What Was I Saying?

Most of what the general public believes about being old is a pack of lies, spread by the young who know nothing about it. Just because we don't give a rat's ass about Taylor Swift doesn't mean we've got one foot in the grave. It just means that, nearing the end, we've got better things to do than worship a stranger from afar. And no, we are not all deaf -- we can hear you mocking us. 

One annoyance happens at the grocery store when the teenaged clerk, who holds up an item and asks, "What is this?" when it's a peach or an artichoke, assumes that all older people are weak and frail. Then the doofus doing the bagging asks if I can carry a bag "this heavy" and do I need someone to help me to my car. I always say the same thing: "No thanks, I go to CrossFit." That shuts them up fast.

Just like young people are all different, so are we. We're not all crabby with dentures and hearing aids. And we don't all wear diapers. But sadly, some common beliefs about the elderly are all too true. For example, I can remember word for word my son's first sentence uttered when he was about two, which makes it 34 years ago, but I cannot remember what I had for dinner last night. This is a common occurrence for people my age, meaning everyone else who attended Woodstock has the same affliction.

Funny thing, I can remember Woodstock like it was yesterday. As for that first sentence, it was a doozy: "I was downstairs eating an ice cream cone and Mommy was upstairs talking on the phone with Aunt Irene when all of a sudden the wind blew the door shut."