April 29, 2020
You’re only as old as you feel. You have to think young. You need to eat right; stop smoking; keep fit; excersise; walk 10,000 steps a day; keep your weight down; take this, that and the other supplement or vitamin; get lots of fresh air and sunshine; stay out of the sun; use this product for younger looking skin; don’t let yourself go, try hair coloring; be cool with purple and organge hair streaks; sit in two claw foot tubs and watch the sunset with your partner. Lots of people are happiest in their older years because they don’t sweat the small stuff.
Sing along with me (if you’re old enough to remember the tune): “Fairy tales can come true; they can happen to you, if you’re young at heart.”
The above clichés are written in Goudy Old Style font. Perfect for the quaintness of such advice. But George Bernard Shaw has it down:“We don’t stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.”
Paul and I are growing old physically, no vitamins or supplements, cosmetics, hair dyes, or exercise changes that. I sweat lots of small stuff! I’ve noticed a crepier neck and a turkey waddle. Can’t make that go away with an attitude; maybe with plastic surgery. But I love to play. I love my toys, my little tiny R2D2, C3PO, and Dobby, complete with his book on my window ledge. I rearrange them and have them “communicate” funny things to each other.
I love the fun Paul and I have had making silly videos, doing puppet shows, hosting costume party murder mysteries, creating skits and thematic family Thanksgiving entertainment, like conferences and lip synch rock and roll concerts. I love the goofy videos we’ve created over the years and laughing at our own corny performances.
All the funny movies and record albums have become part of Paul’s and my dialogue with each other. Firesign Theater (you had to be stoned to laugh), Monty Python, Mel Brooks movies, I Love Lucy, Nichols and May. Their lines worked their way into our every day. Every morning before one of us goes downstairs we ask the other: “More coffee, Warden? This was from a Firesign Theater album, I don’t even recall why it was funny, but we use the tone and inflection and still chuckle.
While we play, nothing in our physical realities are what we focus on. While we play, our imaginations are free to take us to the feeling of being Forever Young (sing that one, even better than Bob Dylan!). We transcend our petty issues, our fears, our tears, of other health deteriorations and the ever threatening Covid.
In the past, games of Scrabble, Charades, Celebrity, & Hearts have filled family reunions. During the summers when we used to camp with friends, we had a fabulous splashing war in a faux pirate capture game in our separate water floats. I recall that and laugh. Old bodies and old age, and health threats happen. But oh how important it is to keep playing. I hope to literally die laughing.
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