separate attachments. I wonder if this is meant as a gift idea for the grandkids, or whether blemishes plague the elderly, which would be extremely unfair.

I feel like someone is spying on me, because they are. I feel like I have entered a new stage of life, because I have. Outside, a crow sits on a telephone wire, unconcerned.