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The trick to a long life is a sense of humour
© by Mike Keenan 
Dear Mr. Retired Person,My name is Jeff and I am in Grade Six and our teacher thinks that we should study gerontology which means old people. You look really old in your picture in the newspaper so I figured that you would be perfect so I wonder if you would mind helping me with our homework. We are supposed to interview really old people just like you and ask them questions like what's the trick to living for a long time. Can you give me some decent answers? I suspect that our teacher really just wants us to make friends with old people to make them feel better. Hope this letter makes you feel better. Your friend, Jeff Dear Mr. Retired Person, My name is Amy and I am in Jeff's class. I was the one who thought about writing to you, and I don't think you look that old in the newspaper. Jeff never comes up with good ideas. In fact, he stole my idea. I just thought that you should know. Your new best friend, Amy Dear Jeff and Amy, I am delighted to help you both with your homework assignment. There is only one item that is important for youngsters like you to know to live as long as me. No, it's not money. It is a sense of humour. I will provide you with examples from real life. Mr friend is an undertaker at a local funeral home. Just before funeral services, one day, he approached the elderly widow and asked, "How old was your husband?" "98," she replied, "Two years older than me" "So you're 96," my friend, the undertaker, commented. She responded, "Hardly worth going home, is it?" That's the sort of spirit you have to have. Here's another example. A reporter for CBC is interviewing a 104-year-old woman: "And what do you think is the best thing about being 104?" the reporter asks. "No peer pressure," she replies. Get it Jeff and Amy? If not, soon your class will read Lord of the Flies and you will suddenly understand the principles involved in peer pressure. Many young people simply think that older types are senile. Well, let me tell you Jeff and Amy, older people enjoy being senile especially at Easter because we can hide our own Easter eggs. Get it? Hide our own eggs. Funny, eh? Now here is something that should worry you both. Soon, you will want to borrow the family car. Well, I was talking to my neighbour Bill who owns a spiffy Mustang convertible. Bill said to me: "I've sure gotten old! I've had two bypass surgeries, a hip replacement, new knees, fought prostate cancer and diabetes, I'm half blind, can't hear anything quieter than a jet engine, take 40 different medications that make me dizzy, winded, and subject to blackouts, have bouts with dementia, have poor circulation, hardly feel my hands and feet anymore, can't remember if I'm 89 or 98, lost all my friends, but, thank God, I still have my driver's license. Think about that Jeff and Amy. That's the kind of guy with whom you have to share the highway. Have you heard this one? My memory's not as sharp as it used to be. Also, my memory's not as sharp as it used to be. And let me tell you both, it's scary when you start to make the same noises as your coffee maker. You know how it gurgles and sputters and then sighs? That's Miriam and I in the morning. We went shopping yesterday and half the stuff in our shopping cart had labels that said, "For fast relief." Your teacher is probably not familiar with the Senility Prayer: "Grant me the senility to forget the people I never liked anyway, the good fortune to run into the ones I do, and the eyesight to tell the difference." The trick is this: you don't stop laughing because you grow old; you grow old because you stop laughing! |
