That’s right, reeling. Reeling And a rocking, rolling till the break of dawn. That’s me! Actually its more like creaking and a cracking, falling till the break of bones. WTF? What’s happening to my body, when did all this shit all sneak up on me? Many words and phrases seemed innocuous but these days when I hear dig it I have grave concern. Buried in my work, quite an undertaking, dying to go there, drop dead gorgeous, all common phrases which now give me pause. But don’t pause too long, pour yourself a stiff one! Here’s what started this gloomy thought process. A snot nosed brat said scuse me gramps the other day and I was pissed. I was like who the Hell does that little jerk think he’s calling Gramps? But then I remembered…. I am a Gramps. I’m a fucking granpa! I have grandkids??!! How? When? Not possible! I still like to rock an roll, I’m just as fit as I used to be. Okay maybe not as fit, but my clothes still fit. Okay, maybe I have grown a few sizes and had to buy bigger belts and shit, but I can still rock and roll all night and party every day. So long as all night ends by midnight and partying every day begins sometime after five. Holy shit man, WTF has happened?
Its called the declining years for a reason. Everything declines downhill. It sneaks up on you, hitting your legs first. One day I’m running to catch the bus and an going slower than I should. When I just barely make it I think, Goddamn I’m out of breath. And my thighs and knees hurt. It was a struggle to chase the damn bus. Shake it off, its nothing, must be the weather. Its raining after all, and the rain does weird things to peoples bones. Yea, that’s it, the rain. With a sense of relief I wipe my face dry when something else occurs to me. There isn’t nearly as much hair to dry! WTF? When did my hair get so thin? And how did my forehead grow so big? It goes up so high I can’t see where t my temples are. Its like one big mass of lumpy hairless scalp halfway up my head!. OY, the decline is starting.
Then one day my indigestion seems harsher than normal. Wait, What?? Normal? WTF? When did indigestion become a normal occurrence for me? And now I have a baseline to follow? What happened? Here’s what happened, my digestive system has been working overtime for years, battling all the beer, wine and booze, chips, fried food, Mexican foods, Thai foods, donuts, cupcakes (shameless plug), an every other substance I carelessly forced down my intestinal tracts. Years of hard work!! And now its pissed off. My intestines are mad as Hell and they’re not gonna take it anymore. Time for some gastro-intestinal karma, exacting some revenge via my stomach. Best served cold means swallowing Zantac with cold water, and chewing Rolaids like candy on a daily basis. Too late for apologizing to the stomach, the damage is done. Apparently drinking lots of milk to line the stomach before an evening of heavy drinking was bullshit, and my stomach is liver. I mean livid!
Hair falling out, running ability compromised, and now daily stomach issues. How much worse can it get? Okay, time to go to CVS and find something that will slow down this aging process. Here we go, aisle 6. I grab a box of Lifetime Youth Glow something or other. Lets see what’s in here. WTF? Why did they make the lettering so small and blurry? Maybe if I put it a bit closer. Nope. Maybe under the light? Nope! I pick up the box next to it and can’t read that either. WTF has happened to my eyes? The writings not smaller my eyes have gotten cloudy. I look across to aisle 10 where they have a rack of cheater reading glasses. That’s it, that’s all I need, a pair of magnifying glasses so I can read the small writing. I’ll start with something low, like 1.25, that’s the lowest. They don’t look horrible and if I only need them for reading then these should be all right. Where’s the chart? WTF? The chart is blurry too? 1.50. Better, but maybe 1.75, perfect. Jeez Louize, 1.75? Whatever. Two weeks later I’m back looking at the 200+ with a case because I need to bring the fucking things with me everywhere I go. WTF?
I said to Maureen, “could this get any worse?” She didn’t answer. A bit louder, “Can this get any worse?” Come on now, I need someone to make me feel not old, so one more time this time real loud, “CAN IT GET ANY WORSE?” My answer? “For the third time! What the fuck are you talking about?” OMFG! My hearing now? Did I really not hear her the first two times? Maybe she was speaking away from me? Yea, that’s it, it’s the acoustics! I didn’t hear because she didn’t project AT me. But I bought some extra Q Tips just in case. Now if I can only remember where they are.
Yea right! Remember! That’s on the way out too. Hell I can remember an incident back 5 years ago pretty well but don’t ask me what I had for dinner last night, cuz I don’t remember. Dude Where’s My Car has become my reality. Let me review, instead of rolling joints my joints ache, and creak, and snap crackle pop. My skin isn’t tight enough to fit my body and it leaves wrinkles no iron can flatten out. The only thing that gets wasted anymore is my waistline and even with a belt nothing fits right anymore. I need to plan any road trips around bathrooms because while my bladder hasn’t physically shrunk it seems to get much more impatient and desperate than it used too. I can’t see or hear good but that doesn’t matter because I wouldn’t remember what I saw or heard anyway. I don’t go out but my back does and by the time the last candle on my birthday cake is lit the first one is a blob of melted wax. Shit man if I do eat the cake I get indigestion, which has a baseline. Speaking of bass lines, music that used to be classic rock is now golden oldies and golden oldies are now Fossil Rock. Does aging gracefully mean I don‘t pee when I sneeze so I don‘t really need a diaper? Depends!
Whatever, the big-bottom line is I am getting really concerned about all this because there’s only two things I can think of left to lose, sex and sanity. If worse comes to worst a little pill from the Doc will solidify one problem, that won’t be hard, er, well, yes it will be hard but it won’t be…. you know what I mean! At this point I need to worry more about dementia, about becoming senile. I can fix the penile but senile is another story. I know what senile is, I worked in a Nursing Home for many years and I witnessed a lot of senile patients. Wandering around not knowing where they’re going or why, stopping and talking about random things then forgetting what they were saying, concerned only about what’s for dinner. I can only assume senility is the next step. That sux! …..Or does it? Now that I think about it, those patients were happy walking around doing the Thorazine Shuffle like they were so stoned they didn’t know where they were. Is that senility? Totally stoned all the time, worrying about nothing but what’s to eat, and not being accountable for my actions? Kinda like the old days when we smoked weed by the ounce then went to 7-11. Not feeling quite so bad now, pills to keep me digesting, pills to keep me going, pills to keep me up, maybe some pills to make me feel stoned all day and not responsible for any thing I do or say? WTF, bring it on senility, give me a few extra bong hits of the shit!! PEACE

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