How to Live to an Overripe Old Age

How to live to an overripe old age.

Jim Vann

1.) Great fitting Genes

2.) Eating, Drinking and Breathing the Air.

3.) Marriage, ‘til death do us part

4.) Children and other sexually transmitted diseases

5.) Exercise your way to a healthy, miserable existence

6.) Stress, It could kill you…it will certainly bore you.

7.) Health Care Industry Care

8.) Embrace Your Inner Grouch

9.) Grandchildren…Just when you thought there was nothing left to live for.

10.) Senior Care, a reason to be nice to your kids.

11.) And finally…”Never Say Finally.”

Introduction

There is a story about a little, emaciated, white-haired man sitting on a park bench, feeding the pigeons. A young lady sits down next to him and they begin to talk. After a while, her curiosity gets the best of her and she says,” I have to know what is your secret to long life?”

He replies, “I drink a quart of vodka and smoke two packs of cigarettes a day. I eat a diet rich in fatty beef and wash it down with beer. I never sleep more than 6 hours a night and have been intimate with hundreds of women.

She responds in amazement, “How old are you?”

“I don’t mind telling you I’m 35 years old”

Saying we want to live a long time is like saying we want to have a lot of money. Let’s face it, to an orphan in Calcutta, what we mean when we say, “Keep the change,” is a lot of money. It’s the same with aging. We need to be specific. This is where it gets a little tricky. 30 seems old when we are 15. 80 seems old at 50 and I never met a healthy 80 year-old who was ready for that one way ticket. It’s like the old saying, “everybody wants to go to heaven, but nobody wants to die.”

So as we begin, we will define our terms. A ripe old age is when people come to you for advice and are willing to pay for your expertise. An overripe old age is the point when they won’t even listen for free. There is a t-shirt that puts it well…”Just when I have all the answers, somebody changed the questions.” In today’s computer and media driven society it is possible to be ripe at 25 and overripe at 30. The number one reason for retirement communities shoud not be to warehouse those with more ear-hair than head-hair, but so, when (not if) the time comes to fix the mess we’re in, they will know where the find the answers.

We will, when the time is right, tell them all of the intelligent things our parents told us… all of the wise lessons that we should have shared with our progeny while we were raising them. We were too busy buying stuff to consider old timey ideas like living within our means, individually and as a country, honoring women (did they get sold a bill of goods in the ‘70’s or what? Even cats know better than to settle for equality when they are, by nature, superior.), being loyal to our country instead of bad-mouthing it just because some Hollywood superstar du jour says it’s “cool”.

Oh, It will be a great day to behold! We will be more obnoxious than an SEC football or Boston Red Sox fan.

But since none of that matters, we will proceed.

Chapter 1 Recognizing Aging

One of the problems of aging is not realizing when it happens. One day you are bopping along at a lively pace, checking out the pretty girls and fast cars. The next day you are watching QVC and dialing up to buy those shoes that fasten with Velcro.

One night you are out dancing and hoping you get lucky…a week later you’re complaining that the music is too loud and hoping to get “lucky” and make it through tonight with only one bathroom run.

Scientist are baffled by the sneaky timing of getting old. Partially, it is because there are so many variables, like wealth, genetics, personal habits and so on. But the main reason more research hasn’t been done is that there is a lot more money in acne creams and feminine hygiene products.

As a public service to those in doubt about where they are on the road to the afterlife, here are five questions that will help you find your way.

1.) True or false, whoever invented the pill minder deserves the Nobel Prize.

2.) True or false, The “convenience” of having everyone able to get in touch with you via cell-phone is the worst idea ever.

3.) True or false, Movies are better than ever.

4.) True or false, They ain’t making ‘em like they used to.

5.) True or false, I fell asleep on question 2.

Before we get to the responses, please understand that there are no right answers…not because of any belief in saving your self-esteem or even because there is no Federal standard for aging (just look at Social Security…apparently “old” is whatever the trust fund will bear at any moment.) No, there are no right answers because this little quiz is meant as a guide, a roadmap to show the way. However, if there were correct answers, they would be as follows:

1) True. When we peruse the list of Nobel winners of recent decades, it is obvious that the cause of mankind was better- served by the invention of the pill minder than Jimmy Carter’s lasting peace in the middle east, or by Al Gore’s foray into the movies, or even by the current chief executive’s courageous act of, well, taking the oath of office and meaning well. How much more of a service to humanity was the dual purpose pill minder. Think about it, it not only keeps a weeks worth of drugs in their place allowing for proper dosage and keeping us from winding up like many a young Hollywood star, but, at a glance, one can know, with some degree of certainty, what day of the week it is. If you are among the ever-expanding mass that has been cut out of the workplace for having experience, you can appreciate the importance of that little feature.

2) True. If you have ever had the pleasure of having that little device go off in the bathroom only to have the party on the other end ask, “What’re you doing?” you know the truth of number two (actually, if you answered the question asked by your caller, you both know the truth of number two.) Also, let us not forget texting. Seriously, does anyone have fingers that small? I once spent week trying to figure out why everyone I knew was lolling. I though they were all at the beach lolling in the sand or on a ski trip lolling in the lodge. I wondered who was doing any work if they were all lolling about. Then a young friend (40’s) told me about text-speak. It took me three years to get through Spanish I and I would still probably starve to death in Barcelona. Now we’ve got tattooed little freaks just making stuff up to make me feel stupid. Well all I can say is, “How about if I repond to your new shorthand with my old long finger. Oh, and you can take pictures with your phone…at least that’s what they tell me.

3) If you answered “true” to this one, you are the reason why so many of Tinseltown’s elite can afford to OD. The good news is that, if you think movies are better than ever, you probably also, “Can’t believe it’s not butter,” and think tofu burgers are food. To be exact, When we have to endure warnings on cigarettes although medical science can’t tell us when they are going to kill us, why are we able to blindly go into movies like “The Men Who Stare at Goats?” When this masterpiece of modern cinematography was over I wished I was blind. In fact, I truly believe Helen Keller would have sensed the need to walk out of this. In this age when everyone is getting naked and cussing on regular TV under the guise of “maturity,” maybe we need a new movie rating system. Instead of trying to keep us away from sex and violence, how about a little guidance in the area of stupidity and pointlessness? I can hear the announcer now, “This movie is rated PS. It is pointless and stupid. The rating could also stand for the fact that it will “probably sweep” the Oscars.”

4) True. Regarding everything from cars to politicians to houses to schools to parents to…well you get the point. I will give you an example. John F. Kennedy had a girlfriend. Bill Clinton had a girlfriend. Kennedy was fooling around with Marilyn Monroe. Clinton had Monica Lewinsky. ‘nuff said!

5) If you answered “true,” don’t feel bad, old fellow. You don’t even want to know how many naps went into writing this.

Chapter Two-Great Fitting Genes

Everything we need to live long enough to be a burden to our children (which should be the goal of each and every one of us) we got from our parents. Somewhere In the deep recesses of our bodies are the genetic tendencies that will, pretty much, govern our longevity. To put it scientifically, the fix is in. Someone once said that birth control is genetic. If your parents didn’t have children, chances are that you won’t, either. It is the same with long life.

Now, there are those who will argue that this is an oversimplification and does not take into account the many variables like modern medicine, new discoveries about nutrition and exercise, the great taste of beer and the advances in pizza-making, etc. They are right, of course. It also doesn’t take into account the odds of starving to death when the government finally completes the destruction of our economy, but we digress.

Let’s say you are born…as so many people are these days and you have two parents who have blue eyes and blonde hair. They are both around six feet tall and both of their parents lived to be 114 years old. Most people would agree that the odds are pretty good that you will also look like an Arian god, and live a long and healthy life, unless, of course, you move to Detroit, Indianapolis, East L.A. or Harlem and enjoy a good midnight walk. Once again, those darn variables.

If we dismiss the high and low marks like they do in the Olympics, which means discounting the increased chance of skin cancer in very white people and the chances of your pursuing a career in law and/or politics and getting shot at a relatively early age, you are still looking at the very real possibility of outliving your value by twenty or thirty years.

The bottom line is that nobody really knows how long you will live. Oh, sure, the government pretends to have a calendar on their refrigerator that will tell everybody’s life expectancy. How else could they continue to pull the Social Security scam? It’s the same with the insurance companies. There is viable research that, if you lie about your smoking to an insurance agent, you will live just as long as if you actually don’t smoke. You say you don’t believe it? Well, It’s right there on the internet, along with the global warming/cooling/ statistics, and those pills that make things (and I don’t mean tomatoes) grow. Now don’t you feel foolish?

It’s a lottery. It’s one big game of chance. It is such a gamble that one might, rightfully, be surprised the powers-that-be in the Bible Belt allow people to have children, (although many of them would prefer the process not take place on Sunday.) At best reckoning, the odds of living to be a burden on your children, which is everyone’s secret ambition, are about 90% set by genetics.

So, one might ask, why all the brouhaha about living a healthy life, eating well, drinking in moderation and avoiding stress? Because the government ran out of anything productive to do right after VJ Day. They were bored. So, they embarked on a crusade to convince us all that, 1) we want to live forever and , 2) they can help us do it.

Not to belabor the point, but the reason is, as you might have guessed, commercial. In an effort to thwart unemployment the government started the propaganda campaign about long life being a good thing in order to get rid of warehouses full of juicers, tofu and exercise equipment. Actually, it has worked better than any government program since The Department of Education raised the level of union membership (and ignorance) across this, once-great nation. The warehouses, once emptied, were filled with Viagra, Scootarounds and that stuff that you spray on your head that “looks and feel like real hair.”

Then the warehouses were torn down and Active senior subdivisions were built. They had golf, tennis, bowling and Wii. All of this served to accomplish exactly what the government wanted. Since these folks have long-since outlived their savings,(not to mention their pension plans that were sunk into government corrupted investments like Enron and Bernie Madoff they are left with nothing but Social Security. Who do you think gets those votes?

All of this foolishness, to try to change the fact that people die. It might be worth consideration to just live while we’re here and give people something, other than how natural we look, to talk about at our funeral. Of course he looks natural in a casket…he’s 100 and dead. Get a life!

As children, many of us were taught that the necessities of life were food, clothing and shelter. Of course, this was before cable, cell phones and the internet.

Thanks to advertising gurus, we now have more necessities than we know what to do with. The argument can be made, for instance, that transportation has become a vital need in the wake of the growth of our cities. If you live in Los Angeles you can take the city’s rapid transit. It is mostly clean and reliable and it will get you to work at least every other day.

There are busses that save gas by putting a hundred people in one vehicle and stopping every ten feet between where you are and where you want to go.

There are taxi’s that not only take us from point “a” to point “b,” but, if you pay close attention to the radio, you can learn a new language…a twofer.

Trains are an amazing combination of speed and inconvenience. In Atlanta, Georgia, If you want to see the Braves play, MARTA takes you rapidly from the place where you parked to a station which is an easy 30 minute walk from Turner Field through a crime-infested area (you have to walk right by the state capitol, after all) .

And that’s just local travel. When you want to go over the river and through the woods to Grandma’s condo in Florida, a whole world of frustration is opened to you. You can take the Interstate Highway System, which was started by President Eisenhower and could be finished any day now. Or you can fly and meet the nice people of TSA, which, of course stands for Terrorizing and Slowing Airports. Here’s a sure sign of aging .Remember the movie Airplane? Remember the scene with the x-ray machine? Remember when we thought that was funny? Of course, Granny could always come to see you. Who knows…while going through the screening, she could make a love connection.

For long distance travel, the environmentalists and people older than you will tell you to consider traveling by rail. Great idea! It’s the best of both worlds. The expense of air travel combined with the speed of hitchhiking.

As you can see from the examples above the need for transportation is very real, and is filled nicely by …cars. Even at today’s gas prices, the cost of travel by automobile is cheap by comparison, even if you include the cost of psychotherapy and possible divorce proceedings in the mix. As for saving the ozone layer, if you are over 50, you have been hearing for over fifty years that we are making the planet unlivable. Consider this…if the amount of hot air expended in our lifetime on the subject hasn’t caused massive global warming, it could be that we are safe for the near future…and really, isn’t it a little hypocritical of Washington to tell us to consider the future generations, what with the way they budget?

But if we just take the original three, food clothing and shelter into account, we can see that the aging process changes life at the most fundamental level. You can’t eat what you want, you can’t wear anything stylish and a house is really just a roof to keep the rain off of your head and a set of walls for pictures of the grandkids.

The James Bond penthouse in the sky is never going to be where you live, and you couldn’t afford it and the Viagra necessary to use it properly, anyway.

Then, as a consolation prize, we discover meat. The meat is often accompanied by French fries. Once again, life is good. That is, until we get older and we come face to face with cholesterol. Meat is declared bad and forbidden…especially when cooked outdoors, the way God intended. In one fell swoop, men are deprived of the food we love and the manly act of preparing it. It’s enough to make you hit the milk bottle again, since the other form of dairy delivery has long since stopped being offered. So we decide to take the path to good health because we have bought into the fantasy that getting older is a good thing, in spite of the misery it brings. So, from the time we are in our mid fifties (middle age…yeah, right) until the end of the road, food becomes what it seems like instead of what it is. “You know, this tofu tastes just like meat,” your wife will say. Or, “I can’t tell the difference between this mushroom burger and the real thing,” you will say to her.

It is a code between old people. What we are actually trying to say is, “Shoot me! Please shoot me before I have to eat any more of this crap.” She doesn’t let you win because it’s for your health and the other wives would talk about her if she let you die. You go along out of habit, more than anything else, since, ever since you were dating, your whole purpose in life has been to please her…something that goes back to those milk containers, I’m guessing.

Clothing is, frankly, just a matter of personal exhaustion. When we are teens, tight fitting jeans are a sign of virility for males and availability for females. Past a certain age, tight fitting jeans are a sign of…fat. Oh and just a short survival tip, here. “Do these jeans make me look fat,” is not a question. Anything you say will be wrong! Here are just three examples:

“No, I don’t think it’s the jeans,” will put an abrupt stop to any romantic plans you have for the night.

“ Yes,” will make you the talk of the neighborhood and possibly give you the chance to meet Dr. Phil.

“It doesn’t matter. Nobody is going to notice, and besides, we’re late…” let me put it this way, do you sleep on your back? So did John Bobick.

Psychologists tell us that, during the teen years, part of the mating ritual in the human being is to wear fancy colors, like many birds, in order to be seen by the opposite sex. It is only natural that, as we get older the female dresses down so the male won’t get exited and cause her to miss Oprah. The male, meanwhile, dresses in more subdued colors to avoid the attention of the female and thus dodge taking out the trash, helping with the dishes or hearing about her day.

Food, clothing and shelter…they were once the three necessities…they are now the three disappointments.

Chapter 3-Eating, Drinking and Breathing the Air.

As children, many of us were taught that the necessities of life were food, clothing and shelter. Of course, this was before cable, cell phones and the internet.

There are busses that save gas by putting a hundred people in one vehicle and stopping every ten feet between where you are and where you want to go.

There are taxi’s that not only take us from point “a” to point “b,” but, if you pay close attention to the radio, you can learn a new language…a twofer.

Trains are an amazing combination of speed and inconvenience. In Atlanta, Georgia, If you want to se the Braves play, MARTA takes you rapidly from the place where you parked to a station which is an easy 30 minute walk from Turner Field through a crime-infested area (you have to walk right by the state capitol, after all) .

And that’s just local travel. When you want to go over the river and through the woods to Grandma’s condo in Florida, a whole world of frustration is opened to you. You can take the Interstate Highway System, which was started by President Eisenhower and could be finished any day now. Or you can fly and meet the nice people of TSA, which, of course stands for Terrorizing and Slowing Airports. Here’s a sure sign of aging .Remember the movie Airplane? Remember the scene with the x-ray machine? Remember when we thought that was funny? Of course, Granny could always come to see you on the plane. Who knows…while going through the screening, she could make a love connection.

As you can see from the examples above the need for transportation is very real, and is filled nicely by …cars. Even at today’s gas prices, the cost of travel by automobile is cheap by comparison, even if you include the cost of psychotherapy and possible divorce proceedings in the mix. As for saving the ozone layer, if you are over 50, you have been hearing for over fifty years that we are making the planet unlivable. Consider this…if the amount of hot air expended on the subject in our lifetime hasn’t caused massive global warming, it could be that we are safe for the near future…and really, isn’t it a little hypocritical of Washington to tell us to consider the future generations, what with the way they budget?

The James Bond penthouse in the sky is never going to be where you live, and you couldn’t afford it and the Viagra necessary to use it properly, anyway.

When we are young, our parents get us hooked on milk, the stuff that turns cute calves into big fat cows. Nutritionists and Hugh Hefner tell us breast milk is best. Males of the species probably would have figured that out by ourselves. Then we get weaned. It is the first clue many of us have that life is going to get worse. Then, as a consolation prize, we discover meat. The meat is often accompanied by French fries. Once again, life is good. That is, until we get older and we come face to face with cholesterol. Meat is declared bad and forbidden…especially when cooked outdoors, the way God intended. In one fell swoop, men are deprived of the food we love and the manly act of preparing it. It’s enough to make you hit the milk bottle again, since the other form of dairy delivery has long since stopped being offered. So we decide to take the path to good health because we have bought into the fantasy that getting older is a good thing, in spite of the misery it brings. So, from the time we are in our mid fifties (middle age…yeah, right) until the end of the road, food becomes what it seems like instead of what it is. “You know, this tofu tastes just like meat,” your wife will say. Or, “I can’t tell the difference between this mushroom burger and the real thing,” you will say to her. It is a code between old people. What we are actually trying to say is, “Shoot me, please shoot me before I have to eat any more of this crap.” She doesn’t let you win because it’s for your health and the other wives would talk about her if she let you die. You go along out of habit, more than anything else, since, ever since you were dating, your whole purpose in life has been to please her…something that goes back to those milk containers, I’m guessing.

“No, I don’t think it’s the jeans,” will put an abrupt stop to any romantic plans you have for the night.

“ Yes,” will make you the talk of the neighborhood and possibly give you the chance to meet Dr. Phil.

“It doesn’t matter. Nobody is going to notice, and besides, we’re late…” let me put it this way, do you sleep on your back?

Psychologists tell us that, during the teen years, part of the mating ritual in the human being is to wear fancy colors, like many birds, in order to be seen by the opposite sex. It is only natural that, as we get older the female dresses down so the male won’t get exited and make her miss Oprah. The male, meanwhile, dresses in more subdued colors to avoid the attention of the female and thus dodge taking out the trash, helping with the dishes or hearing about her day.

Food, clothing and shelter…they were once the three necessities…they are now the three disappointments.

Chapter 4-Children and Other Sexually Transmitted Diseases

When we were growing up, there was only one way sex could kill a person. That’s if her father found out. Today, because of women’s rights, welfare, the state of education, the sexual revolution and other “progressive” gifts to our society, we have countless means by which we can die from intimacy. As folks are so fond of pointing out, women today have “choice.” You can “choose” from a smorgasbord of illnesses that can ruin your life and, yes, even take it from you. Of course, you could “choose” to use condoms to stop the spread of disease- including the STD that keeps on giving, children,- but a surprising number of people “choose” not to use them. Then, when the inevitable event for which the sex act was invented occurs, a multitude of men, “choose” to disappear. The child grows up without a father, probably in poverty, joins a gang to get some male recognition and the “mother” spends a life behind the eight ball and at the mercy of those who would abuse her. Well, at least we didn’t interfere with a woman’s right to “choose.”

Surprisingly enough, in spite of cable TV and public education, a lot of people go about having a family in the time-honored way that starts with marriage and, for about half of them, ends with death. At the time of death, usually of the man, the “cause of death,” is listed as cancer, heart attack, complications from diabetes, etc. The actual cause of most people’s death is, “kids.” Let’s look at this objectively, shall we?

A child is born and it is referred to as a “blessed event.” The new Mom and Dad have waited nine whole months for this little package from heaven. It is usually a boy or a girl, (pretty soon it may be against the law to check.)

If it’s a boy, the parents are destined to a future that includes a lot of leaving, a lot of pride and a lot of tears. First, he will leave for daycare and Mom will cry. Then, a few days later, he will leave for football camp, a day or two after that he may depart for boot camp where he will spend a couple of weeks and come back as a man. More tears from Mom. Possibly he will decide to go to an Ivy League school. (Did we mention that football didn’t work out and the band had some kind of Draconian requirement that its members have talent?) The bottom line is that he may get in, but the word “scholarship” appears nowhere in his acceptance letter. Mom sobs because her baby boy is going away and Dad in inconsolable at the thought of eating cat food.

If the blessing is female, well, you, as parents, just fell through the looking glass. For the rest of your life, you will be blessed with a creature that is, and I quote,

“So stupid” and yet, ”too smart to be cool,”

“Ugly as a wet goat,” and yet “sick of being a sex object.”

“Too fat,” and yet, “too flat.”

“In need of whatever procedure is going around at a given moment,” but “unable to understand why people can’t just accept her for who she is.”

Then, all of a sudden, she will want to go to college…as far away as possible, so she can fly home every other weekend because she hates being away from you (translation, she has a boyfriend at home that she failed to mention on her application to Faraway U.)

Needless to say, this will end with her dropping out of school so she can be with the man (or, if she stays in college long enough, woman) she loves. You will be disappointed that she did not graduate, but somewhat relieved to stop the gusher of money flowing out of your pockets. But of course, you will be wrong. Finish this phrase, “First comes love…”

It may be love or it may be the biological need for children, but most girls want to get married. To be more specific, they want a wedding. The urge to procreate is one that is as old as the species. Unlike most evolutionary traits, the need for a wedding can be traced back to 1981. Prince Charles married Diana Spencer and fathers the world over have been paying for that wedding ever since.

The biological need we spoke of earlier is God’s way of making sure we keep procreating. Sex is great but even young people who love each other would, after generations, figure out that the pleasure is not worth the pain. Were it not for the “biological clock,” that says, “recess is over…let the games begin.” There is not a sex drive in the world that could withstand life with a two-year-old and come out on the other side saying, “Ahhh, let’s have another one.”

In other words, if God didn’t have a sense of humor that passes all understanding, there would only be only children. And if there were no little brothers and sisters, there would be no need for grandparents…or Valium.

We’ll discuss grand parenting, later. Right now let’s just savor the concept of sweet revenge when your children come home to their children and have no way of proving who shaved the cat.

Chapter 5- Exercise your way to a healthy, miserable existence.

In high school, boys and girls who can shoot or throw or hit or block or dribble are called “jocks.” They are revered among the student body and they usually get their pictures taken a lot for the annual. We all want to date them but, that is not in the cards because they usually date each other.

“Got to keep those bloodlines pure. No A/V club genes allowed in this end of the pool.”

Their high school experience teaches them to be leaders and to command respect. They often grow old having never known anything greater than themselves. The only thing more pathetic than their misplaced egotism is our misplaced envy.

As life goes on and we enter middle age, if we sell enough shoes we can scrape together the money to join the local “Club.” These are establishments created and maintained for the sole purpose of reminding us that we had acne as teens and a spare tire long before our time. When we look at the “Club Champion” trophy it’s like déjà vu. We can almost feel the wedgie as we stand in the presence of their perceived greatness. It’s just like school all over again, except now, we’re paying monthly dues for the thrill of defeat.

But age is the great equalizer. Eventually, the athletic prowess mentioned earlier diminishes (and dribbling takes on a whole new meaning.)

We expand our circle of abuse to include others who are willing to abuse us and remind us of our faults. The guys and girls who verbally taunted us are slowly replaced by men and women who, as teens, were even bigger geeks than we. Today, they are called, doctors.

Have you ever wondered why nobody can read a doctor’s handwriting? It is because they are members of a secret society called the American Medical Association and, like all clandestine groups, they have a code. This private club is dedicated to getting even with the rest of us on behalf of smart kids, everywhere. They have, in their membership, an inordinate number of valedictorians. Think about it! There is a requirement that dictates that one must be, at least, an honor graduate to get into the special schools that prepare them for a life of vengeance.

Remember how all of the “cool kids” in school smoked? What is the one thing all doctors tell us? “Quit smoking!” You can be wheeled into the emergency room with a severed limb and some kid in a white coat will tell you that, first, you have to stop smoking. What they are really saying is, “Not so cool now, are ya’, Bunky.”

They are given classes like, “Intimidation Through Scowling,” “Referrals: Money for Nothing,” and, of course, the medical mathematics of aging called, “As we Get Older 101.” They are taught to write so that only their street pushers, or “Pharmacists,” can decipher it.

The Hippocratic Oath is just for show. The real Credo of the medical profession is as secret as the Masons’ (although not as secretive as the mystical, changeable code sworn to by CPA’s) but it is believed to contain a solemn pledge to, “make ‘em know what the inside of a locker feels like.”

One of the most powerful weapons in their arsenal is the phrase, “As we get older…” As mentioned earlier, it is so much a part of the practice of medicine that it has an entire course dedicated to its proper use.

Usually uttered while writing a prescription for a drug you can’t pronounce (possibly because he’s making it up as he writes) the phrase is often an entre´ to the insistence that we “get more exercise.”

Ah, it comes around. The inability to do a cursed chin-up, push-up or sit-up forced them into a life of solitude and study. When the great equalizer gave them the power they lacked in high school, they were prepared for the challenge.

Slowly, at first, they began to control our lives. Like any other pusher, they hooked us on pills, first. But, that was not enough revenge. Under the guise of surgery, they gleefully cut into us while we slept, as they had always dreamt of doing. Then, when we awakened, they took all of our lunch money…for the next hundred years.

Now comes the next step. “Nationalized Health Care.” All the fun and sadism as before, but make the taxpayers…the successful, pay for it. It is as brilliant and diabolical a plan as mankind has ever devised. It’s even better than lawyers going to Congress and passing laws only lawyers can understand thus, creating a greater demand for lawyers.

Of course, this is only a theory. Or is it?

Chapter 6

Stress, it could kill you…it will certainly bore you.

Scientists have long told us that one of the leading causes of death is stress. They tell us it leads to everything from heart attacks and strokes to acne and the heartbreak of psoriasis. Oddly enough, they never mention the leading cause of stress. That, of course, is science.

The vast majority of us want to spend as much time as possible in an erect posture, breathing the air and enjoying the many wonders of the world around us. Then, of course, we spend an inordinate amount of our time watching MSNBC and Fox News and listening to talking heads that get paid a ton of money to make sure we do not enjoy the world around us. In the words of Yul Brynner in “The King and I,” “Is a puzzlement.”

It appears to the untrained observer that a lot of scientific progress lately has to do with telling us something else that is going to kill us, why it’s our own fault and what things that make life worth living we have to give up in order to extend our life. They say very little about what they plan to do about it. One of the frustrating and stress-inducing facets of aging is found in comparing medical science when we were young and medicine today.

If you were a child of the ‘50’s you remember the Salk vaccine that essentially eliminated polio. Then, a couple of years later you remember the Sabin vaccine that allowed it to be administered orally. You probably also recall how every child of the day believed the Nobel Prize should go to the guy with the sugar cube. We didn’t know much about science but we understood that not getting a shot was better than getting a shot.

In retrospect, the important thing was that science prevented polio. Salk didn’t get on TV and tell us he had found a way to live a relatively normal life in an iron lung. No, he said, “Stick this needle in your arm and you won’t get polio. You’re welcome. Have a nice day.”

One of the best descriptions of the scientific method, as it exists today, came from the runaway bestseller of the ‘70’s, “Looking Out For Number One,” by Robert Ringer. Ringer believed, in 1977, that the more people are working on a problem, the less likely a solution would be found. The reason is simple. If the problem gets fixed, the need no longer exists for the people…and they have to go find other work.

Now, you may think me cynical for agreeing with this sentiment, but, here it is 33 years after Ringer wrote these words and we are still plagued with cancer, malaria, traffic and government, in spite of the dedicated effort of tens of thousands of people and tens of trillions of dollars. That is the sort of fact that leads to stress.

We can only hope that stress doesn’t become a cause célèbre. The only think worse than bureaucrats trying to accomplish something, is actors and singers giving of their time and talent to tell us why we should give of our money to keep these worker bees on the job.

Think of the amazing effectiveness of “We Are The World?” Many of our younger readers probably don’t remember that before 1985, people were starving in Africa. Then, a group of soft-hearted superstars gave two whole hours of their time and recorded a song that Cyndi Lauper and Billy Joel agreed, “sounded like a Pepsi commercial.”

It raised over $60 million dollars and did such a good job of eliminating hunger, they decided to try it again after the 2010 Haiti earthquake. Amazingly enough, as of this writing, there has not been another earthquake since that recording.

Now let’s try to imagine the sincerity and heartbreaking emotion these stars could bring to the problem of stress. There, in a dim light would be some superstar who happened to be out of rehab that week telling us, “Stress is a killer. Every year stress takes the lives of so many due to heart attacks, strokes, psoriasis…not to mention the gunshot wounds inflicted by the stressed out because George W. Bush did nothing about gun control…

There we sit in our homes, thinking to ourselves, “He’s right. Stress must be stopped. I think I’ll send some money so we can end stress in our time, the same way we ended hunger in Africa.” Obviously, what we don’t see is the celebrity ending stress in his own fashion (probably illicit) right after the cameras go off.

To paraphrase the song, “There’s a point we’re making, we’re wasting our own lives.”There is only one way to live to an overripe old age in this age of stress…ignore it. Or, as another pop icon said, “Don’t worry, be happy.” And the best way to not worry and be happy is to be a celebrity. See how it all comes around? “American Idol” and “America’s Got Talent” are not just mindless pabulum. They are part of a master plan to save lives by turning everybody into a celebrity, regardless of talent, or lack thereof. Then, as quickly as we can say Paxil, stress is gone.

Brilliant!!

Chapter 7

Health Care Industry Care

Practically ever since the ink dried on the U.S. Constitution, elected officials have been trying to get re-elected by promising health care to the great unwashed. Even after it was discovered that we could achieve better health by becoming “washed,” politicians went around promising that, if elected for a fifty third term, they would see to it that those greedy doctors only took one chicken for taking out your tonsils. Left to their own devices, medical people have been know to charge as much as three chickens and two ears of corn for tonsils. For heart surgery or a boob job, one could lose the farm completely. Something had to be done. Promises had to be made. Non-specific threats to rein-n these saw-bones had to be issued. Who did they think they were? Lawyers?

Then, in the early part of the 21^st century, a new breed of politician came upon the scene. This bunch either didn’t understand the rules of the game, or they didn’t get the “When you actually get the job,” memo. When they got to Washington, in a move that was sneaky even for politicians, they actually went after the health care industry. They underhandedly broke the gentlemen’s agreement that had kept the stalemate alive (as well as many a patient) for generations. The deal went something like this, health care industry lobbyists would continue to give both sides tons of money as long as they (the lobbyists) were allowed to write any laws about health care. Lawmakers, as they are often called, were not to pass any laws about medical care in this country without prior approval. To paraphrase Sheriff Buford T. Justice in “Smokey and the Bandit, “You can talk about it, but dooooon’t do it!”

Now, as any high school guidance counselor will tell you, a politician is not a doctor. The practice of medicine, like any other form of witchcraft, should be left to people with specially trained accountants.

We all remember what happened the last time elected officials tried to get into anatomy. They passed a law that said a woman could have an abortion as a matter of personal privacy. After all, sex is fun…motherhood is difficult. Women have a Constitutional right to not be inconvenienced by a being too young to vote.

So, for about a year, proponents of the government getting into the health care business went around crying about how, without their intervention no cure for swine flu, bird flu, cat flu and the heartbreak of psoriasis would never be found. After all look at the way polio and malaria are running rampant.

Meanwhile the opponents toured the country explaining how, under the government’s plan, the next time you need a PAP smear, you’ll have to go to the DMV to get it. Not only that, under government health care we will be required to eat French fries the Canadian way… with mayonnaise. The health care debate was enough to make you sick.

When all was said and done (a term unfamiliar to Congresspersons) public opinion turned out to be a minor consideration. To the folks in Washington it ranked right ahead of actually reading the bill and figuring out how to pay for it. It turns out that all you have to do is pass a law at night, while the good shows are on TV and nobody will ever notice. What little coverage there was, was taken with a grain of salt. Everybody just thought it was a really boring episode of “House.”

One could make a pretty sound bet that, when the dust settles and the powers-that-be get bored with this toy and move on to “fix” something else about which they have no knowledge , we will be left with pretty much the same health care we have always had, only more expensive, of course. We can only hope that when all the lawyers and lobbyists and bureaucrats get their fill, the rest of us have a chicken left to pay the doctor.

Chapter 8

Embrace Your Inner Grouch

One of the raps against people as we get older is that grumpiness increases. The experts say this is due to physical maladies and mental diseases caused by the aging process. Of course, most of the geniuses making these pronouncements are barely old enough to go to a night baseball game alone, so there may be a more objective and less, shall we say, stupid, cause.

Yes, hearing loss is aggravating but what’s more irritating is the fact that, once we get that hearing aid, at a cost higher than we paid for our first car, there is very little worth hearing. Everyone around us seems to be an idiot. There are a number of reasons that this may be the case.

Number one among them is the fact that, about a generation ago, the American population got convinced that everybody deserved a college education. Here we are 30 years later and nobody knows how to fix a toaster because they all think they can fix the economy and cure cancer. They have been referred to as “overeducated morons.” The moniker is almost as harsh as it is true. The fact that you spent four years in higher education only seems to have taught you to be arrogant, small minded and in love with the sound of your own voice.

Meanwhile, the electronic media, which can best be compared to parasitic pilot fish or Spanish moss, pretends you are brilliant so you’ll buy blankets with arms and feminine hygiene products with wings. The media is so out of the loop that they don’t even notice that you are ignoring them en masse. This brings another thing to mind. You complain that we turn the TV up too loud. Would you like to know why? Well, here it is anyway. As inane and empty as the content of most TV shows is, we would still rather hear it than you. That’s how much we value your opinion. Put that in your diploma and smoke it.

You say we move too slowly? There is method to our madness. The next time you are out in your sports car behind a person of age, going ten miles below the speed limit with his left blinker on for about ten miles, go ahead, try to pass. We’ll hang a left whether there’s a road there or not. We’ve always wanted a Corvette, and the impatience of youth is a lot cheaper way to get one than anything GM or the government (oops, same thing) has come up with.

You laugh at us for going to the restaurant at 5 o’clock. Do you know what we miss by going early-You and your bad table manners, screaming kids and constant extolling of the wonders of sushi. Do us all a favor, the next time you order the raw fish, get an order of raw hush puppies to go with it. That’ll shut you up for a while.

If we seem a little grumpy and out of sorts, try to look at it from our perspective. We have to deal with you, and the fact that you never learned to use OPM (other people’s mistakes) All of the stupid and useless stunts you are pulling, we pulled years ago. We can look back and tell you what the outcome is going to be, because we already lived it. Can you imagine how frustrating it must be to be God? He’s probably up there right now saying, “Hey, Moses, check it out. You’re not going to believe it. They’re at it again” When He says, “I’ve seen it a thousand times…He’s actually seen it a thousand times.” Being older is just a small taste of what He has to abide eon after eon. God has learned to deal with it. Sometimes I think all we are to Him is an ongoing episode of “Humanity’s Funniest Home Videos.” Otherwise there would surely be a lot more volcanoes.

So when you observe that we are a little out of sorts, before you express your opinion try to remember, there is very little reason for us not to shoot you. First of all, most judges are our people, so we probably won’t be convicted. Secondly, “Life in prison” is, to us, just not that long a sentence. Besides, we get three meals a day and a roof over our heads. TV sets are controlled by adult men, and we still get visits every week from the grandkids. Then, they go home, and we go back to our quiet, peaceful cell and take a nap. In perspective, it’s amazing that any of you have survived.

Chapter 9

Grandchildren…The Pot of Gold Near The End of The Rainbow

No one really knows, for sure, the reason for the bond between grandchildren and grandparents. It has been suggested that it has to do with the fact that they have a common enemy between them. Some psychologists opine that the elders are just trying to recapture lost youth. Of course, these are usually young psychologists and, therefore, as we have discussed earlier, should probably be ignored. One expert is of the opinion that grandkids are a do-over…a chance to atone for all the mistakes we made as parents. The glitch in this theory is in the legitimate question, “If I was such a screw-up as a parent, how did my progeny turn out these perfect beings?”

The truth is there is no reason whatsoever to try to analyze the relationship. Life is too short. (There will be a brief pause for grandparents to say “No kidding!”) The best explanation offered, so far is that, when we are raising our own, we are constantly focused on the future. What will they become? Who will they marry? Will they be healthy? How much more can the cost of sneakers rise? Grandchildren are “Now” and “Then.” They are to be enjoyed now and they love hearing about then.

If I may be allowed a personal aside, one of my daughters’ favorite childhood Christmas memories has to do, not with presents, or sugar plums, but of grandparents. We were fortunate to have both grandmothers living near us. They would both spend the night on Christmas Eve and, when the girls would go to bed, the grandmas would go with them and tell them stories about Christmases when they were young. Sometimes it’s hard to believe people call that time “The Great Depression.” I think about how important those stories were (and are) to my kids whenever I am soaking sore muscles after playing baseball with my grandson, Oliver. I think of how he will remember this when he grows up…and not just because it will probably the cause listed on “Pop Pop’s” death certificate.”

If you think the preceding was self-indulgent, please be advised that it may happen again…and again. I’m a grandparent.

This leads us to another advantage of “grandhood.” Remember back a few chapters when we were discussing how doctors always want us to exercise? Grandchildren are good for the heart in reality as well as metaphorically.

There is a story about Jim Thorpe, the greatest athlete of the 1^st half of the twentieth century. They say, in order to get the best workout possible, Thorpe decided to emulate every move made by a two-year old. It is reported that the greatest athlete of the 1^st half of the twentieth century collapsed in exhaustion after twenty minutes. Is there a mother reading this who could not have predicted that outcome?

Oh, there are certainly problems associated with grandchildren. Here are just a few that come to mind:

1.) When you show pictures of your grandchildren to another grandparent, they take it as a sign that you want to see pictures of theirs. This issue should probably be undertaken by the United Nations, as we are given to understand that it is a worldwide phenomenon.

2.) Well, I thought there were more, but, for the life of me I can’t imagine what they are.

When all is said and done on the subject of grandchildren, whoever said they were God’s gift for not killing your own, had it about right.

Chapter 10

Senior Care- Where Everybody Knows Your Name…On A Good Day

Assuming the traffic, government, your children and modern medicine don’t kill you, you may be faced with the decision that, while you are not ready to test what you claim to believe about heaven, you begin to see the signs that you are finally becoming the burden you always hoped you would be. Enjoyable as that may be, there will come a time when the kids start to pick up on the signs that you need to be cared for by anybody but yourself…or them.

Senior care facilities are uniquely American institutions. Like the rest of the country, they are run by, what amounts to “aging consultants.” A consultant has been defined as someone has read a lot of books on the subject, but has never done it himself. We have consultants for business, who have never run a business, political consultants who would never consider running for office. Why not have 35 year olds telling us how to get old.

Then there are the communities for “active seniors.” According to the advertisements, these places are like Club Med for attractive old folks. It is not clear from the brochures that you can even get in if you happen to look like Abe Vigoda.

Can’t you just envision life as an active senior? At long last, somebody built a golf course with a bathroom on every hole…each one equipped with one of those diaper changing tables, in case of a hole-in-one.

There will be trick or treating for Viagra and oatmeal.

“Hey, look. I got insulin!”

Who can wait for the never ending Easter egg hunt or the concerts in the park where you can’t turn down the symphony volume. The activities will be as endless as they are cliché.

One question, though…you may be active when you go into the place but, do you get bounced if you fall below a certain level of activity? This is another reason you may want to take care of your “elder care” plans while you are still young enough to read the fine print.

There are, however, many advantages to being in “senior care.” For example, no more home maintenance. In fact, at many of these facilities, full scale work is done on the place every morning. And, let’s face it, you needed to get up anyway.

Second is the attentive staff, who will never tire of hearing about your experiences in Viet Nam, your grandchildren, how it was back in the fifties when music was music, men were men and women were in the kitchen. The reason is two-fold: Unlike relatives, they are being paid to be there. And more importantly, there is a good chance they don’t understand English.

When you consider the planned activities and nutritious and “tasty” meals that the overseers have planned for you, basically, living in senior care is a lot like perpetual vacation bible school, but without the cookies… remember your sugar!

Of course the real reason people fight being, “shipped off,” is the idea of being forgotten. In the back of every aging person’s mind is the idea that the kids are just trying to get Mom or Dad out of the way so they can have things their way. That son-in-law never did like the way you grilled steaks. This could be a “bar-b-cue” coup. There are two facts of which you need to be aware if you have these fears.

First, if you watch TV, listen to the radio, or pay any attention to our government, you have to know that the fear of being forgotten is completely ridiculous because that train left the station when “The Golden Girls” went off the air. Anybody over 50 in this country has long since been forgotten. The real reason most people join AARP is just to get mail. Now, don’t you feel silly?

Second, in reality, although there are exceptions, most of the time the children are just trying make the difficult choice as to how to do the right thing. As we age, and become, slow, grouchy and a general pain in the butt, the kids have to decide whether to send us to be with others of our species, or smother us with a pillow. It kind of puts that shuffleboard tournament into perspective, doesn’t it?

…And Finally, Never Say “Finally.”

At every stage of life the body and mind go through changes. Some of these changes are welcome and some are not. We become aware of our sexual nature as teenagers. But, for that awareness we trade the ability to think coherently. This affliction often lasts well into adultery (not a typo). We are allowed to drive a motor vehicle but we have to deal with, “that time of month,” and embarrassing erections during Algebra class.

As we enter young-adulthood, we have ambitions and dreams. We fall in love and enjoy optimism, confidence and an attitude that there is nothing we cannot conquer. As a means of tempering this thought process, nature gives us children. As we pass from our twenties into our thirties the belief that we are invincible gives way to the beginnings of wisdom. We meet, for the first time in our lives, our new best friend…tired.

We discover that sporting events are on television and we notice that all of the tail-gaiting foods are fattening so we stay home on weekends. At first invite friends and neighbors over to watch the game so we can tell ourselves that we are just as sociable as before. But then our friends discover that sporting events are on their television, too. Why get dressed up and come to someone’s house when we can stay in our underwear during the game… just like the players.

Oddly enough, the further removed from actual sports men get, the more they need to talk about sports. This has given rise to something called. “Sports talk radio.” This is an electronic forum where men who hit a double one time in Little League can sit in a chair and call up the show and anonymously pretend they know why the local team’s manager or coach should be fired. This can be done with our without the benefit of alcohol…allegedly. You may find it hard to believe but, Las Vegas bookmakers rarely listen to these enlightened callers for tips.

Women are biologically incapable of talking about sports for hours on end. This is why they are called the “weaker sex,” (behind their backs, of course). But the need for companionship remains, so they get together in groups of three to five and eat small or green food, gossip, drink white wine, gossip and talk about how aggravating the men in their lives are. This is called “shopping.” Details on the practice are sketchy, at best, and it is probably best that they remain so.

As we enter our “Golden Years,” certain terms begin to have new meaning…or no meaning at all. One such term is, “Golden Years.” If you are in your, “Golden Years,” and you hear the term, “Golden Years,” you are advised to stifle the urge to laugh hysterically. This behavior could lead to extremely assisted living. A better plan is the one that most folks have tried in the past. Just ignore the person talking. This is effective because the speaker is probably a younger person (and most likely a sales person) who assumes you are hard of hearing since you are in your “Golden Years.” The hearing aid industry has known about this practice for generations, but they aren’t talking.

There comes a point, nobody ever sees it happen, where even sports and shopping give way to doctors appointments and funerals. If those “sports talk” stations had any sense, they would change formats and go with, “What’s Wrong Radio.” People could call up and talk to a sensitive host about their ailments. Then, like sports radio, others could call and tell why their shingles trump the last caller’s bursitis. Believe it or not, regardless of how your kids react, there are a lot of folks out there who thoroughly enjoy hearing other people’s problems. It has made Dr. Phil and Judge Judy very rich.

It could all be sponsored by those bee pollen pushers. They could have an afternoon show broadcast live from the local American Legion where Vietnam Veterans would help elders deal with being ignored and underappreciated. When all was said and nothing was done, they could have a nighttime show called, “I couldn’t sleep, either.” It would feature special guests who have proven cures for insomnia…economists, investment analysts and anyone from National Public Radio come to mind.

Of course, before we could get the accountants running radio to go for the idea, we would have to convince them we aren’t all hard of hearing. It is kind of a detriment in radio programming.

In a nutshell, the point of this chapter, (and really, this book) is to help delve into the never-ending possibilities of life after middle age. It is important that we lead the way and show those who will come after the proper attitude. The reason for this is simple. At the rate medical research is growing there is a good chance we are never going to die. All of the diseases that used to wipe out older people are being cured and we don’t have the energy to get the really deadly ones the young people are inventing, although, thanks to Viagra, that old joke about dying at the age of 120 at the hands of a jealous husband is no longer a joke.

Embrace your selective hearing! Understand that short-term memory loss is a blessing! And, most of all, try to remember that it’s going to be even worse for the next generation. They’ll probably have to live with their ungrateful little offspring for 200 years. Now, don’t you feel better?

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Jim Just Thinking