On Turning 80 (Me and Joe)

By Shlomo Maital

  Hey, Joe Biden and I just turned 80.  Happy birthday, Joe.

  Here are some random thoughts on turning 80. 

  But first.  Joe Biden: —  as Jenny Curran told Forrest Gump:  “Run!!!”  Run, Joe, Run.  Don’t listen to the ‘progressives’.  Run in 2024.  Please.  We need you to defeat Trump, again.  And we seniors need you to make a statement: If 82 year old Joe Biden can run America, this increasingly unmanageable mess of a country, and do it so well —  we seniors can certainly manage to tie our own shoes.

    And that reminds me.  How do you really know you are old?  (And yes, it is OK to use the word ‘old’.)  If you’re 80, you’re old.  As Churchill noted, the alternative to old is not so appealing. 

   How do you know you’re old?

   When you get praise for being able to tie, and untie, your own shoelaces…and cut your own toenails.

    When you tell which day of the week it is, by the letter on your pillbox.

     When your pills file a complaint for overcrowding.

     When you change from hoping things get better, to praying things get worse a bit more slowly.

      When  you remember your First Grade teacher (Miss Switzer), and your Kindergarten teacher (Miss Pawson) – but forget what you had for breakfast this morning.

       When you have to send a list of your medications to get Motor Vehicles to renew your driver’s license.

       When your biggest most daring adventure is eating a rich desert before supper. (In secret).

      When you are comforted to know that with each passing year, the % change in your age gets smaller and smaller.

      When on the London Tube (subway), polite young people offer you a seat …and absolutely INSIST you sit down, dammit, what kind of an old guy are you? 

      When you look forward to your next birthday, …… when you will be 92.