I’m shocked at how quickly so many of my friends and neighbours are aging. One would think that living the retirement dream in a beautiful setting would tend to delay the inevitable but it seems this is just not the case.
I can’t understand how some of us retain our youthful vigor and appearance yet others don’t.
Can it be a beneficial result of taking vitamin D or low-dose aspirin?
Surely these other elderly looking people must have seen the advertising on television promising all sorts of good things for just pennies a day?
What occurs to you when listening to reports from the World Health Organization and the World Bank Group?
The former tells us that by and large we are all living longer. The latter say the large number of thriving elderly pensioners is putting a strain on the capacity of governments to pay the pensions promised. Corporations are struggling to hide the fact that their pension plans are under-funded. I think I could safely speak for all people of a certain age when I say, “Gee, sorry about that.”
Maybe we should all take up skateboarding to hurry things along.
To be perfectly candid, I do see some minor signs of my own aging. Actually I prefer the term mellowing, like good cheese.
Recently I found myself enjoying a book abut England in the 15th century. There were plenty of details about clothing, medicine, housing, etc. I checked the library catalogue to see what other books the author had written and saw a small notation that read, “Suitable for 9 to 12”.
Crikey, I was reading a kid’s book.
I now recognize other signs as well.
For example, I simply cannot accept the fact our kids are all in their 40s. I still see them in an aura of training wheels, baby teeth, kindergarten handicrafts and scraped knees.
I spend a fair amount of time trying to remember the names of old colleagues and favourite customers.
Yes and I talk to my roses and swear at the weeds and rabbits.
I have far less patience with politicians of all stripes in senior levels of government here and abroad.
I put this particular foible down to the fact that I’ve been around long enough to have heard it all before and know that most of the stuff they spout is pure nonsense or half-truths.
Yep, I’m getting older.
I’m far less fussy about how I dress these days. I really don’t care if I’m wearing socks of different lengths although I still take care to wear the same colour on each foot.
I’ve given up my distaste for socks and sandals. To heck with it, my feet get cold otherwise.
I don’t care what Picasso wore, I didn’t like him anyway.
I still shave the first thing every day because that act signalled my emergence from adolescence and I don’t intend to regress.
I hope I don’t sound like a curmudgeon. The good things in my life far outweigh the bad and I’m very conscious of that.
It’s just that with age I’m realizing a lot of the things I fought against or complained about don’t really matter after all.
They are trivial in the grand scheme of life and I’m not wasting precious time on them. I suspect that many of you, dear readers, are miles ahead of me.
Above all, I’m beginning to see the irony in life.
I came over here 20 years ago to see the sights and now I’m one of them.
— Harvey Dorval lives in Parksville