Monday, October 14, 2024

I love the years, but sometimes hate the days

By Michael Corcoran

I’ve let myself go. Look at those words individually: let myself go. Where is the negative?

It’s liberating to grow old and not give a shit. I don’t want to die and I do things to add time between now and that day, but I’m not going to do dumb stuff to look younger or lie about my age. I’ll walk in a circle on a trail, then spend $7 for a juice, but I’m not doing anything with dyes and scalpels.

I’m proud of all the 66 years I’ve been alive and look forward to every birthday. Another year I beat evil and biology. It’s another year longer than I thought I would live. Age is a number on a scoreboard and this ain’t golf.

I had to use a cane for awhile after some surgery and I kept using it even after I healed. Man with a cane gets respect in a crowd. It’s a poor man’s bodyguard. People clear you a path when you have a cane, and no one’s looking to start some shit. An advantage of aging no one ever talks about.

What’s the worst thing about growing old? Depends.

Not quite there yet with the dumpster drawers, but I’m up on the downsides of getting old. The constant aches are kind of a drag, but it’s still better than being young and stupid.

You know you’re getting old when you’re online searching for a masseuse and you’re hoping it’s the real kind, not some woman you pay to pull you off.

Mortality is acknowledged every night when you clear your computer history because there’s a chance you might not wake up and who’s going to understand that the Google search for Hung Mexican Men was for some research on drug cartel violence?

Age is the elephant in the room… watching “Judge Judy” at full volume. It’s something that’s always there, but in the back of your mind. Like the spare bedroom at your kid’s house that’ll be your dorm room until graduation to the nursing home. If you’re lucky.

 

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