“Old things are always in good repute…present things in disfavor.” – Ben Franklin

This story is for all you elderly people for whom I have a soft spot. Even I might someday get to that age and need a writer to cheer me up with a few kind words.

I should have inserted a “pitiful joke alert” before the above.

A look at the word “old”: old fishing gear, old cars, old buildings. Cranky white haired people. In other words if it ain’t new…

There’s no such thing as “old.” Except me, and only because my wife keeps telling me, “you are old.” That’s not possible, so I will ignore that comment.

I love the sayings people come up with to try and live in an alternate reality.

“Age is just a number.” Yeah. A big big big number.

“You’re only as old as you feel.” Gee, thanks. That didn’t help a whole lot.

“Sixty is the new forty.” Usually at best it’s the new 58.

“You’re not getting old, you’re getting better.” Huh. Ask my wife about it.

“Old is a state of mind.” No, that’s called dementia.

“The best part of aging…” That it doesn’t last too long?

I’m tired of getting that smirky smile from you young punks. I have shoes older than you, and they have 20 IQ points on you. Yeah, I know I’m old.

I’m so old I remember when the Dead Sea was only sick.

I know I’m old when I eat supper at 4:30. Sometimes P.M. … sometimes A.M.

Sure, I’m old. Last birthday the candles cost more than the cake.

Yep, I see expensive antiques and I recall throwing away one just like it.

I’ve found that as I get less young, the more smarta** I become. Not that I wasn’t already halfway there anyway.

I was filling out some of the piles of paper you are always filling out when you get old. To one question, IN CASE OF EMERGENCY, CALL…I put, “AMBULANCE.”

It’s of course not all great, but one of the super grand things about getting older is that you can say anything you want any time you want. To anyone you want.

You won’t realize how glorious that is until you get here. Trust me.

My wife continues to tell me I need a hearing aid. The great thing is if I don’t lip read or close my eyes, I have no idea she said that. Life in balance!

There are few things I cared to hear all that much about anyway, even less than that now. It’s wonderful.

If I’m watching TV, sometimes if there is an English person, or even a more foreign person speaking, I will turn on the closed captions. One game I play is if there’s a politician on the screen talking, I turn both the captions off and kill the volume.

It’s amazing. They actually look way less mentally handicapped. It’s very relaxing and comforting.

Unless you can compare it to something similar, the word “old” itself has no meaning, just a sound that hangs in the air.

A 25 year old horse will very soon be heading for the glue factory. But a human the same age is still on his mom’s insurance and on his way to his job at Starbucks to work off the debt from his Gender Studies degree.

Thom Caraccio ([email protected]) is a retired musician and retired motion picture scenic artist living in West Palm Beach, Florida who hails from Columbus. He graduated from S.D. Lee High in 1968 and still considers Columbus his real hometown.

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