Episode 79: The State of the Geezer

Gazing far too long into the middle distance is a common symptom of passage through one of those big "0" or "5" birthdays, an occasion to reflect on what has been and what might come. When it's the arrival of the 75th anniversary of your birth month, the contemplation of clouds and trees and hills and water can last hours, days. More.
It is, after all, the bleak transition from what gerontologists classify as "young old" to plain "old", with a decade to go before "old old." Further inducing reverie is the fact that 75 years is the average life span of the American male.

Brooding about receding gums, rectal probes, unexpected bodily discharges, and every new ache or twinge - is the downward path to ruinous despair. Instead, I try to look to the light, as, for example, back when I qualified for Social Security and found that I wasn't required by law to replace all my jeans with those suspendered trousers with the two-foot zippers that every old coot I'd ever known seemed to favor.

Remember, Boomers, you're not all that old if (a) no one has offered you a seat on the subway yet, (b) you've only had one colonoscopy so far, (c) you can remember which of your cars you drove to the supermarket, and (d) you can identify two or more of the following celebrities:
Peter Gabriel. David Naughton. Kelly Hu. Mena Suvari. William Katt. LeVar Burton. Lisa Loring. Tea Leoni. Carrot Top. Sean Astin. Anson Mount.

We turned our reading chairs around to face the window. It looks through the treetops over our valley and out to the confluence of the Croton and the Hudson. The eagles are still doing wheelies over the water this late in winter, yet I spotted our first robin yesterday in the big black walnut out back. Deer are gamboling down on the river flat. Blizzards of white trumpeter swans lift off in great flocks to traverse the valley, north, then south, then back again.

We're off to Paris for a month in Spring, so we've been getting our innards and outer layers checked. Over the last three months, my dentist, internist, urologist, cardiologist, optometrist, dermatologist, and gastroenterologist all cleared me, with a caveat or two. They confirmed, in order, that I had no cavities or need for extractions, my blood sugar is within bounds, my prostate is still supple, my cholesterol readings were the best in ten years, my vision prescription remains the same, I haven't developed any melanomas, and there was only one benign polyp in my colon. And, nine years after my quintuple bypass, my blood pressure was 120 over 70.

We're going to Paris, did I mention?