Maybe. As usual it depends on how old you are, how hooked up you are and how financially solvent you are if you can’t imagine a good time without spending lots of money. Mainly, it depends on your point of view: What IS a good time?
I have friends of all ages – lesson one in going into old age with friends. As the older ones pass away and out – the younger ones are still there. My idea of fun doesn’t have an age.
Friday I visited a friend in a rehab center who had just had knee surgery. At our age (old) we are enlivened when we are being paid attention to and being cared for – even if we are in great pain. So I arrived with my JRT to check on her and found her spirits higher than mine. Her high spirits came from the fact that she had a definite goal – to recover ASAP so that she could get back on track and live life to the fullest. It’s a full-time job. She’s doing well. I have been drifting this summer but not Susan. So I was cheered by stopping to see if someone else was OK. Funny how reaching out sometimes works. Funny the difference a dog makes!
On the way back to the country, I stopped by to see a single cousin who is a bit younger but still a man about town. The woman he really loved died 20 years ago so he has been looking for her in someone ever since. You have to know that it will be almost impossible to do so he was alone when I walked in at 5:00. He was busy wrapping up a real estate appraisal and trying to get his emotions under control because an attorney had said he was charging too much. I was just about to say bye – see ya when he hooked me: Want to go down to the lake and find a seedy dive for a fish fry? He knows I love seedy little places with good food.
What a gem we found. He had a much younger girl he knows join us. She was not happy. She is from Poland and is very well-traveled. Our part of the world is a backwater to her. She wants to bail. So how to get her out of her funk when Bruce had just pulled himself out of his? Sometimes when things are going swimmingly, it doesn’t pay to get ANYONE else involved – even if you have to be alone. So I strategized and strategized and determined to compliment her to death and agree with everything she said. Come on, a little subterfuge is OK in the service of saving someone from themselves. It worked. We had a good meal and all parted happy.
Saturday my Korean student boarder, Daniel, was into the usual – sleeping late from having talked with Korea all night and/or playing computer games. At 4:00 I ordered him downstairs dressed. I told him he was going on a mystery tour. The destination was an old time hot dog stand in a nearby village open only in summer. We all wait for it like Christmas. Daniel lives in bustling Seoul. This was not bustling. There wasn’t anything trendy about the place or the clientele. The food is excellent. I ordered for us and determined to let him eat before talking about our surroundings. He’s a man, right? This is what you have to do or be killed some days.
I simply said to him: Daniel, you are in the United States of America. And here at this hot dog stand you are with the bulk of the people from all over who make up this nation – nothing fancy. Well, the food had been so well received that he happily agreed with my assessment of the situation and he went home happy having learned something from someone he first thought could not teach him a thing and in a place where he had determined there were no lessons to be learned.
And now it’s Sunday. I’m exhausted from helpful visits, strategizing and instructing. Like Garbo, I want to be alone – and quiet. NOW I’m having a good time! Hello computer. Greetings bloggers. AMEN
steve
May 30, 2010
Oh, you’re old huh! rriigghhtt … All I usually say to folks is “I’ve got young blood, it’s just in an old container”. I like quiet and cannot take chaos of any kind. My little beast Sandy is a joy to me. Right now he’s lying in front of my fireplace (gas burning) and is out of it, without a care in the world. I sure love that little guy!. I just finished David Baldacci’s book, “Deliver Us From Evil” and have started one by Vince Flynn. Guess I’ll get back to it.
I sure like your stuff here.
samhenry
May 30, 2010
Old isn’t a bad thing. I kind of like it. Trouble is you have days when you do realize that time will, in fact, run out. I can’t think of not being in front of my computer in any world in any way. On my death bed, I will be arguing with the doctors and the Godhead about having to leave before I get to try the latest version of windows. That’s just how it is. And I wouldn’t want to miss any news or rumors which in today’s world amount to the same thing. I love what you are reading. I don’t read as much as I would like to because of dyslexia but I got an MA in English anyway – and a library degree. So I wait for the movies of them even though it is a different experience entirely. I read a lot on line and do it very fast for some reason so I have been visiting google books. What a fine picture you paint: reading in chair by fire with faithful friend asleep nearby. Excellent. What a good time. Another scenario for the weekend to treasure.