Part I
Recently, it seems that whenever I see someone after an absence of a year or two they often say “Virgil, you never looked better.” Probably they are referring to the three stages of life i.e. youth, middle age, and ‘you never looked better.’ That made me feel good for a time until the day my sister and I were rummaging through a box of photos that our mother collected, and there was my high school graduation picture, the kind that is sent to the relatives whether they want it or not. Reluctantly, I admit that I looked better then than now. Probably when people comment favorably on your appearance, they are being polite and in effect are saying “You don’t look so bad for somebody your age.”
Time affects everything on earth. The purpose of this modest composition is to mention the vexations of the senior years and the ways of making them yield contentment and satisfactions.
People look on age differently. Ask a little boy how old he is, and he is likely to reply “Oh, I’m eight and going on nine.”This enthusiasm implies that he is eager to age and grow up fast. Ask a mature man how old he is, and if he replies, you are not likely to hear “Oh, I’m forty-nine and going on fifty. HOORAY!”
There is another strange thing about the passage of time: the closer we get to a certain age the younger it becomes. For example, a ten-year old thinks twenty-five is ancient, but a person of sixty does not consider seventy old. Time also causes some seniors to change their opinions of advanced age. Women, primarily, but not always, are coy about age revelation until the eighth or ninth decade. Then, many seem to delight in boasting “Oh, I’m 87″ or a similarly advanced age.
A wit suggested that for men there are four stages in senior progression. He overlooked women probably because discretion is the better part of valor. A man knows he is a senior in the first stage when he forgets names. In the second stage he forgets faces. In the third stage he forgets to zip up, and in the fourth stage he forgets to unzip.
Tags: aging gracefully, E arte de vender con éxito, El envejecer con garbo, El humorismo, humor, joyful aging, La alegría de la tercera edad, La mente.El músculo, La mezcla (asociarse con gente), Life Enrichment, senior humor, three stages of life, Virgil y el humorismo
March 19, 2009 at 4:08 am
Interesting. I remember seeing my mother after the absence of a year–and how she’d aged…. Guess it was inevitable–but made me feel older too.
http://frisbeepainting.com
August 13, 2009 at 4:46 pm
Sorry for the belated reply to your reply in March. Some health problems have cut down on my activities. I’m working to augment my logging.