WITHOUT AN ANSWER by Rosalyn Clark

It seemed to me that most of my life, my long life, a lift of 84 years, so many times, when people have said stupid, mundane things, prejudiced talk, insensitive talk, that all these many years I was “without an answer.”

Maybe some time later, after an asinine conversation, with a friend or a neighbor, or with a person at work, I might then think of an answer, but it was too late. Oh, how many jobs I have had where the patrons were rude and I had no answer.

But as I entered my 80th year, I began to notice a change, a transformation was talking place. Now I am always “with an answer.”

Why, just the other day, sitting and knitting a blanket for my great-granddaughter at the Wool Co. in Woodstock, a young woman came in, a stranger, and sits down to knot near me. She now says to me, “Oh, how nice it is to see someone your age being so busy.”

And this transformed woman answers her right back. “I beg your pardon, I am not a woman who keeps busy, I have passions in my life, which I work on constantly. I have been a serious artist for most of my life, a drummer and a Poet for about 14 years, now I am part of a Memoir writing group for two years and this class has inspired me to have a portfolio on my computer of my stories.”

And the young woman, this stranger, replies, “That is great. I have just sold my business in Saugerties and now I am reinventing myself.”

From then on we just sit quietly and knit away.