I was reading in the NYT Sunday Magazine about the increasing numbers of very, very old people who are still thriving and fully engaged with life. One man they profiled is 100 and still a practicing lawyer, and one thing that struck me was when he was described as keeping his gestures to a minimum, like he's conserving energy, and I thought of course, that's a lesson I'm going to need to take to heart. I wonder how many years a lifetime of ludicrous over-gesturing has already cost me. And for what? Am I unable to communicate without my hands? Must I always be a blur of limbs and electroconvulsive facial expressions, slashing and chopping the air, creating wispy gestural curlicues and exotic spirals in a kind of epileptic Tai Chi, churning the space around me like a manic talk show host? I should always have a rose in my teeth and hold castanets. There's sometimes an aspect of rigid semaphore motions, or moving traffic along slowly past a construction zone, or a demented crossing guard giving conflicting signals to bewildered children, sometimes I'm drunkenly guiding an airliner into a gate or incorrectly spelling out the team name with my body (G-O L-R-T-W!), or applying the Heimlich maneuver to an invisible choking friend. It never ends, I'm surprised my arms don't feel tired after an ordinary conversation. If I was ever called to testify the judge would threaten to hold me in contempt for disrespecting the court with frivolous testimonial accessorizing.

I should practice, sit on my hands while talking. If I ever got committed and was confined in a straitjacket I'd need to be able to converse with my appointed psychiatrist. Or what if I lost my hands in a thresher incident?

I want those years back, the time lost to foolish surplus physical movement. I could use them near the end, when almost any motion will be accompanied by pain or discomfort or the threat of bones snapping like kindling. It's my new beginning, I'm going to assume a conversational persona of coiled energy never expended, or calm Buddha-like repose, unruffled and unfazed, unnerving others who wait for me to erupt into my usual cloud of pointless twitchy acrobatics. In this way the merest suggestion of a shrug or a raised eyebrow can do all the work, I can communicate precise and devastating judgments with nearly imperceptible physical expression.

And then I can work on doing the same thing with my writing style.