It’s a long and dusty road,
It’s a hot and a heavy load
And the folks you meet ain’t always kind….—Tom Paxton
When we were kids, Old was an adjective reserved for Other People. Your grandparents were Old. Our revered Monsignor Daley was Old, old enough, perhaps, to be included in that celebrated artwork at the Sistine Chapel. The Yankees’ manager, Casey Stengel, was Old even when he was middle-aged, earning his nickname, “The Old Perfessor.” Perhaps nobody was as Old as grizzled Dan Toomey, who lived in a house at the end of the street and hobbled by occasionally with his trusty cane, reaching speeds of up to six blocks an hour. Dan was known to take a drink now and then, which contributed to the hitch in his getalong.
One bright morning, three of us kids were sitting on the Killeen front porch abusing the spinner on my Cadaco-Ellis All Star Baseball game when the Old Man came shuffling down the street. This was cause for the usual greeting: “Dan, Dan, the dirty old man!” we shouted, gleefully. Toomey was actually more unkempt than dirty but kids don’t know from “unkempt”—and besides, try working that into your chant—it lacks pizzazz. So “Dan, Dan, the dirty old man” it would be. Alcohol-fueled as he was, Dan remained mostly oblivious to all this and merely shuffled on. Except for this day, when he fell—ker-splat!—right on his face. There was blood involved.
My Mother, who was fine-tuned to anything happening within a half-mile of her immediate vicinity, charged out of the house and bounced down the steps. “Get over here, you kids, and help me with Mr. Toomey.” She turned Dan over and we carefully sat him up. He was trickling a little blood from his nose, but said nothing. A couple of large men from the neighborhood loped across the street, got Toomey to his feet and helped him home. My Mother was less than thrilled by our behavior. “But Mrs. Killeen,” Eddie Ledwich protested, “It’s his own fault! He drinks. He’s a drunk.”
Mrs. Killeen, as empathetic a figure as God ever posted to his favorite planet, got a little misty-eyed. “Did it ever occur to you boys,” she wondered, “that maybe Mr. Toomey drinks because he is old and sick and has nobody left in this world who loves him?”
Oh.
No, Ma, I guess that one got by us. But don’t worry—we’ll think about that for the rest of our lives. At least, I will. And have. Reminded occasionally by poets and balladeers like the gentle John Prine, who once suggested the following:
So if you’re walking down the street sometime
And spot some hollow ancient eyes,
Please don’t just pass ‘em by and stare
As if you didn’t care,
Say, “Hello in there,
Hello.”
Funny how, even at this age, I continue to think of myself as one of the contributors to rather than receivers of this largesse. May it ever be thus.
Moving On
I didn’t think much more about personal age advancement until I was twenty-nine, slipping into thirty, when it struck me like a ton of metamucil. Damn, I thought—THIRTY—I’m getting old! Even if you make it to ninety, you’re a third of the way gone. And that last third won’t be spent climbing Mount Kilimanjaro, count on that. It took me awhile, but I finally made peace with Thirty and there was no repeat shock when the gong rang forty, fifty and sixty, although you certainly begin to take stock of those adventures you wish to pursue while you’re still agile, mobile and not too hostile. Somewhere along the line, I joined the Life Extension Society and began looking for a way out. I read about Zero Food Intake, telomeres, stem-cell advancements, body-parts farming and even cryogenics, which is for crazy people. A couple of investigators promised they’d have it all figured out if I could manage to hang around another 15 years. Hey, thanks a lot guys, nothin’ I’d rather do than live forever as a 90-year-old.
Fortunately for me, I am the Anti-Woody Allen. Where Woody obsesses over his mortality, I refuse to dwell on mine. I do what I can to keep the train on the tracks—reasonable diet with almost no red meat, thrice-weekly gym visits, sensible dietary supplementation and an optimistic attitude. I have always been a glass-half-full guy, so there’s that. And, due to a winning ticket in the Cosmic Lottery, I wound up with a clever and amusing woman who provides physical, mental and spiritual sustenance. Who could ask for anything more? Except, possibly for a champion racehorse, which my friend, Chuck Lemasters, has assured me is on the way.
Regrets? I have a few. But then again, too few to mention. When I was seven, I thought I’d like to play first base for the Red Sox. Ten years later, the idea of playing 162 baseball games a year was decidedly unappealing, not that there was ever any danger of that happening. These days, I would rather just own the Red Sox. Given a second swing at the pinata, I would try to be a better friend, a more loyal husband, a person who wrote more and traveled further. Everyone would like to put to use in earlier life the things they learned later, but that’s not the way the universe works.
I have finally reached the stage where I’m more seriously pondering my visits to particular locales. You know the mood….”Gosh, this could be the last time I ever come here.” How maudlin. This foolishness temporarily imposed itself in Jacksonville Saturday while I was celebrating the last minutes of the Florida Gators’ 27-3 romp over Georgia. I was sad for a brief moment. At this stage of the game, you never know, right? Fortunately, optimism prevailed. I thought about the rapid success the Gators had attained with a brand new coaching regime, the upcoming recruiting boom which would add depth to the larders. Hell, we’d be whipping these Bulldogs forever. I turned to my seatmates left and right. Handshakes all around. “See you next year,” I promised. “Same time, same place.” And if there’s one thing I’ve learned in this life, it’s this: you always keep your promises.
What I’ve Learned
A few years ago, Esquire Magazine began sporadically including a page called “What I’ve Learned” in its monthly offerings. The subject called upon for this illumination could be a prominent actor, athlete, politician, etc., someone who had achieved at least a modicum of fame. Esquire never called upon Mortie from Ed’s Landscaping Service to ruminate over his discoveries but I’m not sure that wouldn’t have worked just as well. While the concept was brilliant, it lost something in the execution. The subjects might start out by discussing a few things they had learned but the conversations always regressed to include talk of their careers, precious family moments, life in Hollywood or Nashville or Green Bay. What I’ve Learned became What I’d Like To Talk About. We can do better. We’re sticking to the subject.
When you’ve been haunting the Earth for 75 years, you’re bound to pick up a few things. Many of the lessons I’ve learned will not be unfamiliar to the rest of you codgers out there who have been on patrol for a like number of decades. Shockingly, however, there are people who read The Flying Pie who are actually under fifty and a dozen or more still in their twenties who might benefit from ingesting these singular revelations. Let’s have at it then. A recitation of things one man has learned:
1. Be Honest. This is more than an admonition to avoid whoppers, although that’s a good start. It’s more an encouragement to operate your life in an honorable manner, to avoid guile when dealing with others, to present yourself as you actually are, void of pretenses. If you agree to something, do it. If you promise something, deliver it. Avoid excuses. Perform. Be an advocate for The Truth.
2. Moderation In Everything. As compelling as Pure Honesty might be, there is only one correct answer to the woman’s question “How do you like my new haircut?” Get it right.
3. Persevere. In all matters, Diligence and Determination win the day. Great projects are not easy. Few wars are won after a single battle. Failure will have its moments. People like to tell the story of Thomas Edison, who developed the light bulb after 99 failed attempts. The story of Greg and Christie is better. Greg was a mutt, though a talented artist with a sardonic sense of humor, not a particularly handsome fellow or otherwise physically endowed. Christie was a statuesque blonde, a ballet dancer of some merit blessed with a great sense of humor and a striking countenance, also a couple inches taller than Greg.
Greg fell in love with Christie instantly, almost falling at her feet. Christie laughed him off, though kindly. He was an impossible suitor, unqualified in even her wildest dreams. Greg wouldn’t go away. He was not a stalker but he came ‘round time and time again, always in good humor, always professing his adoration. The rest of us laughed at his sad desperation. Then, after a couple months of this, one day Christie approached me with a question. “What do you think about this guy?” she wondered. “He’s crazy, but he’s nuts about me. I’ve never experienced anything like this. What should I do?”
I told her a single date couldn’t hurt. She agreed. The door now ajar, Greg put his best foot forward, slew the dragon and won the maiden. They moved south and lived happily ever after, or at least I’d like to think so. A gong-ringing testament to the powers of Perseverance.
4. Do Not Expect Happy Endings Every Time.
5. Be A Risk-Taker. Admittedly, this works better when you’re younger and have less to risk. One of my better girlfriends, Betsy Harper, used to tell me this: “One of the things I like about you is that you’re a risk-taker. I wish I was more like you. When you were 17, you went halfway across the country by yourself to college. You risked getting expelled from school by publishing the Charlatan. With no money, you moved to New York to learn the magazine business. Again with no money—not even a driver’s license—you headed from Massachusetts to New Mexico, ending up in Austin. You opened a retail store with twelve hundred measly dollars. Then you put most of the profits into the horse business. Yikes!”
A lot of people do chancy things when they’re young. Adolescence is a time for experimentation, for learning what works and what doesn’t. Failure is transitory, it’s easy to bounce back as long as you avoid entanglements like marriage and kids. The greatest risk I took by far was investing in horses, but whatever I lost there the ultimate reward was the greatest payoff of all. I got Siobhan.
6. Hedge Your Bets. It’s a good thing Betsy wasn’t around when the roof fell in, it might have put the kibosh on her risk-taking ambitions. After years of unabated personal success, The Empire struck back, first with a Gainesville paraphernalia ordinance that crippled the Subterranean Circus, then with an IRS tax change fostered by the Reagan administration that devastated the thoroughbred business. What do you do when your back-up plan has no back-up plan? Make sure you never arrive at that state. The Circus once had a very diverse inventory, curtailed considerably to concentrate on the much more profitable drug-related items unavailable elsewhere. But that abandoned diversity was legal. It could have been sold forever. A lesson learned, but a little too late.
In the horse business, the people who succeed are primarily those who breed to sell. Racing is a bottomless pit, albeit an exciting and enjoyable one. We had endless opportunities to sell horses and subsidize the racing operation, but they were always the best animals and the risk-taker chose to demur. The old gamblers were accurate in their advice: always hedge your bets. Oh, and by the way—never collateralize an extant loan.
7. Learn To Do One Thing Well. Make that one PRACTICAL thing. Most of my creative friends, and I have a bunch, have learned this lesson. It’s fine to be a painter or a sculptor, a writer, a dancer, a musician. Follow the dream. But figure out some way to make a dollar in the meantime. Starving artists have a tendency to lose their ardor. Nobody likes bringing their exciting new date to the Bent Card Coffee House. Creative people often gravitate toward the building trades. The Subterranean Circus’ sister-store, Silver City, was largely built and spiffed up by the local artist colony. Learning how to do one practical thing is the salvation of many, the talent doesn’t discriminate between white and black or grade-school dropouts and PhDs. Anyone can do it.
Our Fairfield neighbor, James Powell, was not an intellectually gifted man. His schooling was meager, the world around him a puzzle and his future looked bleak, but James had a hole card. He learned to lay tile and to do it very well, better in fact than most of his Orlando-area competitors. When it came time to build Disney World, contractor Ward Theisen summoned James to the fray. He soon married, bought his own house, and eventually moved to Fairfield, where he had enough left over to purchase a few horses. A couple of them became stakes-winners at Tampa Bay Downs. One day, waiting for a race at that track, James looked at the swelling crowd, then over at the odds board where his entry had been tabbed the favorite. He tapped me on the shoulder, smiling his big James smile. “Look at that, Bill. All those smart people bettin’ on my horse. Just goes to show ya, y’don’t have to be a genius to get by. Hell, I may run for President next year.”
8. Take Care Of Yourself. Two things first: (a) be careful what you eat, and (b) get some exercise. Make that, for GOD’S sake, get some exercise. I know, I know, nobody likes an evangelist, least of all me, but I have a special dispensation since we’re dealing with What I’ve Learned here. And by the way, I don’t come by all this exercise stuff naturally. I was a malingerer, too. Then one day at age 55 I noticed a gradually expanding waistline, though no apparent weight gain anywhere else. I had seen this sort of heinous thing before. The unruly stomach takes on a mind of its own and expands disproportionately to the rest of the body, sometimes causing the dreaded Trouser Slippage, a frightful disease which often leads to Butt Crack Revelation. Not a series of events to be desired by anyone, least of all a person always blessed to be thin. Extreme measures had to be taken. I joined a gym. Twenty years later, I weigh less than I did then. I have photographic evidence, presented herein. And no, there is no photoshopping involved. My photoshopper took early retirement.
New Year’s Day is like Christmas for gym owners. Every January, a legion of new recruits joins health facilities across the land, prompted by New Year’s resolutions. And by the end of March, they are all gone. People have the faulty notion that exercise will wipe out fat in one fell swoop and when it doesn’t they pick up their ball and go home. Exercise does help maintain weight but six hours in the gym every week will not obliterate a weight problem. There is only one thing which will do that. Eating reform. Eat differently, eat less. Loathe as I am to recommend it, the Atkins Diet will get pounds off in a hurry. As soon as that happens, ditch it, it’s otherwise unhealthy. Two things help me avoid weight gain. The first is simply to avoid bringing into the house anything I shouldn’t be ingesting. If you don’t buy it, you can’t eat it. The second is to use lunch to help regulate weight. Too heavy in the morning? Less lunch. Works for me. Oh, and one other thing. Much as I realize that eating out is now a major social occasion, a little bit of it goes a long way for me. Restaurants are primarily concerned with the taste of their meals, not their healthful qualities. Many of the things which contribute to taste—salt, fat, etc.—are heaped into restaurant meals. Obviously, some places are worse than others. Just try to avoid the worst offenders.
Finally, get a physical once a year. If there’s a budding problem, you can head it off at the pass. I get blood drawn for a lipid panel and to monitor liver, kidneys, thyroid, etc. Men need annual prostate checks. When the results come back. supplement accordingly. I have had friends whose clever plan it was to avoid the doctor and never receive bad news. Some of them are dead
9. Every so often, do something outrageous. It will make you feel good, bring back youthful memories, give you another story to tell….and what’s better than a good story? Besides, at this age, the cops are far more lenient. Nobody wants to lock up grandpa.
10. Practice what you preach. I’m a devout advocate of this philosophy. The evidence is obvious.
The Best Women
There are things you learn late in life and things you learn early. There are supposed truths which slither and slide and others which are etched in stone. One of the latter is that Life would be a sad joke without women, especially the Best Women. The Best Women are poised and independent and quite capable of living their lives without you. They might take you in if you amuse them but it is not a bad idea to keep a suitcase packed. The Best Women are empathetic and kind and will stop in their tracks to investigate a tear. The Best Women appreciate all creatures. Where the Average Woman might slow a vehicle to avoid a turtle in the road, the Best Women will pull over, pick up the turtle and find it a pond. The Best Women have and appreciate an excellent sense of humor. The Best Women will show up with a picnic basket in the middle of your ten-hour mowing day. The Best Women will not be jealous for no reason. The Best Women will not allow you to neglect your wellbeing. The Best Women look just as good in a t-shirt and jeans as they do in an evening gown. The Best Women are willing to sweat. Don’t take offense, but every so often the Best Women don’t want you around. The Best Women don’t choke in a crisis. If you are fortunate enough to find one of these women, you will not be allowed to build a fence around her and claim her for your own. The Best Women must be shared with the world.
That’s all, folks. We’ll be back in another 75 years with more Universal Truths.
About The Photographer: When you’re looking for someone to shoot nude pictures of yourself, you can’t just walk down the street asking people, willy-nilly. Sooner or later, the police will become involved. When we shot the logo photo five years ago, I recruited a male naturalist photographer. That’s “nudist” in street palaver. He’s scuffling around somewhere in the Ukraine these days and besides, at 75, these might be the last good pictures I’m able to salvage. I needed a pro.
I looked at a lot of galleries on-line and came up with Jaime Swanson, who plies her trade out by the Millhopper in Gainesville. Jaime is the hardest-working mother in show business, with four kids to truck around all day. She reserves her mornings for photography, however, and her work is impressive. Also, whereas most photogs shoot primarily weddings, babies and portraits, Jaime also does “boudoir sessions,” where young ladies pose in their underwear—or less—for boyfriends, husbands or portfolio material. I asked her if she would be uncomfortable taking these shots for The Flying Pie and she said no, she’d previously photographed a fireman’s calendar. I mentioned that 75-year-old firemen were probably a rarity and she agreed. “But you don’t look 75,” she said. Some people consider this a great compliment but what it means to me is something like, “You’re no James Dean, but, then again, you’re not as bad as Walter Matthau, either.’' Nonetheless, at this age, I’ll take all the solace I can get.
I showed up at Jaime’s studio with a few shirts and the requisite hats and we got started. She kept asking for a smile every now and then and we compromised on a half-smile, so she gets credit for the great shot at the top of this column. People always ask if it’s uncomfortable having nude pictures taken by a stranger. Well, better than by someone you know, I’d say. Besides, if you want something, you gotta pay the price. Not to mention, I like to practice what I preach. So every so often, I do something outrageous. I may even expand my crimes in the immediate future, and why not? As I said before, nobody wants to lock up grandpa. Yet.
