GROWING OLD

When I was in my teens I was sure I was going to live to be 100.  Those sure feelings have now drifted over the horizon. I may make it, but a few health scares in my life have made me just lucky now to be alive. A little over a year ago I went to the ER  and discovered that I had a blood clot in each lung. I was pretty much told that I was knocking on the door of death.

I have been feeling pretty good ever since that health scare. I just turned 77 a couple of weeks ago. I am happy to reach that milestone. It is not super old but many from my high school graduating class are already deceased. Some as early as their 30s. So young for people to die. I am thankful reaching 77. I still have high school friends that I keep in touch with. We joke about the old days, as we call them. Growing up in the 1950s and 1960s was so different. We had no computer, cell phones, or the technology that we have today. I think so much of that technology is good, but some of it I frown on.

As an example the cell phone. When I was a child I wore penny loafers and had a dime in each one so I could go to a phone booth and call home for mom to come and pick me up. Our phone at home was a corded black one with a rotary dial. We were on a party line, three houses on the same line. Wow how times have changed. The cell phone is great to have in case of an emergency or making a quick call to a family member or a friend.

However, I think those cell phones also have a bad side. It seems like people  have become obsessed with them, people seem to be looking at them constantly. Sitting in the doctors office waiting room the other day there were about 12 people that we could see around us. Everyone was using their phones. Before cells people actually talked with each other while they were in a setting like that. I honestly text with my older friends and we say there were times that we wish we were back in the good old days. Those days were much simpler, we didn't have the stress that is placed on us today.

I often look at the local TV news and I see that someone is celebrating their 100th birthday and they look so happy and full of joy and life. I think to myself, I just might make it. I exercise every day. Sure not as hard as I used to. There was a time when I was young that I could do a thousand situps. Now I do chair yoga for seniors. They are not stressful exercises but they help with the balance and mobility. Keeping me more limber and in good shape. I also do a few other exercises on my own.

Yes, I am 77. My wife is 80. We still do work around the house. Do yard work outside pulling weeds, mowing the grass, trimming the bushes. We plan on doing it even when we get old. We feel young, act young, can do much that we did at 30, it just takes us longer to do it. We are happy, have been married for 54 years. Don't worry about getting old, many people don't have that privilege. Enjoy it!

Larry W. Fish