In 1953 when my mother, my grandmother and I left Buenos Aires for Mexico City I told my mother she had to buy me some lovely equestrian lead soldiers featuring the Granaderos de San Martín. I wanted to have them as even at my age, 13, I was thinking I would never return to Argentina. The soldiers disappeared and I have no recollection of when that happened.

Now, like Jorge Luís Borges, and because I will be 80 this year, I wonder about all sorts of things that I might be doing for the last time. I tell my daughters that my five year old Chevrolet Cruze is the last car I will ever own. With mortality around the corner I keep wearing worn out flannel shirts and jeans not wanting to buy new ones. These will do, I think, they will be there after I am gone.

In spite of all that, today Saturday April 23, 2022 I drove to the old Walmart near Boundary and Grandview Highway to buy a new pair of house slippers ( I know I will find my brand there!). These slippers have a rubber sole so that means I can go from my living room on a rainy by the deck to my oficina with no problem.

From travel writer (now gone) Gary Marchant,  I took his advice to remove my shoes in an airplane and put on these comfy slippers. 

Returning from Italy in 2019 with Rosemary I left my slippers on board. This happened in the Toronto Air Canada lounge.

 I paid $20 for these made in China slippers with the Canadiana brand name.

Like Borges I wonder if these will be the last I buy.

Below are two versions (one a short one) of a poem called Limits (Límites) by Jorge Luís Borges, in Spanish and in English

 LÍMITES Jorge Luís Borges

Hay una línea de Verlaine que no volveré a recordar.

Hay una calle próxima que está vedada a mis pasos,

hay un espejo que me ha visto por última vez,

hay una puerta que he cerrado hasta el fin del mundo.

Entre los libros de mi biblioteca (estoy viéndolos)

hay alguno que ya nunca abriré.

Este verano cumpliré cincuenta años;

La muerte me desgasta, incesante.

Limits (my translation)

There is a line from Verlaine that I will not remember again.

There is a nearby street that my steps will not be on

there is a mirror that will have seen me for the last time,

there is a door that I have closed until the end of the world.

Among the books in my library (I am seeing them)

there is one I will never open.

I will be fifty this summer;

Death wears me away  unceasingly.

De estas calles que ahondan el poniente,

una habrá (no sé cuál) que he recorrido

ya por última vez, indiferente

y sin adivinarlo, sometido

a Quién prefija omnipotentes normas

y una secreta y rígida medida

a las sombras, los sueños y las formas

que destejen y tejen esta vida.

Si para todo hay término y hay tasa

y última vez y nunca más y olvido

¿quién nos dirá de quién, en esta casa,

sin saberlo, nos hemos despedido?

Tras el cristal ya gris la noche cesa

y del alto de libros que una trunca

sombra dilata por la vaga mesa,

alguno habrá que no leeremos nunca.

Hay en el Sur más de un portón gastado

con sus jarrones de mampostería

y tunas, que a mi paso está vedado

como si fuera una litografía.

Para siempre cerraste alguna puerta

y hay un espejo que te aguarda en vano;

la encrucijada te parece abierta

y la vigila, cuadrifronte, Jano.

Hay, entre todas tus memorias, una

que se ha perdido irreparablemente;

no te verán bajar a aquella fuente

ni el blanco sol ni la amarilla luna.

No volverá tu voz a lo que el persa

dijo en su lengua de aves y de rosas,

cuando al ocaso, ante la luz dispersa,

quieras decir inolvidables cosas.

¿Y el incesante Ródano y el lago,

todo ese ayer sobre el cual hoy me inclino?

Tan perdido estará como Cartago

que con fuego y con sal borró el latino.

Creo en el alba oír un atareado

rumor de multitudes que se alejan;

son lo que me ha querido y olvidado;

espacio y tiempo y Borges ya me dejan.

Limits

By Jorge Luis Borges

Translated by A.Z. Foreman

Of all those boulevards that sink in sunset

There’s one (I know not which) I've made my way       

Across for the last time, indifferent

And without realizing it, in sway

To One who predesigns almighty norms,

A rigorous and secret scale to gauge

The dreams and shadows, formulas and forms

Which weave and unweave this our life and age.

If to all things there is a terminus,

A last time and oblivion, who will tell

Any of us whom in this house we have

Unwittingly already bid farewell?

Now through the dawn-greyed window night withdraws

And there amid the stack of books that shed

A craze of shadows on the hazy table,

There shall be one I'll have to leave unread.

Out in the south stands more than one worn gate

There with its cactus and cemented urns

Whose entry is forbidden to my feet

As in a lithograph. Nothing returns:

You’ve bolted shut a certain door forever;

A mirror waits in vain, expecting you;

The crossroads seem to lie unbarred before you

But four-faced Janus watches what you do.

Among your many memories is one

Which has been lost to you forevermore;

They will not see you by that fountain nor

Beneath the yellow moon, or the white sun.

Your voice shall never come to what the Persian

Said in his tongue of roses, wine and birds,

When under dusk before the light is scattered

You wish to say some unforgettable words.

The ceaseless Rhône? My European lake?

That yesterday I hunch upon today

Will be erased as Carthage by the Romans

Whose salt and fire it could not hold at bay.

At dawn I think I hear a multitude

Receding out of earshot, out of mind:

Those who have loved me and forgotten me.

Borges and Space and Time leave me behind.