Officially an Old-Fart

   I don't remember exactly when I became an old-fart. It was sometime between AARP sending me a card and now. I watch TV and the ads come on with I-phones and so on... flashy ads jumping around with images and devices that make the laptop I finally got last summer obsolete. I walk into a store, or look on Amazon, and damned near everything is way over and out of my price range. I miss the times when a store on State Street called Banks sold stuff from packed to the rafters office supplies and I could get a ribbon for my Remington Noiseless typewriter there. I miss the times when one could walk into any Art Museum anywhere free of charge unless there was a special exhibition. I miss the times when I could write out a letter in longhand and send it snail-mail for a dime's worth in stamps. I miss the times when I could browse in a record store.... when record stores had a booth where I could try out an album before purchasing it. I miss the times when a rock band stood on the stage and played music... when the most action up there was Chuck Berry duck-walking to songs like Maybellene, No Particular Place to Go, or Mick Jagger prancing and posing to Satisfaction! No one had to be lifted into the air on a string and spun around while lipsynching some banal piece of crap like last night's Grammy's (Does anyone know what a Gramophone was and that this is the word that the Grammy Award came from?).

   I am unashamedly an old fart.... no longer concerned with keeping up-to-date and relevant or am I enamored of the mixed up and confusing non-linear plot of "The Followers". The Followers.... my God, what a piece of crap! How many holes in the plot can they get by with? How dumb can the FBI be portrayed and how magically-smart a group of murderous maniacs be portrayed? Still, I watch it... I admit I'm hooked. Yes, I am hooked on that, as I was The Wire and Breaking Bad (those two at least had some good writing and an understandable story). I do secretly wish I were younger and could understand why I need an I-pad or similar device to watch my favorite movies or TV programs. But I really don't care to stare into a tiny screen as I walk and text, taking pictures of myself in exotic places. Speaking of that, I do wish I had hairless abs and pecs. I do wish I could parkour around town like a chimp on steroids. But I am resigned to being designated to a park bench instead and am rapidly sinking into the murkiness of passé.

   Ahhh, but youth. Can I at least admire you for the way you are handling the Brave New World we have left for you to create within. I guess so. Why not? Enjoy the life I have and let go of it. It is your world now and I am gradually backing off... run with it!

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