Something’s been happening a lot more frequently these days.

I don’t mean that I can’t avoid this weird new trend.

I just mean that it’s happening enough that I’m starting to notice it.

Some of my peers….and most of the people a little older than me….are starting to talk “old”.

There’s not a symptomatic way of talking that defines “old”…there’s not a new lilt in the voice, a cragginess that wasn’t there before….it’s just that the subject comes up more now than it did when I was in my 20’s.

When I was in my twenties, “old” was a curiosity. Now it’s trying to become an intimate friend.

I can see that if I don’t do something quick about this growing up thing that “old” is going to be a real monkey on my back if I don’t watch out.

So when these people around me start to moan and groan about the “age thing”, it’s kind of like being around people sneezing in public who won’t cover their mouths.

“Geeeeeesh…..don’t say that!! Gaaaaaaaaahhhhhh…don’t talk like that with all that ‘old’ talk!!! Arghhhhhhhh…you’re infecting me!!!”

I think they send out the AARP cards and membership because they want to kill us all off.

They give us a taste of a discount…the discount is attached to a reminder of our getting older….we get to be in a club that’s huge but exclusive…we get to be in a club that is only for older people….and….

BAM! In our heads, we are now officially old or approaching it fast.

Then we start feeling it….we start feeling “our age”…and soon we’re sitting around all the time and creaking and getting stiff and wearing out from disuse.

And then we start seeking out ways to keep the thought of being old fresh in our minds.

We get all the senior discounts that we’re entitled to.  We work the system.

We’ll leave Neverland forever for a cheap cup of coffee at McDonalds.

So I think that it’s a weird plot.  Euthanasia is still illegal…so why not hit it from a more subtle angle? Why not just make everybody who is susceptible feel old so that they kick off sooner?

Freaking AARP.

It’s like this whole thing is some kind of club that I didn’t even know I’d asked to join…but all of a sudden…or so it seems..”all of a sudden”, I’m a member of.

I’m a member of a club that loves company.

Why do all these people want to remind me of the inescapable fact (look at Conan! He’s getting older, too!) that as you add years, at some point you’re getting older?

It’s no big deal, really.

No…actually, it’s a huge deal.

Sometimes, I just feeling like saying, “Hey, you….yeah, you….wrinkly man…yeah. You. Do me a favor, won’t you? Why don’t you just keep your old to yourself for a while? Do you think you can do that?!”

Everything’s about the attitude.

I don’t want to be an embarrassment with my inappropriately youthful demeanor …I don’t want someone to yell out of their mid-life crisis mobile, “Hey, You!!! Why don’t you grow up already!!! Young punk!!”….I don’t want that to happen…but I don’t want to be infected with an Old Head before my time.

I guess that what I’m saying is that I don’t want that.

Ponce de Leon, out.

“I can fly, I can fly, I can fly!!!” Funky Fred and the Neverland Bunch