Reflections On Three Score & Ten

“Your youth evaporates in your early 40s when you look in the mirror. And then it becomes a full-time job pretending you’re not going to die, and then you accept that you’ll die. Then in your 50s everything is very thin. And then suddenly you’ve got this huge new territory inside you, which is the past, which wasn’t there before. A new source of strength. Then that may not be so gratifying to you as the 60s begin, but then I find that in your 60s, everything begins to look sort of slightly magical again. And it’s imbued with a kind of leave-taking resonance, that it’s not going to be around very long, this world, so it begins to look poignant and fascinating.”      

Martin Amis

A Facebook friend and kickass musician named Jim Rockwood posted this the other day. I thought it was really interesting. Mainly because it sort of mirrored my own life, and where I am at right now at 70.
I have never really thought too much about age or eras of life. Guess I have been too busy trying to live it on my own terms. I stopped counting the years and celebrating birthdays at age 50.
That’s OK, because that was a blowout party and most of the people who attended have scattered to the four winds. Nobody’s gone too far from Toronto, though and most of us manage to keep in touch through Facebook, Skype and email.
All my best friends are around my own age and because most of them are creative people, and like me, they still think like they did when they were in their forties.
In fact one of the nicest compliments I ever received was on one of my posts easily beBee posts like….”I really liked this post so I looked you up on Facebook. Seems like you are almost 70. Well, you sure don’t write like any 70 year old I have ever met.”
So this is the upside of not paying attention to age. But if you look back at the Martin Amis quote at the top, you’ll see that whether you are keeping track or not, he pretty much nailed down my feelings on the matter.
I am in a place in my life where I have absolute freedom of choice. Where I can write about what I feel is important, without caring too much about offending anyone. That, for a writer, is the true freedom.
And because I still feel like a guy in his mid to late forties, I can write all day and all night and it will all make sense.

You Really Are Only As Old As You Feel

I have worked very hard all of my adult life. Truth be told I worked hard during my adolescence as well. But I don’t feel like I deserve any sort of reward for that. And that's kind of how most people see retirement.
Writers don’t retire. The older they get the more kick-ass they becomes because they realize that there are a lot of people out there who need to be woken up because they have been lulled into a coma, by unfulfilling work, laziness, me-tooism, and the hypnotic lure of just staring into a fucking smart phone screen all day.
It’s not their fault. In fact, the whole capitalist system has been engineered to keep people as dumb and pliable as possible, so they don’t get any notions about elevated expectations.
Sure there are exceptions. And these people go on to be the leaders.
But even doing that  seems to be more and more of an uphill climb these days.

So in a lot of ways I’m glad I am the age that I am, whatever that is, because I’m not climbing any more. I’m up there shouting words of encouragement to those who will benefit from it.
To the rest, I have nothing to say. Because they currently lack the ability to listen and they will be what they are until they actually start thinking for themselves, and not like they are expected to or have been programmed to think.
I know that sounds like some sort of kind of harsh. But it’s actually my most realistic description of the world as I see it.
And you know what? It’s always more or less been this way. Anybody who actually figures out a way to make something of themselves can usually trace that back to the day they came out of their society-induced coma and started thinking like an individual.
For me, it was the first time I heard Bob Dylan singing 'Like A Rolling Stone'. Something happened in my head, more like a notion that I could write something like that. I didn't have any pretentions about being as good as Dylan. And I didn’t start writing for four or five years after tha. But I was thinking about it right up until I started doing it.
Bottom Line: The world is a fascinating place. All of my anger and frustration about it comes from my desire for everybody to feel the same way I do about life. That it’s a challenge and a game. And that working to make the most of your life is a whole lot more fun than the alternative of being an intellectual vegetable.

jim out

Jim Murray is a marketer, communication strategist, writer, art director and blogger. His partner, Charlene Norman is a business systems and operational analyst. Their collaboration is called Bullet Proof Consulting, headquartered in St Catharines, Ontario. Bullet Proof is designed to help companies change their thinking for the better, to become more productive, efficient, better branded and successful in today’s highly competitive business world. You can get a very clear impression of how we think by reading our business blogs at www.bulletproofconsulting.ca/blog

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