Terribly Strange

Terribly Strange

“How terribly strange to be 70” is a line in the Simon and Garfunkel song “Old Friends” on the Bookends album. That album was released in April of 1968. At that time I was 19 and Paul Simon who wrote the song would have been 26. When I listened to that song back then that line said to me that it must feel strange to be old, a shadow of your former self with your life largely behind you and with just a small part ahead of you. I don't know what Paul thought about it but being in his 20's I can't imagine his thinking was too much different. Well, I am finishing up my 70^th year as I turn 70 today. It has not been an easy year in that I got a bad case of shingles on my face and around my eye. I got it in June and it was very bad for about 6 weeks. It was another 6 to 8 weeks before it calmed down enough to where I started feeling like my old self. This experience caused me to face my mortality more than I ever had before. I had been very sick one time in my 30's where I was in and out of consciousness for a few days, but I was too out of it to even think that I might die plus I was so young. In my 40's I was in a high speed accident where I thought I was going to die as soon as I crashed, but I didn't and I didn't even end up with a significant injury. I also got Bell's Palsy in my 40's which was weird but it did not make me feel any more mortal, only more fragile. Shingles hit me so bad that I thought about death as in this might be a good time to die. More than that though, once I started to recover thinking about dying caused me to come to terms with the fact that I will die and in reality it could be any time. After all, I am in my dying years – 70's, 80's, 90's, these are the ages at which people commonly die and I just joined the club. It was easy to do, all I had to do was live long enough.

A while back Kris asked me what are some things I'd like to do before the time comes where I will not have that option given our advancing, particularly my advanced age. I think I mentioned a few things but I had no strong desire for anything in particular. I feel like I've done a lot of things I wanted to do. I had wanted to spend an extended time in New York City. By extended I mean at least six months. One reason is I grew up back east and would like to experience being there as a resident one more time. Another is I had always wanted to live in New York City when I was young. The third, and maybe more important reason is, all my family live in the East and it would be nice to be more a part of their lives again for a bit. This is not something we can really do right now as we have an older dog. (You dog people will understand this.) Places to visit? I had once really wanted to go to Africa when I was younger but that now seems like too big a trip, well big enough that the draw for me has diminished. I wouldn't mind seeing New Zealand and I always saw myself at some point spending extended time on a quiet tropical isle. With that said, there really is no place that I feel I have to see and there's no activity that I have never done that I feel I must do before my life ends.

After this summer what I really want to do became clear to me. What I really want is as many Saturday evenings or “date nights” at home with Kris sitting on the deck or in front of the fireplace listening to music, sipping some wine, and chatting as I can squeeze in. That is unquestionably the number one thing, my only must have thing. After that, I'd like to get back east and visit my sister and brother in their new homes. I'm lucky that I have already done a lot of things but I also have always had rather simple needs. My mother tells the story that when I was young and she'd have to take me somewhere all she had to do was to find a little space and give me one toy and I could entertain myself. I am never quite sure if this is a good thing or not.

Back to the “How terribly strange to be 70”. Here I am turning 70 and it is indeed strange but not anything like the strange I thought about when I used to listen to the “Old Friends” song. I don't really think about the amount of time I have left and compare it to the amount of time I have already lived. I don't lament that I may only have a few years left in this life. I don't wish to be young again, well, to feel young again would certainly be delightful but no I don't want to go back and I don't have a desire to live forever. Like most people, I suspect, I'm just focused on the current week of my life. None of us know when we are going and for the most part we all live like there is no end. 70 doesn't change any of that. No, turning 70 is strange because it doesn't feel like me. I don't see myself as 70. I suppose I didn't really see myself as 60, or for that matter even 50 or 40. But none of those seemed alien as I reached them. But 70, that's somebody other than me, an age I can't seem to relate to. It has gotta be some other guy doing this. I can kinda relate to being in the September (or is it the November or even December?) of my years. I don't worry about dying. I think Woody Allen did a good job of summing up my feelings about death when he said: “I don't mind dying. I just don't want to be around when it happens”. But 70? It feels so not me. I can't really explain why. Telling me it's just a number is of no help. I know it's just a number. I will not mind saying “I'm 70”. It just won't sound right. As the song says I find it TERRIBLY STRANGE to be 70.