family

Why?

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There is never any shortage of subjects to write about. Or talk about. The world today is ludicrously different from the world of my younger years, but the amount and scope of problems are about the same.

In the 1960s*, the war, civil rights, women’s right, climate change (yes, way back then), voting rights, tree-hugging, love, sex, algebra, the Exquisite No Bra, the end of The Bullet Bra, there was just so much to worry about that old people often warned me the end of civilization was near.**

With the young deaths from The War, the riots in the cities, and an older generation intend on making my cohorts and I toe the “shorthaircutcleanface” regimen from the 1950s, it did seem like The End was near. My father personally offered to end my world if I did not get my haircut.

Ah, good times. One good thing about my father is he loved bars/taverns. If we were with him, we loved them, too, especially the patrons who felt it was the right time for me and my brother to learn the evils of alcohol. And pickled eggs.

Flash forward to the present and what are we worried about? The End, still. Our Democracy is threatened, again, our natural world is at peril, still, and our capacity for destroying each other has increased. We can kill people from afar with effortless ease and without the time-worn threat of nuclear involvement. Through Ai, we can even wipe ourselves out with a “fox in the henhouse” attitude that seems to enjoy the eggs without regard for how long they may last.***

And we can instantly tell someone they are a butthead from long distance. We can even put it in writing so the butthead can review it at his/her/their leasure. ****

Soon, the magic of Quantum Entanglement might make it possible to insult the butthead face to face and beam back home before they understand what butthead means.

Here begins an age-old problem. This essay was started with the best to intentions and clearest of “point to be made”. But you can tell by the footnotes my brain has taken the nearest exit from the constructive, intelligent speed of the super highway to the slow-paced, drowsiness of memory lane. A cogent, pithy, well-thought-out essay is now as extinct as a pterodactyl. (Why can’t you hear a pterodactyl go to the bathroom? The “p” is silent.)

What do you call a person who can’t fart in public? A private tutor. Hope you don’t have to think about that one.

Or anything else. The World is The World and it has been for billions of years. Can we do anything to change it? Or course we can, look at history.

But can we do anything to change it and make it better? More livable for all? Happier for at least The Majority? Even if we change the world for the better how long will we be able to enjoy it?

Meh. Let’s say not long, and believe there is life after death, a better life, a fuller, life, an easier life with no Ends to worry about.

There was an advertisement for a self-help book “How to Solve 50 Per Cent of Your Problems”.

Ever the optimist, I bought two.

Full disclosure, if I ever write a joke of my own I will make sure you know it.

*Conveniently forgetting pre-1960 years of farming, using a baseball bat with the wrong grip, trying to shoot snakes with a cap gun, building snow forts in snowbanks as the plows were still running, and—you get the point: stupid kid.

**Apologies for mentioning the bra controversies but it was puberty and my mother bought all my clothes from the Sears Catalogue, so fashion (ahem) intrigued me.

***Pardon me for kind of enjoying this symbolism/metaphor/mini allegory.

****Yes, I do do this. Do do. Ha.

Do You Ever Wonder…

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What would it be like to be very rich? Obscenely rich? When I dream about it, it lasts two minutes before the impossibility of it shuts down the wonder. But what if…maybe…

Dr. Steven Wright says we wouldn’t really like it if we got everything we wanted: Where would we put it? Maybe one of the seven houses we would buy, one on each continent. Or a complete warehouse.

Hey. Why am I saying “we”? It would be mine, mine, mine.

What would it be like to look exactly like you think you want to look? Or—for the delusional among us—how you already think you look? Delusion, by the way, is underrated. Is it wrong for a 1 on the 10 scale to think he, she, or them look like a 9 or 10? If given a choice between an ugly man who sees himself as Hugh Hefner and a well-adjusted man who is a serial killer, the choice is easy. Not that a well-adjusted man would be a serial killer. As an irrelevant aside, I wouldn’t mind being George Clooney for a day. Or Cindy Crawford if options were limited and it didn’t last forever.

What would it be like, come to think of it, to suddenly become a member of the opposite sex, or any sex* you aren’t, presently? Is there an honest man amongst** us who will admit to imagining being a woman? I’ll bet this modern world has a woman or two who would never dream of being a man. And if you males imagine being a different sex, add different eras to be different sexes, too. To wit: a women in the 15th century. Or a cavewoman.

From my college days, I wonder what it would have been like to know what you want to be at 18 years old. In 1970, a circular group of 14 incoming Colgate University freshmen*** were asked what they wanted out of the University. 13 had specific goals like pre-med, pre-law, politics, health administration. Might be a good documentary to flash back and see how many made it. I hope they all did.  And if they did make it, hope it made them happy.

What would it be like if all the gadgets from old (and new) Star Trek shows were invented? Imagine being “beamed up” and around anywhere in seconds. Or the health analyzer Bones just pointed at people to learn what ailed them. We’ve had the “flip” communicator device for decades, now, so…there’s hope.

And have you been having trouble with your Ai partner? I turned off Emma, the dedicated and hard-working Ai add-on on my Android phone, last month. It wasn’t because of her small-type disclaimers at the end of her answers, but because if I asked her about slip-on shoes,  minutes later my phone was infected with slip-on shoe ads. I gave her a chance and asked if she was selling my interests to a third party and she denied it, but facts a facts, even when dealing with Ai. Since being uninstalled I have not heard “boo” from her. Good, right?

If you’re wondering, it’s back to plain vanilla google searches and so far, so ad-free. Google seems to be more interested, now, and asks questions.

Wonder what it would be like to not have my smart cell-phone partner anymore.

Ugh. Cold shivers.

I wonder if it would help my memory issue. Has my brain opted to let my phone remember everything? What if my battery dies?

Now, there’s a healthy conversation about a death other than my own.

*There are more options, these days.

**Notice among and amongst used correctly in two different places?

***And freshwomen? Or is freshmen a sexless term like sophomore, junior, and senior?

Weird Odd Things

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The Sand Striker worms are between 3 and 6 feet long. They burrow in the sandy sea bottom until only their antennae are exposed. They are blind but when a small piece of seafood touches their antenna, the worms flash up and use powerful pincer jaws to grab the small fish or whatever was passing by. The Sand Striker then pulls the catch into its sand tunnels and enjoys a meal. I heard about this from a radio interview with author Sabrina Imbler, who was talking about their book “How far The Light.” I haven’t purchased the book yet, but will, and hope everyone else does. They have an interesting way of knitting together science facts and human realities, and are a fine, interesting writer. There will be more.

It isn’t unusual to not know about sea creatures. We don’t run into them much on land. But another sea floor inhabitant, the Flatworm, has an interesting sex life. There is a great video on “youtube” from the BBC, narrated by David Attenborough. You should google. His wonderfully English-Empire voice and gravitas make the Flatworm’s reproductive operation serious as the Pope but with overtones of Monty Python. See, the flatworm is born with both male and female sex organs. DEI, anyone? Flatworms have mated in an odd way for millions of years, but it’s not clear why, or the Darwinian reasoning for their survival. When two Flatworms cross paths in the bottom of the ocean, they rise up like cobras and—really not making this up—begin to fence with their erect, two-pronged penises. It’s part Inigo Montoya* and part pornographic professional wrestling. The first asexual flatworm to “stab” the other with his penis, becomes the male of the relationship and floats away to enjoy his freedom. It is not clear if “he” is happy or not, but no child support. The “stabbed” flatworm becomes the female, mother, and transporter, assuming all the responsibilities and duties.** Can’t tell if “she” is happy or not, either. Wonder how many of us men are descended from flatworms. If any. It was so surprising I never researched how many times this can happen, or if–when one flatworm becomes a female–is it always a female? Uncommon (sic) sense suggests there might be a time at which all flatworms return to their dual-sex, true selves. Imagine what the Flatworm retirement home must be like. And the bathroom signage. And possible ED? Nothing like a sword fight with flaccid swords.

Life has been kind of nice, lately, learning new things is great. But a bad night’s sleep made me cranky and the drive to the grocery store was filled with idiots, morons, and flatworms who must have learned driving from The Three Stooges Driving School. The short trip ended without accident so as I sat in my car, the amount of time, effort, and blood pressure exerted in 15 minutes impressed me, and made me wonder why. The self-examination calmed me and allowed me to see the real problem: I had cursed 5 times and every time it was the same. I’m in a rut.

But I also felt it was all my fault for being cranky and most people were good, decent, caring drivers. I started my walk to the grocery door feeling better about people. So when I was suddenly cut off by a white Mercedes screeching to a halt right in front of the automatic doors, the first noises out of my mouth were not words. A very obese young man popped out of the car, left it running, and walked into the store. I followed out of curiosity. He spent 11 minutes shopping for bathroom tissue, paper towels, and beer. Then checked out, got back into his running car and drove off.

Nary a word from me or him, or anyone.

I deeply, deeply, regret not stealing his car. Repositioning it, I mean.

Hopefully, he feels the wrath of my dream of his capture by a Sand Striker.

Ah, life. You can’t live with it and you can’t something something something…

*Best line in any movie; “Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die.” For the young reader, watch The Princess Bride. A classic.

**But no soccer practice. Flatworms are feet-free.

Common Sense or OMR?

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12/24/2024 My favorite restaurant has an interesting customer service policy. It’s a modestly large restaurant about 40 yards square with banks of booths and clouds of tables. Some tables and some booths are in the front, facing the public, like European on-the-plaza restaurants, and the remainder of the tables are in the back area, behind the front row of booths and tables. When I visited the place (in 2024), I was disabled and using at least one cane. The hostess walked me all the way to the back of the restaurant to seat me. The front, public facing area was “not open”. It was odd but didn’t bother me much until it happened several more times. I asked the manager why was the front area off-limits, at least to me. “We don’t have enough servers”, was the response. What? I get there early with very few others, the restaurant is open 24 hours, and I’ve never seen it being cleaned, despite it’s obvious and satisfactory cleanliness, so…? With the front area being equidistant to the back in relation to the kitchen, why would a hostess drag a disabled customer all the way from the hostess stand to the secluded back of the place instead of the closer, brighter public-facing front? As a last personal dig at me, by the time I am done eating the hostess has begun seating people in that nice, open, bright, cheerful, public facing area.

This post sounds whiny but is an appropriate and measured response to the restaurant’s illogical seating. They had no idea the customer is always right. For 50 years I’ve dined in restaurants, dated waitresses, and learned the seating rituals of the Modern American Restaurant. Why doesn’t this restaurant begin the shift with all diners in the front area? It would be free advertising, too. Disabled patrons, especially, should not be walked to the very back of the dining area.

Present Day, August 10, 2026. I filed the beginning of this essay away two years ago, dismissing it as an unhinged, Old Man Rant (OMR). But it has crept back into my frontal lobe due to more opportunities to spawn* new OMRs. Like “un-placarded” vehicles parking in Handicapped Spots. No senior discounts at sites of commerce. Bread rising** in price by nearly 100 per cent. Insurance rates rising (again with the rising?) for a senior driver with no accidents in 50 years and 5,000 miles on the road per year. And a real oldie from last year: my 800 credit score meaning nothing to banks, lenders, and landlords.***

Uh-oh. Now I remember why I filed the original essay away: OMRs don’t matter (ODM). Okay, kids, who wants to hear an OMR?

My good friend Bill, who is 84, and I would like the rest of you to know if you ever want all the problems of this world solved, put us in charge. We’ve got plans and have compiled a list****. Just give us The Power and get out of our way.

Oh, and grant us immunity from state and Federal prosecution.

*What a perfect verb…

**The grammar police want me to use a different word,here, but bread rising is too cute to change.

***The reported and recorded facts of my financial history used to generate their own FICO numbers mean nothing in the new Ai credit approval world. One bank person actually told me “Just because you paid your bills on time for 50 years doesn’t mean you’ll do it again.” Ba dum dum.

****It may take us a moment to find it, so…be patient.

Things I Remember Blaming on Aging

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I invented a new curse word for a driver who turned left without a turn signal, but had to use the same word when my own blinker wasn’t on.

One thing gets done at one time. No multi-tasking—or any multi-anything—for a senior. I made a perfect grilled cheese sandwich and marveled at its crispy, brown coating while I  put the cheese away in the silverware drawer. So…when I went to make another sandwich it took me two and one half days to find the cheese, and it only happened while putting away the cleaned utensils from the first sandwich. If you lost your cheese, would you look for it in the silverware drawer? Sorry for the personal question. And yes, the cheese was moldy.

It’s the same with scissors. I bought a second pair and try* to treat them both like newborn babies.** If I didn’t, scissors would be left on the top shelf of the closet where the shelf lining was cut and not be found for some other task until more shelf lining was needed. A second pair has saved time, since it (almost) guarantees one pair will be in the drawer they are supposed to be in.

Prescription drugs are impossible without a chart of some kind, and a writing instrument (of some kind) to mark the chart. And mnemonic helpers. During the months of surgeries and treatment for The Calamities there, were pages of drugs to take with numbers, times, and descriptions. Thank God. Now, I take just two and a plastic marked tray keeps everything in order.  One has to be taken one hour before a meal and the other one two hours after a meal. I labeled them 1B, for one Before, and 2A, for 1 After. I think that’s-be right back.

We’re good. Checked the scissors and cheese while I was gone, too.

It isn’t that the brain is getting smaller, is it? Isn’t it just that there is so much happening, and we all only have so much computing power?

Whether that’s true or not, even suspecting anything is amiss fulfills its own whatever. I went out one time without my keys. One time in 74 years.*** Now, before the apartment door is opened, there is a moment of reflection to make sure my keys are in my hand. Other needs are checked, too, the wallet, phone****, and the thing for whatever errand I’m running…it’s hard to return unneeded shelf-lining to Walmart if you leave the lining in your apartment and remember it halfway to…where was I going?

So, “possible” memory loss is a tough issue. For one thing, what if we forget the “baseline” memory of youth? How would we identify and analyze memory loss in Old Age? And who among us trusts a complete (?) stranger who comes up to us and asks: “Don’t you remember me?”

One thing I know for sure is memory “retrievability” has slowed. It took me about 2 hours to remember Roger Federer, my tennis hero, the other day. If we just be patient and don’t waste computing time/brain time wondering why Roger Federer is not on the tip of our tongue, we will eventually see the memory is there, it’s the “indexing” that might have vanished.

But…wait…isn’t that memory loss?

*Try. The most used word, these days. Try to do this, try to do that, and try to remember to remember to try.

**As a 74-year-old Great Grandfather I have NEVER misplaced a baby. That I know of. Or was told about.

***I was a driving prodigy from a young age.

****A sharp-eyed reader may remember an essay about The Man Bag, the perfect tool for remembering everything. And who carried a phone in the 1970’s? A Wallet? We stuck a $20 bill in the pocket of our denim jeans and went out the door. At least that’s what I remember…

Fathers Day, with no apostrophe or apology

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Aging is interesting. Not to the young, of course, but there is a point in everyone’s life when we “suddenly” realize we are aging, if not “aged”. It is what happens after the realization we will talk about, here.

Fathers Day 2026 was an interestingly humorous celebration.

I probably learned about Fathers Day way back in The Early Years. Fathers Day was first proposed in 1909 in response to Mother’s Day.* Fathers Day was officially “recognized” in 1966 by Lyndon Johnson, and Richard Nixon made it a National Holiday in 1972. I was unaware of these dates because in 1963 I was learning how to shelter under a wooden desk if nuclear missiles were headed to upstate New York.** In 1972, I was either drunk, blazed, or courting the second or third “love of my life”. Honoring dad was the last thing on my mind. It didn’t help the holiday that my father and I had a unique relationship during my 1960’s teen years, and I wouldn’t have honored him, anyway.

It’s safe to use “aging” as an excuse for not remembering the first time Father’s Day caused my day to be about someone other than me.

But here’s the thing: the concept of unimportance has floated through my conscience many times over the last few months. It started with the China documentary where the repeated cycles of Dynasties rising and falling over hundreds of years led to millions of people—perhaps billions—dying simply because they were of the wrong family, cult, religion, or geographic area. What was important to those people? Did they have scrapbooks of family photos to pass down to survivors? Were their deaths heroic? Were there any survivors? Did they have special days for Fathers and Mothers?

And then there is politics…the rise of one party, the decline of another, and the passing of time making us forget all about The Whigs of the 1830s-1950s. And remember when Republicans were Democrats and Democrats were Republicans? And who can forget The Teapot Dome Scandal and Tammany Hall shenanigans, corruption at its finest. You remember, right?

Of course, you don’t. It doesn’t matter, now. Any of it. So what does matter?

National Geographic put out a wonderful chart detailing the rise and fall of “civilizations” through the ages. The Romans. The Incas. The Mayans, The Greeks. What do they all have in common? They’re gone, and we dig in the earth to find about as much as we can about them so we can…make the same mistakes?

It isn’t the rest of the World that forgets the lessons of the past, it is us, individually. We don’t pay attention. Even worse, we have the hubris to think we are smarter than The Romans. Even smarter than the Greeks.*** And we work harder than the Mayans. And we know better what to do with the Land than The Mohicans.****

It was Fathers Day last Sunday and the current local family met for burgers, beers, hot dogs, potato salad, and farting around the table. Of note, there were two whole barbecued chickens none of us had room for, even after passed gas made more space.

But as I sat there, watching kids, grand-kids, and talking about a great-grand-kid 1,100 miles away, the idea of how temporary life is swung into view with a thud. I’ve personally known over 50 Fathers Days, thanks to a young marriage and fatherhood. Is there any difference from the first to the last? And how many will the young people around the table experience?

I’m not sure where this essay is heading, but the Fathers Day tableau gave me something besides a sore butt from an uncushioned wooden chair: my time on this earth has been okay and would be okay, no matter what happens in the next few years. I am headed for an activity billions of people have already done, and everyone at the table would eventually do the same.

“It isn’t the destination, it’s the journey.” Please google this phrase. Ask Ai about it. They have more resources, space, and ability to explain it. For even more fun try it this way: “It isn’t the journey, it’s the destination.” And don’t believe everything you read.

*With an apostrophe. Google it. Or Ai, it.

**Don’t laugh. The air base sending B-52s to Russia was 5 miles down the road.

***We must be smarter because so many of the Greeks were homosexual and bi-sexual. How long can a civilization last with activity like that? 4,500 years?

****Google them. I dare you.

Why I Was Cranky

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If you crossed my path, yesterday, I’m sorry. It was a bad day. See if any of these things happened to you…in one day.

It began with a product search on Walmart’s website. The button for “In Store” was clearly bolded, but Walmart still gave me three pages of things that “Can be here tomorrow.” Four screens later I found the product I wanted, noted the in-store location, and put one in my cart. Off I went all the way across our small town hitting every one of the 374,000 red lights in the 3.2-mile trip. One red light lasted 3 minutes. (It felt like 300 since it was early morning and NO other cars were on any of the streets.) At the store, parking was easy but its tough to figure out what door is best because one checkout is at one end of hte building and the other checkout is at the opposite end. I guessed, parked, and turned on the Google Pixel Watch to track steps.*

My item was in Aisle C3 and I came into the store at Aisle G, clearly marked with a 2-foot square sign. I turned right, saw, Aisle H, and turned around to get my steps in the other direction. First was G, again, then F, E, D, and then…aisles with no big signs saying which one they were. A nearby stocker said she worked for “a supplier” and had no idea where Aisle C3** was.

I searched on my own for a bit, then sought help from a nice-looking lady with a Walmart Vest. In response to my question she looked up, looked around, and shrugged her shoulders. I sensed she might not be any help, so I found another vested worker. She, too, looked puzzled, but looked offended by it, so she got up from her stocking*** position. She walked around and found a small, square “mini-aisle” and let out a whoop. The six-foot square “aisle” was marked with a one inch wide, 6-inch-long label hidden behind a shelf support: C1. We exchanged nods, knowing C2 and maybe C3 would be around here, someplace. She asked what I was looking for and when I showed her the picture of my product, she pointed, excitedly: “There is is!”

It was behind glass in another 6′ x 6′ mini-Aisle with no markings. I walked around the entire “aisle” looking for any feature indicating any aisle numeration. Nothing. Well, some extra steps, so…

She unlocked the glass and handed me the product as if it were a new-born baby. I bowed to her otherworldly power.

Up to the front my product and I went, my mission, my quest complete. We strode confidently past the lonely, deserted, self-checkout registers to the only open cashier. We were sixth in line. Eight other checkout lines were empty and unlit. But wait, the unlit checkout next to us had a live person, entering information and checking someone out. Yes! I started to scoot over, but three new shoppers beat me to it. One of those shoppers gloated and asked why the rest of us were standing-now-ten deep in the lighted, open line.

I’ve run out of space so to summarize: all hell broke loose. The unlit checkout lady was going on break after she finished the current customer, so now there were 16 people ready to check out and not one of them could think of a pleasant thing to say. I left my product in a candy bar display and walked out.

On the way home an expensive Cadillac in front of me saw something in the road and shifted to the left lane. A hundred feet later he put on his left blinker. Shortly after, the Caddy shifted back in the right lane, with the right turn blinker coming on as soon as he/she/them had safely completed the move. Can turn signals be past tense? Or were they warped by a Black Hole’s massive gravity?

It was a day of many more small, niggly, balls-of-shite that fertilize The Cranky Weed, but they’ll have to become famous in a future essay. And I must tell everyone about the left-hand-turner-who-did-not-turn-left-at-the-green-arrow in the busiest intersection in the city. THAT is actually a good, cranky antidote, so it will be saved for later. And even it wasn’t enough to overcome the rest of the day. Why does it have to be that way?

Or is it all a tempest in a teapot?

Cheer up, People. We aren’t going to be here much longer.

*Which I enjoy taking. I was guessing for the door and checkout that would give me the farthest walk, and the most steps.

**Is it bad my mind keeps adding “eepio” to C3?

***Which was on the floor next to the lowest shelf in the store, probably.

Ruminations…Again

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If God is so smart and loves us so much, why did He make it so easy to gain weight and so hard to lose it? I’ve personally studied this phenomenon for years and sense an earthly conspiracy that may have corrupted God’s initial plans. All will be revealed, soon.

And we won’t mention teeth, but wasn’t titanium around when He designed the mouth?

The Republican Party should now be required to calculate and reveal how much the now 10-year search for voter fraud has cost American Taxpayers. Recent news reports say Trump and others have “hired” and then “fired” several private companies to review elections in several states, counties, and municipalities and expose fraud. Several Federal Agencies have been involved, too. Anyone seen any Fox News Reports?

Maybe Trump paid for the investigations, himself? If you are a donor to Republican Party PACS, you might want to see how your donations are being used given the results.

A lesson in hope was delivered to me, this week, and it was accepted. My car’s “Check Engine” light came on and the thought of a $1500 repair bill immediately joined it. But the nice people at my local auto parts store suggested it might not be an entire catalytic converter and offered  a bottled compound cleaner that may work well enough to clean the converter and get a few more months–possibly year–of “Check Engine” light relief. Even if it’s a scam, hoping for a $16 bottle cure is worth the risk. Sleep will be easy for the next few days as the cleaner runs it course. Either it works or more sleep will be lost later, stay tuned. BTW: Conspiracy? Extended warranty companies will NOT cover converter repair or replacement. Hm.

Give blood. It is one of easiest and most rewarding things you can do. Full disclosure, I am a volunteer Red Cross Blood Donation Ambassador and have a vested interest in your donation: saving lives. If you are medically able to donate, you can use an app that tracks your donation from collection to medical use. There’s nothing better than the last stage of your “Blood Journey” where the app not only shows where your blood went, but also this; “You’ve helped save more than one life.”

As a survivor and continuing student of The Calamities of 2023*, and now a regular blood donor, I am an expert on the drawing of blood. It may hurt my plea from the preceding paragraph, but can any big-brained, or mechanically-inclined brain, find an easier way to get the blood out of the body and into the tubes/bags or bottles? My exposed arms suggest multiple, suspicious injections to someone unaware** of the blood collection mechanics. Maybe we need a rating system for phlebotomists? Or some kind of shut-off valve.

I live in an area we can call Trump Country. At a recent public event there were lots of comments begging for a response. No, I did not to all, but to some, in case you’re curious. “I hated Joe Biden” was a frequent comment. I ask the speaker if they’d ever met Biden, but the point was lost when they answered in the negative and looked at me like I’d asked a stupid question.

“It sucks to live in California.” Me: “Have you ever lived there?” Trump supporter: “No.”

And for balance, one supporter said, “Trump is an asshole.” The supporter didn’t elaborate and I did not ask him/her/they the “Biden question”. What would be the point?

The real point is stop believing what you hear without learning more.

And hate never does anyone any good.

*As time passes, it’s become important to note the inception.

**Thankfully, most people are aware but still feel compelled to ask, “Did it hurt?” No, it didn’t, but the questioning is annoying.

Blind Finding the Blinds?

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God, through His subscription streaming service, Life, has interesting ideas about human existence and the years we spend on earth. For our senior years, for example, He has instructed the powers that be at Life to make our last years as challenging as possible. The point is to test us seniors and see which side of The River Styx* we end up on, and how high up in Heaven or how low in Dantes Circles we go. An example of this late-in-life testing is simply getting dressed. All of us remember jumping out of bed, throwing on some clothes. and heading off to work, play or party…when we were young. It might have been ten minutes from awake to turning the ignition key.**

If we tried doing the same thing this late in life, we’d eventually make a call to a close relative or friend to come get us up off the floor. And—because we get stubborn as we age–it would be a lot longer than ten minutes before we surrender all pride and get to a phone, even if we planned ahead and left it near us. Damn socks. Invent slip-ons, like shoes, dammit.

Senior life then becomes a life of leisure and disregard for the world’s major events, but with a close, annoying, aggravating, non-symbiotic relationship surrounding the Activities of Daily Living (ADL***).

As a younger old man****, my patience was lost on nearly every test thrown my way in my new Old Man career, with the resulting invective stream: “Dammit! WTF! Why me? Why now?” You may have read about some of these adventures in very old essays.

But a simple reading of the room—”commonly called paying attention” –revealed while annoying things were happening, they weren’t just happening to me. The pain is cohort-wide.

Now, with understanding and patience firmly tucked into the frontal lobe, I aspired to get replacement blinds for my apartment windows. This was going to be a long story, but the preface appears to have taken up most of today’s available space. The incongruous but—sadly–modern twists and turns of the War for The Mini Blinds will have to be delineated and explicated in a future essay. It’ll tug at your heart strings, whatever the hell they are.

But a warning, here, for anyone who thinks senior life is all napping, streaming, and ranting: It is, mostly, but we do face a life of paper cuts no younger person can imagine or would have the will to endure. We achieve patience by knowing it happens to everyone who gets the privilege of being “Aged”. We view it as a blessing. Ask any senior and they will tell you how happy they are to be so old. Ask, I dare you.

There isn’t much room left for anything but a quick joke. If I’ve told it before, sue me. And if you are offended, good. Its nice to finally get credit for doing something. Of note, my ancestors–and therefore moi–are citizens of the butt of this joke and do not mind you laughing, as long as its with us and not at us. We’ve come a long way as an Ethnic Group and are proud to be part of making someone else’s life a little brighter.

A Polish man locked his keys in his car.

It took him an hour and a half to get his family out.

Tomorrow, we pick on Italians! Another robust branch of the family tree.

*Yes, I know. I am Unitarian Universalist. Deal with it. Think “Literary License” aka “Poetic License”. Qualified immunity.

**We didn’t have push button start in those days.

***Real thing. Google it, especially young people. Best to learn about it, now, and be ready.

****You get that, right?

              What To Do With Old Memories

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Years ago, when mom died, you all read about the 20 plastic totes of memories in the basement of her house. Pictures, articles, obituaries, birth announcements, first communions, wakes, and simple stuff like when the girls were photographed jumping rope in 1973 and the picture was printed in the paper. IN THE PAPER! In 1973! The old paper stuff feels important, historic, even if it is just two little girls and a rope on Embargo Street in Rome, NY…in 1973.*

The “Sorting of The Totes”, a family tradition since the Middle Ages**, resulted in mountains of memories and momentos being distributed to each totes’ primary focus. Each child, grandchild or miscellaneous stranger had their own tote. Mom made two for me, her favorite.  At the time of the distribution, we all probably did the same thing: took a quick look and put the tote(s) up on a shelf.

Eight years later, in 2024, in preparations to move to NY and recovery, both my totes were front and center in the back of the car. In April 2024, the totes were picked up, carried to the door of the apartment house, set down in the elevator to the second floor, picked up and carried into the apartment, and put on a closet shelf. For two years. I can’t remember the reason for recently pulling them down and going through them, but the event was mind-boggling. The totes are both a Pandora’s Box*** of—

Ai says opening Pandor’s Box “released all of the worlds’ sorrows: disease, old age, famine, jealousy, and death.” They came flowing out and spread all over the world. Mom’s totes aren’t like that, are they? Maybe. Looking at photos of people from The Past, with most being complete strangers, can cause sorrow, and most of the subjects of the photos and articles are dead, so, there’s that, too. Look how happy they were, how joyous, how young, and how invincible…jealousy? Envy? Relief? Foretelling future deaths? Even seeing my 3-year-old myself bundled up for an afternoon of roiling in the snow inspired the question of why we have to grow old, can’t we stay young, forever? Then there’s the journal mom kept when she visited Switzerland, lamenting the cold while admiring the beauty. Her words in her time, now in mine.

Bet you don’t know the end of the Pandora’s Box legend. I didn’t, until Ai recited the entire story. After “The Sorrows of The World” poured out and spread across the globe, there was one thing left in the box. Ai says it was trapped in the bottom, under everything else, and Pandora didn’t see it, at first: One last gift from the gods.

It was hope.

When you look at photos of generations of relatives and friends and strangers who are no longer on this plane of existence, when you see how bright and alive they were, you begin to wonder, to imagine how much of your life will be in a plastic tote, and how soon will it happen. The existential question is normal, human, and helped a great deal by the The Hope stuck in the box, but it is still a question.

Unlike the original sorrows flitting away into the world, what do I do, what do WE do with the totes and their contents?  The Memories. What happens if we burn them, throw them away, or cut them up? Does it affect those no longer here? Does it make them “more gone”?

Screw it. Lunchtime. Everything back in the totes and back to the shelf. Life will take care of them somehow, sometime. Sorry kids, it’s your problem, now.

            *Yes. Repeated for emphasis. Please get the point.

            **Not really. But it should be.

***Really a ceramic jar, but it was mistranslated early on and the mistake stuck for all of eternity. Read the entire legend, it is a “theodicy”, “an explanation of why there is evil, suffering, and death in a world that might otherwise be prefect.”