My Resolutions on Turning Eighty-eight
I will not wear shorts, wing-tip shoes and black knee socks to the beach.
I will continue to be grateful that I lived long enough to see girls running about in bikinis that would have gotten them arrested when I was a youth.
I will not listen to any salesman who wants to sell me a time-share in Lutz.
I will quit telling people how I paid ten cents for a haircut at Webb’s City in 1950.
I will not say, “I don’t know what this world is coming to.”
I will continue to try to distinguish between the accelerator and the brake.
and I will enter a drugstore by pushing my walker through the front door, not
by driving my Studebaker through the side of the building.
I will not lie to Northerners about the size of the alligator I have seen.
I will revel in now being addressed as “sir” although I might have been a Dumpster diver for the past sixty years
I will not wear my hearing aid to a rock concert.
I will not drink a second Martini; lately I stagger before I drink the first one.
I will not tell the same person more than five times about my war experiences.
I will try never to be more than 50 feet from a restroom.
I will no longer worry about getting a promotion.
In fact, I will feel free to tell former bosses to shove it.
I will not flirt with young women; they might respond.
I will feel free to tell other people their deficiencies because they no longer dare hit an old man..
I will no longer be impressed by dignitaries because I now realize they are as dumb as I am.
Now that my hands are shaky, I will grow a bushy moustache so that I no longer have to worry about trimming nose hairs
Although not athletic, I will try to be the best balloon batter in the nursing home.
I will continue trying to learn to wear my baseball cap while eating in Florida restaurants.
I will revel in praise when attendants at the nursing home flatter me because I put my pants on by myself.
I will not consort with lap dancers in strip clubs, fearing they might break my femurs
I will try not to smell like mothballs
I will not touch women inappropriately; I get palpitations when I touch them appropriately..
I will live dangerously —I will not wear a belt AND suspenders.
If people are consistently smiling at me as I walk down the sidewalk, I will check my fly.
I will not wear t-shirts that say “Vote for Wilkie.”
I will try not to point out theatrically people I suspect are gay, inter-racial or Asiatic.
I will not call the police when I hear what I must pay for a bag of popcorn at a movie.
Pleading dementia, I will not file income tax forms anymore.
I will tell people about my aches and pains only until their eyes begin to glaze.
I will not ask people how old they think I am, hoping they’ll say 45
If people guess that I’m in my eighties, then I’ll tell them I’m ninety-five..
I will continue refusing to wear pleated pants.
I will try to stay up until 9:30 on weekends
I will not wobble my dentures to amuse children.
I will continue writing poetry until I become senile; in addition, I will write poetry until I am senile . Also, did I tell you I will try to write poetry until I become senile?
(2013)
