The Betrayal

Remember when we were young and mom and/or dad dragged us off with them when they went visiting friends? When we were young ( back in the fifties and sixties), we were threatened within an inch of our lives if we even harbored a thought of misbehaving while visiting or out in public. So the impending visits were not exactly filling us with frissons of anticipatory delight. We knew we'd be doomed to sit on an uncomfortable chair in someone's dim and musty living room with nothing to entertain us for what seemed an eternity...forbidden to speak unless spoken to and God help us if we fidgeted too much. And for the love of Pete, don't dare ask for anything to eat or drink. But if offered, we would graciously accept whatever it was whether we wanted it or not. And don't forget your pleases and thank yous. Not our idea of a rip-roaring good time.

Often there seemed to be extra old people there. I mean really old people, even older than our parents and their friends and Lord knows they were already old as dirt. Usually, it was their withered parent or old auntie or uncle.The favorite topic of conversation, no matter who we were visiting, was the state of everyone's health. What the heck was the fascination with hashing over Lou's lumbago, Agnes's arthritis or Ernie's erysipelas? Why must we suffer through these monotonous, mind-numbing discussions that only served to set our nine year old mental eyes rolling? Wouldn't it be ever so much more fun to talk about how on Monday night's episode of Mayberry, Barney nearly shot off Andy's foot, but instead blew a hole through Aunt Bea's underwear hanging outside on the line to dry?  The look on ol' 'Aint' Bea's face! We coulda been having us some laughs!

Now, after a lifetime of rosy good health, we've hit our fifties and sixties and the 'stuff' has hit the fan. We feel a real need-to-know what blood pressure medication everyone else is on, because maybe theirs is better than ours. We want to be able to make helpful suggestions to our doctors when they get frustrated that our BP meds are not working optimally. We want to know what other prescriptions our friends are taking and why. And we want to talk about our own ailments and what the doctor told us and gee whiz, now we gotta take this pill or that pill.

Never mind that we don't explain to the doc that our high triglycerides and cholesterol are hitting those numbers because we keep on eating potato chips, slabs of cheesecake, breakfast sausage patties the size of Whoppers, deviled eggs, fat-drenched pastas...etc. Not to mention the stash of Dove chocolates our husband always keeps beside his chair. Or the ever-present box of Hostess Sno Balls for when that sweet tooth just won't give up. Ignore the fact that we never walk every day like we're supposed to. Plainly, we are just recalcitrant, headstrong children who also happen to be senior citizens. And by golly, we're going to do what we want to do!

Let's not even discuss sucking down umpteen colas per day regardless of the zillion articles we've read telling us that it promotes obesity, eats holes in our brains and keeps us hooked harder on the massive sugar dose than any crack addict on his drug. So what if we can pour it in a toilet and it will eat away the rust stains? Don't we imagine what that does to our insides? No, we don't, thank you. 

But, knowing all these things does not keep us from being surprised...even stymied that our bodies have given up on us and are betraying us for our decades of self abuse. We are so amazed that our knees are killing us, our hips need replacing, our system has worn itself out processing the junk we've poured into it for forty years, that our lungs have weakened, etc. etc.

Thus our states of health become the topic du jour when we talk to others who are the same vintage we are. Yes, folks. In many ways, the circle is completing itself and deny it all we want, we have become our parents. WE are the old farts sitting around nattering on about the state of our collective health. "Kids these days!" 

Sincere kudos to anyone, who may with impunity, deny this is happening to them. I'm sure there are great numbers of us who staunchly went in the opposite direction in a grand effort to shed the unhealthy habits of our culture. If so, you're a way better man than I, Gunga Din.

You'll have to excuse me now...it's time to take my ACE inhibitor to help along my calcium blocker.

Till next time,

"One day when I was around fifty, I looked down and stared at the backs of my hands in complete astonishment. They looked exactly like my mother's. 'Mom, please take your hands back!' " ~ LR