I thought aging would overtake me like a gentle tide. I’d gradually slow down, maybe carry one load of laundry at a time, prefer smelling the roses to planting them.

So far, there’s been a lot of truth to that surmise. I may not multi-task but still can duo-task. My voice is weaker, but I couldn’t carry a tune to begin with. My sense of scent is dulled, but the upside is that I can eat my own cooking.

Just this week, however, I tumbled to the truth: Graceful decline has its limitations. You become a senior senior. Long in the tooth, over the hill, worse for wear. Now life on the back nine slams into you like a tsunami.

Case in point. Yesterday I was pulling out of Safeway and saw a flock of birds on the ground, acting very jerky. Never saw anything quite like it. They jolted this way and that in unison, as if worms were executing a synchronized crawl.

On second look, I have to admit there wasn’t a bird in the bunch. It was the shadow of a row of little triangular pennants overhead, flapping in the breeze. In that second, that very second, I knew my eyes were no longer my eyes. These peepers belong to somebody else. I can’t trust them on first glance. I’m not sure I can trust them on second glance, either.

Then last Thursday, around 2:45 in the afternoon, my knees hit senior senior status in the middle of the damn street, between here and the mailbox. There was no slow build up of kneecap nuisance, meniscus menace, cartilage cringe. Just a sudden ‘now we are old’ lurch. I barely made it across the street before the century turned.

Struggling up the curb was akin to scaling the face of Mount Olympus. I used some language loud and clear that should never be sounded outside a military action. Maybe my voice isn’t so weak after all.

It was a slap of cold water to realize old age may be OK, but older age is a tyrant. I need a plan.

Maybe turning down activity can turn back time. The thing is, you have to learn how to do it. There is a guilt factor in doing nothing at all. In resting on your way from the living room to the kitchen.

So once again, late in life, I’m in a learning stage. I believe I shall start by giving up housecleaning altogether. I know I can master binge watching. And there’s one thing for sure. If I see those jerky birds again, I’ll limp on over and give them a piece of my mind. If I can find one.

Linda B. Myers is a founding member of Olympic Peninsula Authors and writer of such books as “Fun House Chronicles” and the PI Bear Jacobs mystery series. Her newest novel, “Bear At Sea,” is now available at amazon.com. Contact her at myerslindab@gmail.com or Facebook.com/lindabmyers.author.