{"id":538,"date":"2026-10-14T16:02:47","date_gmt":"2026-10-14T16:02:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thecatbirdsang.com\/www\/?p=538"},"modified":"2026-10-14T16:02:47","modified_gmt":"2026-10-14T16:02:47","slug":"used-to-be","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thecatbirdsang.com\/www\/used-to-be\/","title":{"rendered":"Used To Be"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a>Used to Be<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I used to be a happy child in, riding my horse<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Bareback, pretending to be a Cherokee. Now I am a somber soul.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I used to play basketball, starting with the neighborhood<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">hoops and moving on to college, played the bench mostly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I used to show horses, even gained a B level in Pony Club,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">now my spine is so twisted that walking is a problem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I used to drink too much at parties, no fun drinking alone;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">all those nights I blacked out. I should be dead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Birding used to take me on adventures from Antarctica to Britain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Today I bird with friends who don\u2019t mind that I stop every 100 feet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At the kennel, I was able to walk the biggest, strongest dogs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Now I only walk the smaller ones, I teach the big dogs kennel manners.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">50 pounds of bird seed too much to carry, I empty<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">it bucket by bucket until I can carry the bag to its container.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This body has faded on me. Need to make peace<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">with it and its limitations.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I hold on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Magnets and Ladders<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 2025<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Used to Be I used to be a happy child in, riding my horse Bareback, pretending to be a Cherokee. Now I am a somber soul. I used to play basketball, starting with the neighborhood hoops and moving on to college, played the bench mostly. I used to show horses, even gained a B level&hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/thecatbirdsang.com\/www\/used-to-be\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Used To Be<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-538","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poems","category-published-poems"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecatbirdsang.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecatbirdsang.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecatbirdsang.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecatbirdsang.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecatbirdsang.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=538"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thecatbirdsang.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":539,"href":"https:\/\/thecatbirdsang.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538\/revisions\/539"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecatbirdsang.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=538"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecatbirdsang.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=538"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecatbirdsang.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=538"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}