. . .How terribly strange to be seventy . . .
This line from Simon and Garfunkle’s song resonates with me today. I am 74. How terribly strange that is. When I graduated from college in 1969, 74-year-olds would have been born in 1895. They would have graduated from college (if they went — not many did) in 1917 — just in time for World War I, the 1918 Spanish Flu Epidemic, and the Roaring Twenties. I would have thought they were ancient.
I don’t feel ancient, but I imagine that today’s college seniors think I am. My hair is white, I have bags under my eyes, and I weigh more than I used to. I don’t move very rapidly and I grunt inadvertently when I get up from a chair or when I have to pick up something from the floor. I never sit on the floor without identifying a strategy for getting up again. However, my skin’s not too bad and I still have all my teeth, so there’s that. I don’t tell kids to get off my lawn very often.
My friends are also old, although I don’t really have “old friends” in the sense that I have known them for most of my life. I’m in touch with some friends from high school and college, but our contact isn’t regular and we don’t know each other very well.
My friends who are old are almost all new friends — friends I have made since I retired and had time to develop friendships. When my kids were little, my “friends” were the parents of their friends. When I was working, I considered a lot of my colleagues to be friends — but we were work friends, and once the work connection was gone, our friendship flickered and went away. If we happen to see each other, we are pleased to reconnect, and we promise to get together soon. But we generally don’t.
My new “old” friends share my interests. That’s how we got together in the first place. We are all generally the same age (give or take a decade). People more than 10 years younger than me are often still working and our paths don’t cross that much. People more than 10 years older than me often — well, dead — or they find it hard to get around so our paths don’t cross either.
Probably two of my closest “old” friends are actually “old friends” — women I’ve known for 30 years. One of them lives in Boston and another in Northern Virginia. I live in Williamsburg, Virginia. We see each other only every few years, but we are in regular contact. We know what’s going on in each others’ lives. When we do get together, it’s like we were just together last week. I consider them part of my posse — the people who would circle around me if I had a crisis.
Several of my local “old” friends are also part of this posse, although they might not think of themselves in that way. We have become friends, generally, over the past 10 years. They don’t necessarily know each other. But because we are in the same station in our lives, we mesh. If I ever got my posse together, they would be formidable.
I like old people. We have reached the “I don’t give a f**k” stage of life. We laugh a lot — often in public — and don’t care if you’re making fools of ourselves. I’m lucky to have old friends, even if I haven’t known them very long.
I think getting the posse together is a great idea. We don't need a crisis...although maybe we could create one. :-)
Yup! I know what you mean!