Knockin’ On Aging’s Door

Here’s one good thing about getting older: There’s no lack of advice about it.

And yes, now that you ask, I just happen to have some of that advice right here:

When you grow old, play the fool. It’s the best part in the show. Who’s got the most memorable line in Hamlet? Not the prince, but an old man with a bit part who says: “This above all, to thine own self be true.”  

Just the other night I was sympathizing with the grapefruit tree in my backyard. The dry summer had stifled the tree. I could have fit the harvest into my sock drawer.  “It’s not your fault, it’s mine,” I said, talking like a parent consoling a child. “I should have watered you more often.”

I knew I was being silly. Then I realized it was the kind of silly I would never have permitted myself in years gone by. Then I realized it wasn’t silly at all.

Years ago I had a conversation with a rabbi who argued that one of the highlights of age is that it’s a perfect time to reflect on past mistakes. I asked how much fun that could possibly be. He replied: “Our mistakes make hollows that wisdom can fill in.”

Hollows, I thought. With me it’s more like canyons. I’d rather devote my dotage to pointing out the mistakes of others. Apparently I’m not alone in this. “The denunciation of the young is a necessary part of the hygiene of older people, and greatly assists in the circulation of the blood,” said American essayist Logan Pearsall Smith.

Better yet are the words of Satchel Paige, a Hall of Fame pitcher who proffered this rhetorical question: “How old would you be if you didn’t know how old you was?”  

What has me on the subject of aging is our quarterly magazine-within-a-magazine, Forever Young, which you’ll find inside this issue. Its title puts me in mind of the Bob Dylan song of the same name, written for his newborn son, from his 1974 album, Planet Waves.

Later on, Dylan composed an even better song on the subject of aging, and no, I don’t mean “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door.” I mean “Things Have Changed,” which he wrote for the film

Wonder Boys in 2000, and which won him an Oscar. Here’s my favorite verse.

Gonna take dancing lessons, do the jitterbug rag,
Ain’t no shortcuts, gonna dress in drag.
Only a fool in here would think he’s got anything to prove.
Lot of water under the bridge, lot of other stuff, too.
Don’t get up gentlemen, I’m only passing through.

Michael McLeod
Editor in Chief
mmcleod@ohlmag.com