“Rage, rage against the dying of the light!”---Dylan Thomas
Not long ago, I ran across an old friend and her great grandson who was all of four years old. Since I had asked his age, he thought it only fair to ask mine. He considered my answer for a moment, looked up and asked, “What’s it like to be 81?”
Ah now, that’s a question, isn’t it? I tried to answer in a manner the little guy would comprehend. “Well, it’s sort of like you have all the toys your parents gave you over the years spread out in your yard. You get on your bike and take a long ride and when you come back someone has stolen them all except for a woodburning kit and a scooter with one flat tire.” He got it, fell back and cried, “WHOA!”
Not many of us really want to die but raging against the dying of the light gets increasingly difficult as the years pile on, adding infirmities, subtracting possibilities, imposing limitations. I could easily swing over a paddock fence twenty years ago, now I have to worry about breaking a bone in my foot. I use a machine instead of a bench press so some transitory affliction doesn’t drop 200 pounds on my neck and kill me dead. I still drive at night but the older I get the more certain I become that there’s a deer out there with my name on it. It’s all part of Nature’s Great Plan---weaken them, then move in for the kill.
I don’t like this business one bit. I have never been the overly cautious type and now I have to check the landscape left and right to make sure nothing is waiting to get me. My wife, Siobhan, well aware of my wanton ways, constantly feels it necessary to remind me to wear my galoshes, not get too close to the car ahead of me and take a spoonful of cod liver oil every morning. I have earned this lack of respect by stupidly having a heart attack sixteen years ago and turning my Toronado over in the rain on Route 441 in 1985. One lousy accident in 81 years and you never hear the end of it. It’s tough to have a wife who’s right 95% of the time.
You sort of make your peace with aging after awhile. Alright self, I won’t try to get all the way to Half Dome if you just let me walk the 600 step stairway to Vernal Falls. Okay, I won’t sweep the leaves off the roof any more but I’m not giving up my tractor. Alright, I won’t try to run a mile this time but I’m going to walk damn fast.
Sometimes, life throws you a small bone and you tend to get a little frisky. A few years ago I had cataract surgery on both eyes and had the astigmatisms neutralized. All of a sudden, I could see better than I did 50 years ago. Made me feel like a kid again. I got into a fight with a 40-year-old guy in Walmart and when I hit him he didn’t fall down, he just hit me back. Disappointment, thy name is a weak left hook. I decided it would be a good idea to stop messing with 40-year-olds, but I can still shoot you if you sneak down my driveway.
Come One! Come All!
The Octogenaria Funhouse is a scary place to enter. The mirrors distort your every aspect, making you look taller, shorter, wider, older than you think you are. Diabolical clowns sneer at your passing, rushing up, chastising you, pushing signs in your face which scream your ancient age. The floor seems different, not entirely level...or is that just you and your sketchy sense of balance? Gravediggers toil in shallow graves, shoveling, throwing dirt out, expanding them for the next lucky customers.
This Funhouse offers you choices. You can take the Scenic Route, which offers sunny drives through pastures of plenty, cruises with unlimited dining opportunities, an Yves St. Laurent Golf Cart and an excuse slip for all gym activities. Or maybe you’d prefer the Marlon Brando Ride on your tricked-out hog along slippery streets with sandy shoulders, a case of Jack Daniel’s strapped to the pillion seat. No cops, no speed limits, no stopping to wait for The Reaper. An always popular third option is the flower-strewn Path to Jesus (donkeys optional) with a personal escort by the Heavenly Host. There are, of course, services to attend, feet to wash and lepers to comfort, but nobody gets a free ride through the Funhouse, right?
Step carefully through the musty cobwebs, mind the squeaking planks, try not to scream when the headless horseman rides by howling your name. Each step is an opportunity to continue, each footfall a chance at disaster, every turn in the road presents a mirage or an oasis, take your pick and make it a good one. Out in the hinterlands, the Pterodactyls fly, the rivers rush over their banks, the skies turn a disturbing shade of yellow and there are few passages to safety. The Octogenaria Funhouse is an simple place to check into but a challenging one to leave.
Give Us This Day Our Daily Breath
Girls just want to have fun. Untrammeled young people opt for sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll. Octogenarians will be happy with another vertical decade, a few of their original teeth and Medicare drug coverage. Rafting the Colorado? How about a slow cruise through Latvia, instead? Ziplining over the Grand Canyon? Can we put a governor on the accelerator? Climbing Mount Kalamazoo? It takes too long and they have such a nice t-bar ride.
Let’s get one thing straight. There are active octogenarians and there are octogenarians pickled in brine. Like all other age groups, there are always the prideful overachievers. Californian Betty Goedhart, 85, is still a daring young girl on the flying trapeze. Sumiko Iwamura, 83, a Tokyo restaurant owner, is the world’s oldest club DJ. Joan Campbell, 87, is a member of the U.S. Masters Swimming organization and competes at least once a month after prepping with four 1.5 mile swims a week. Florence Meiler, an 83-year-old Vermonter, still competes in the long jump, the high jump, the shot put and---hold your socks---the pole vault. “I had strong abs from years of waterskiing,” says Florence, “so I took to it quickly.” On a slow day, she’ll try a few hammer throws just for the hell of it. “I’ve injured myself from time to time,” Meiler reports, “but nothing serious. I hit a hurdle and ended up with 10 stitches in my left leg, but no big deal. It’s true what they say---age is a mindset. They’ll have to drag me away.”
“Local Boy Makes 81!”
When I visit a new therapist, meet an ancient friend or get together for the first time with a recent contact, there’s usually a “There must be some mistake…” moment during which the unmet person scrambles through their files or quickly retrieves their memory banks because I don’t fit their expectations of an 81-year-old person. While I have certainly done my share of work to keep signs of aging in the distance, a lot of this is just the luck of the genes. My sister Alice is a plucky 79 despite falling down a lot and my sister Kathleen is 71 despite drinking more than her share of wine. Alice was nonetheless planning on visiting Russia until her friends warned her the Emergency Rooms were criminally slow and Kathy was seen on a zipline in Belize not long ago, so maybe a disdain for elderliness runs in the family. My mother made it to 85 and her mother was still raising hell at 94 when she made the mistake of poking the Grim Reaper with a stick.
Growing up, it never occurred to me to follow the traditions of proper aging. Let’s face it, if you are still a head-shop owner at age 50 you’re already straying far outside the bounds of propriety, but I never gave changing uniforms a second thought. At age 45, I was forced to finally confront my situation when a Flagler County deputy sheriff hauled in my 19-year-old companion and me for nekkid swimming at Washington Oaks State Beach. He seemed more upset by our age difference than the crime. “You are 26 years older than this girl!” he exclaimed. “Ain’t life grand?” I replied.
My natural health guide, the venerable Dr. Mariana advises me that I am physically ten years younger than my chronological age. “But only ten years, so don’t go crazy,” she warns. I find it much more comforting to think of myself as 71 than the alternative because, well, not many people get out of their eighties alive. If I have any advice to give beyond the usual, I would recommend making sure you have things to look forward to. I don’t have time right now to worry about meager aging difficulties because I have a Reunion to pull off. After that, I think I will finally visit the Avenue des Champs-Elysees and get the old Garfield Street gang back together. I’m planning to hit one more ball into old Mr. Justice’s yard and I’ll bet this time he doesn’t come running off his porch to grab it. Eighty years old is one thing, 130 is another.
What I’ve Learned
There’s many a lesson to be learned via personal experience, but also from observing the plights of friends and associates as time marches on. You Octogenarians already know many of these things but the kids out there might want to cock an ear.
1. Be Yourself. Be inner-directed, not other-directed. Nobody wants to see a false version of yourself and before long the holes in the fraudulent persona will become apparent. You might snag a best friend or even a wife but you won’t keep either operating behind a veil. Be real, it works better in the long run.
2. Do Not Try To Dominate Your Partner. It’s bad juju. People my age grew up with domineering fathers who called the shots, which was not helpful. If you really love someone you will care just as much about their happiness as your own. There is this thing called compromise. Use it. And please, don’t wait until there is a problem before putting this plan into operation.
3. Take Chances While You’re Young. See the country on a shoestring. Travel to Europe on the cheap. You have no responsibilities to anyone other than yourself in your late teens and twenties, so hang loose and learn. There’s plenty of time for the other stuff later. I started the Charlatan magazine with $600 while I was a sophomore in college. I opened the Subterranean Circus with $1200 when I was 27 and had no family to feed. Soon enough, the opportunities for daring and eccentricity will dwindle. Do It Now.
4. Go West, Young Man.
The western United States is a wonderland of beauty and learning any visitor will never forget. The opportunities are endless, from the cliffs of Big Sur to the Going To The Sun Road in Glacier National Park near the Canada-Montana border. Fly into frisky Seattle, drop in at the Pike Place Market, then drive to Olympic National Park and the sacred Hoh Rainforest.
Head south into Oregon, visit the unrivaled Portland Rose Garden, then drive east via the Columbia River Gorge to Multnomah Springs and Mount Hood. Stop in at Crater Lake, the bluest body of water in the country on your way to see the California redwoods.
Go to Haight Street, check out what’s left, have tea with Renee Kidera. Go to the top of Coit Tower, walk across the Golden Gate Bridge, take a ferry to Sausalito. Stop in at Monterey, try an $8 orange juice in Carmel, go see the elephant seals across from the Hearst estate and spend a night at Moonstone Beach in fetching Cambria. Walk to the end of the Santa Monica Pier and buy a small painting from one of the artists. Arm yourself heavily and visit the Venice Boardwalk. Drop in at Laguna Beach, Jack Gordon will buy you a beer. Take a look at Del Mar Racetrack outside San Diego and bet a sawbuck on a 20-1 shot.
There are equivalent spectacles in Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, New Mexico and Colorado. Miss the awesome wonders of this geographical bonanza and you’ve turned your back on a spiritual awakening. “Oh, but I’d rather buy a boat,” you say. “I’ll have that boat for a long time.” Yes, pal, but you’d have the American West forever.
Short Stuff
Don’t marry anyone you can’t have an intelligent conversation with. Respect the value of money but don’t build a shrine to it. Plant a kale garden. Do what you can to keep creative people out of the poorhouse. Go to the beach more often. Visit the lonely. Watch the alcohol, it can kill you early. Get a CBC annually, at least. Talk to old people—smile first so you don’t scare them. Check in on your friends wherever they are. Don’t pass by a tip jar for anyone playing music. Stay in the mountains for a couple of days. Never forget the good times we had in high school (my yearbook friends remind me). And last but not least, Support Your Local Reunion. Show up loud and proud. You can even wear a flower in your hair. Hug an old pal, smooch an ex-boyfriend, dance the Funky Chicken, buy a t-shirt. If us Octogenarians can do it, so can you. See you there.
That’s all, folks….
