Call it a malaise, but the most pervasive feeling these days is one of fragility. From another perspective, vulnerability. Am I simply feeling my age? And if so, what about my age? Or am I, like virtually all of us, feeling at the mercy of a new brand of Dr. Strangelove without the humor…. In any case, I am not feeling robust. Overwhelmed, comes much closer.

This is particularly true of any gesture at movement. Leaving the house seems risky. Driving my car to my doctor tomorrow seems challenging. Reversing into the garage on Friday for some car work seems risky. Which, of course, it may be. Somewhat.

Still, there being no direction but forward, I keep doing stuff. Getting out. In fact, several times a day. And how dangerous is this? Well, increasingly, if one is measuring statistics. Take the #24 Divisadero bus. In fact, take it inbound…in the parlance of San Francisco’s public transport…to Castro Street. Note that there is no reason to take it at all, except that the J Church tram suddenly ceased running on Saturday afternoon, and one had no other alternative.

So, there I was, ultimately headed for the San Francisco Jazz Center aboard the #24 when the bus driver decided to hurtle his electric vehicle at remarkable speed down the Sanchez Street hills, braking abruptly for the stop at 28th St. No, the geography doesn’t matter. What does matter is that this action sent my wheelchair flying head over wheels. Really, I should know better. But I have a cavalier attitude about San Francisco buses.

Which doesn’t make a lot of sense if one is feeling fragile. But feeling fragile doesn’t make a lot of sense either. I don’t know what’s going on. Whatever is happening represents the opposite of the youthful I-can-take-the-world-by-storm attitude of, say, my 20s. Or even my 30s. And considering the fact that I am more than twice as old, or exactly twice as old, well, maybe a little fragility won’t hurt.

This general state of affairs may explain why I am watching nightly episodes of something called Jack Irish. A ne’er do well adventurer, our Jack is not quite a private eye. But entirely a public Australian. My knowledge of Australia is scant, and so is the attire of many of the women he encounters. Jane discovered the Jack Irish series, so I can blame her. But the show is enlivening in the most fundamental ways. Big conspiracies. Formidable opponents. Fair amount of gun violence, and regular bruising and bashing. It is, I suppose, the very antithesis of vulnerability. For if there’s anything that Jack Irish does, it’s to bounce back.

And I’m out tonight. Daring to eat a peach. More precisely, daring to take the #35 over the hill to the San Francisco branch library for my monthly reading group. Is it perilous? Hard to say. But vulnerability may be the new normal. That, coupled with its seemingly constant ally, fear. Whatever. I will be at the bus stop in 45 minutes.