10 • <strong>Sept</strong>/<strong>Oct</strong> <strong>2023</strong> • <strong>Southern</strong> <strong>Indiana</strong> <strong>Living</strong>
Celebrate the Little Things A Note to Baby Boomers Ido not wash my car. I probably should. I probably won’t. Downsides overwhelm us seniors. Medicare and earlybird specials bless us, no doubt. Over-the-counter hearing aids indeed sound sweet. Nothing helps enough, though. Nothing beats aging. Nothing could. Reminders of what used to be — but no longer is — smack us both routinely and rudely. A good day is when I reach my toenails to cut them. A bad one is when the young mother exercising next to me at the YMCA calls me sir. Makes me wish I was almost 30, not almost 70. Or do I? I sure would not mind having more energy, more hair and more reasons not to go to bed before 10. I collect a variety of creepy spots on my skin, so don’t look closely, OK. I’d like to know why my computer and my cell phone and even my television insist I embrace the 21st century. So much as ordering lunch at a counter can make my head explode. Lunch, really? I could feel angry, bitter, betrayed. But which nap would I interrupt to fuss? Who would listen? Besides, our old dog already plays the cranky-old-man role in our household. After a lifetime in occasionally successful pursuit of life’s big things, I now blissfully chase little things. They loom plenty big in their way. The grandkids, our next-door neighbors, come over for a swim, for ice cream, just to hang out and to make another mess. That’s little but that’s big. My gym friend invariably asks “sir” how was his weekend. That’s little but that’s big. People my wife and I met on vacation sent us an anniversary card. That’s little but that’s big. Friends here join us regularly for lunch or dinner, count on it as much as do we. That’s little but that’s big. A long, deep breath pleases me as like little else can. Ten of them are still nicer. In <strong>2023</strong>, I gear down and I get by. No one I care most about cares a hoot if my car is washed. Yes, that too is little but big. I still pitch in to meet community needs. I gradually cut back on that commitment, as well. It’s the whippersnappers’ turn to save the world. I rejoice in saying no, at last. I read obituaries of people I knew and people I wish I had known. I read of their survivors, work histories, hobbies, favorite teams and beloved pets. I now know these people better, for sure. Obits define their subjects respectfully, just not fully. Little things, little qualities, get nudged out in a big picture. My obit probably will not say how much I enjoy listening to birds chatter in the morning. My obit probably will not say how I mourned the loss via storm of our milewide, century-old mulberry tree. My obit probably will not say how much I love our bedroom clock radio; like me, it’s gone from state of the art to relic. My obit probably will not say how I fiercely found no reason to click a single selfie or to spend as much as a second meandering Tik- Tok. My obit likewise well could leave out how I preferred hold-inmy-hand books and TV ballgames with the sound off. My obit probably will not claim Dale Moss was normal. He was a way-too-impatient sightseer, this Moss guy. It was just him to devote too little time to truly big deals such as the Empire State Building and the Liberty Bell and the Lincoln Memorial. Give him instead one of those silent ballgames or his noisy-by-nature yard and he was contented. I heard a man interviewed mention the two most-important days in his life — the day he was born and the day he realized why. The why part of old age gets tricky, doesn’t it? What’s the point when you and I typically run out of points? Most of us have raised kids and have retired from jobs. Our dreams and ambitions turn more into memories. We are left to re-evaluate what most matters and who most matters. Returning to sleep after yet another bathroom visit is tonight’s bear to wrestle. Tomorrow, I hope to remember to clip those Burger King coupons. I no longer jog. I no longer attend any music concert where I would have to stand a minute or more. That’s OK, since I am more into Beethoven than the Beatles. I walk slower and drive slower, eat I walk slower and drive slower, eat less and follow politics less. My world ever shrinks, and I am ever tickled. less and follow politics less. My world ever shrinks, and I am ever tickled. I am finished making big splashes, though I hope I made a few. Busy is a four-letter word, even if it wasn’t one. I admit it; I’m tempted to let General Hospital have its way with me. Keeping life simple keeps me happiest. A goal for tomorrow is to say hi to as many people as I can and to be grateful for whoever says it back. I plan on listening more than on talking, on caring more about sunshine than the stock market. I may or may not succeed on all fronts. Either way, my goal for the day after tomorrow will be the same. Perhaps it will rain good and hard, and my car will come clean regardless. • After 25 years, Dale Moss retired as <strong>Indiana</strong> columnist for The Courier-Journal. He now writes weekly for the News and Tribune. Dale and his wife Jean live in Jeffersonville in a house that has been in his family since the Civil War. Dale’s e-mail is dale.moss@twc.com <strong>Southern</strong> <strong>Indiana</strong> <strong>Living</strong> • <strong>Sept</strong>/<strong>Oct</strong> <strong>2023</strong> • 11