It Takes a Worried Man to Sing a Worried Song

Old men like to worry. We worry about a lot of things, like why our children are such a disappointment; and why we’re unable to tie, or even see our shoelaces; but mostly we like to worry about our health. Complaining boors everyone in seconds so it’s much safer to brag about the ways we’ve avoided death, like brave Sir Knight in the Monte Python movie, protesting he’s only scratched after losing all his limbs. While there are numerous ailments or joint surgeries that inspire fear and awe, the one story certain to impress is how we overcame CANCER!! There’s prostate cancer, of course, the most popular with old men; but also colon cancer, pancreatic cancer, brain cancer, bone cancer, stomach cancer, lung cancer, Hodgkin’s lymphoma, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, and just plain CANCER!! So, when I heard a New York Times correspondent describing the goings on at the recent State dinner for the President of France, Monsieur Macron, I suspected she wasn’t listening closely.

There were Democratic and Fascist, er.. Republican leaders of the House and Senate invited to the dinner and the Times writer noted that conversations between the two focused on safe things, like sports. Given that the leadership in Washington is primarily Old Men, I knew “sports” took a back seat to other safe conversations focusing on joint replacements, cholesterol counts, PSA levels, and friends or neighbors or randoms of about the same age or YOUNGER!  who had recently died of CANCER!! Usually, the death is described in hideously painful terms where the poor afflicted patient is begging the health provider for horse tranquilizers or Fentanyl or anything to take away the pain and bring on welcome death. GIVE ME THE LIGHT!! I WANNA TO SEE THE LIGHT!!! However, the story reaches its zenith when the teller recounts how his cancer markers were off the charts but, lo and behold, six months later he ran a marathon in under two hours.

However, when we’re not worried about avoiding imminent and painful death, we’re worried about why we didn’t Seize the Day when the opportunity presented itself. Why didn’t I take that job offer in Kazakhstan? Why didn’t I wear a Speedo when the pretty lifeguard at the pool was on duty? How come I never had the nerve to take LSD and run away to live with hippies in Humboldt County? Usually, these opportunities involve an attractive young thing, just beyond our reach, waiting for us to demonstrate courage and conviction. But, at the last moment, we didn’t take the risk and now live with regret. Where did our spirit of Carpe Diem fail us? And why are our children such a disappointment?

Of course, some old men can chuckle and smile and recall those spontaneous moments of marvelous spontaneity; and hope that no one else remembers the torrid affair involving broken crockery, fleeing an angry spouse, or screaming fights at the college reunion. Or wasting tens of thousands of dollars on a bad investment when the attractive young other ditches you for the pool boy or girl and you’re living in a ratty apartment after losing custody of your dog. Wearing a Speedo down the Kazakhstan main drag seems like a much better path than those day’s seizure.

Hence, my advice is that since cancer is only a moment away, you should write your own obituary TODAY! You can leave out the stupid decisions and wasted opportunities and focus on the disappointing children and the worthy contributions you made to your Countrymen, or at least the local Lions Club. You can invent clever aphorisms or steal them from famous writers, because everyone will know you’ve written your own obituary and would feel badly accusing you of plagiarism after you’ve died. You can justify the decision to sell life insurance for forty years as a noble effort to provide for your family; and GODAMMIT my children are not a disappointment!! They’ve produced grandchildren, and now I can see the royal family lineage stretching from my grandparents into the fifth generation. The world must be peopled! A popular publication for the youth of my era, or at least young boys, was Mad Magazine. The thick satire and clever writing lampooning the leading popular figures of the day made us feel like we alone had figured out the system. We were going to be hipsters and cool. Carpe Diem or no, the lifeguards could just drool in loneliness, Kazakhstan just another dot on the map, then – just to prove how carefree we had become (“What, Me Worry?”) – we were going to smoke unfiltered Camels. Cancer be damned!!