I'm 50!

And I like to kick, stretch and kick!

A lot of my posts on here involve certain movies at a certain age, like Pulp Fiction at 30 or Clue at 40, and I write about the movie and how I first experienced it, and sometimes how it has aged. It’s all very fun.

Today’s post is about Matt Dursin at 50. Let’s see how fun we can make that movie.

I’ve actually felt old for a long time. When I worked at Boston University, I managed a staff of work-study students who were mostly 19 and 20, and even when I was only a few years older than them in my mid-twenties, I would feel old when they didn’t know a movie reference I made or song lyric that I knew. I always thought that I just knew more stuff when I was their age.

One time, Bob Dylan played a free show near BU, and one of my students asked if he was Jakob Dylan’s dad. That really sucked.

As time went on, and I grew much older than the 19 or 20 year olds that I managed, it still stung when I would discover how little they knew, but I wrote it off as youthful ignorance and just figured they would learn as they got older, like I did.

I still didn’t really feel old until I was in my 30’s and I was seeing a chiropractor for my bad back and a physical therapist for a frozen shoulder (both of them, in fact). I started wearing knee pads when I would go for a run because my knees hurt all the time, and I was taking tons of aspirin to deal with constant body aches. I started losing my hair, which didn’t help matters. I was also drinking a lot, but that probably wasn’t related.

I assumed that would pretty much be my life for the next 40 or so years. Then, I spent my 35th birthday in a hospital bed with a horrible lung infection and thought maybe I should change things up. Over the next few years, I started being a little more conscious of what I was eating, wearing actual running shoes for running and sleeping on a decent mattress. Everything except the drinking. I kept that up.

In my forties, all the jokes I would make about being old were no longer funny, because while 40 isn’t exactly old, it’s no longer all that young. A friend of mine put it perfectly on my 40th birthday: “Halfway home!”

That year, David Bowie died just shy of his 69th birthday, and everyone remarked how young that was. How could I complain about being 40? But I couldn’t help it. I just felt damn old. Tom Brady accumulated more yards and touchdowns in his 40’s than in his 20’s, and won 2 Superbowls, even becoming the oldest Superbowl MVP, and all everyone could talk about was how amazing all that was considering how old he is. And he’s younger than me.

I use Brady as an example because I’m from New England, but it’s everywhere. Actors, athletes, politicians, everyone is either too young or too old. People made fun of Joe Biden because he was too old, and so they voted for a creepy old man who was given a cognitive test just for funsies, and he did better than anyone had ever done ever. Let’s face it, It doesn’t matter what age he is, that guy is out of his tree.

But how can you not focus on it? Commercials for colon cancer screenings, erectile dysfunction, “even “homeowners turning into their parents.” How does one not look at that and say, “Yep, that me?”

But I am 50, and I don’t see a chiropractor anymore, and my shoulders are no longer frozen. I don’t need knee pads when I run, but I mostly bike these days, anyway. I drink less. Way less. I physically feel a lot better at 50 than I did at 40. That’s really all that matters.

I think that’s the biggest difference. I have come to terms with all of it. I wouldn’t care if I knew a 19 year-old who doesn’t know who Bob Dyan is. I wouldn’t care if they haven’t seen the same movies that I’ve seen. I probably haven’t seen any of their favorites, either. I’m 50. Who am I trying to impress with my film-going resume? I’m just trying to get through the day.

This not caring thing feels great. I highly recommend it. All I really care about now is that I’ve been waiting years to be able to post this:

Thanks for reading. As always, keep on keepin’ on. By the way, that’s a Bob Dylan lyric.