A half century, plus two...

Here we are again. It is hard to believe it is already time for my annual birthday blog. It seems like it was only yesterday that I was whining about turning 40. What a silly young man I was… Hopefully, eight years from now I’ll be looking back and chuckling at how I was whining about turning 52 back in 2010.
Usually, after I whine about how old I am, I encourage people to send me gifts. This has never worked out so well, but maybe this year Conan O’Brien will stumble across my blog and be motivated to send me a little something with the extra cash he has lying around.
Sorry, back to whining about my age…
Reading the Minneapolis Star-Tribune this week, I was shocked to read that it has be 33 YEARS SINCE THE VIKINGS WERE IN A SUPER BOWL!!! That cannot possibly be. I watched that game. And to make matters worse, I remember watching the three they participated in before that one!!!!!
All the things I struggle to remember in my life, and I can't seem to shake the memory of those heartaches.
Most of the items in my growing catalog of age-related issues, however, are exacerbated by the amount of weight I carry. Since an October Camden State Park photo shoot I’ve been hobbling around on a sore knee. Finally, in the past few days I’ve been able to navigate without the cane. I’ve been probably 90% cane-free. The diagnosis was a Baker’s cyst—a small balloon of joint gunk leakage on the back side of my knee.
Of course Dr. Snow has a lot bigger words he uses when describing it.
The bottom line is that a cortisone-ish cocktail injected into the cyst a month ago has helped relieve the pain significantly, which in turn should enable me to return soon to my nightly jazzercise sessions. (Wow...Microsoft Word, as I type this, actually recognizes “jazzercise” as a word.)
I also require way too many drugs to keep me alive. Considering the number of trips I make to the back end of Thrifty White Drug in Tyler, you would think I would be burning calories faster than I can consume them.
I guess not.
I can not, however, complain with too much conviction. I have a very good life. I am surrounded by a great family and many very loyal friends (albeit not so loyal that I get birthday gifts from them annually), as well as a job with a company that treats me quite well.
I’m thankful also that I don’t recall ever walking around with my cap on sideways and my pants on the ground…an affliction of the very young and, I would assume, the very old. For those of you who don’t get the “pants on the ground reference,” ask your kids about it…or at the very least, ask someone as young as me.
I am also experiencing elevated levels of joy over the current football season…but I won’t tempt fate by discussing it until after Sunday night.
Just when I think I can’t possibly have any more joy in my life, I find out I can get 10% off hotel rooms with my AARP card.
Yeah, my life is pretty good despite the fact that it is flying by at a break-neck pace. Before I know it, I’ll be bragging about how good my life is at 82—probably to my 92-year-old sister.
In the meantime, no matter how good life is for me at 52, there’s always room for more bliss…so Conan, if you are reading, I like movies and music. A simple gift card would be a great place to start. (PO Box 89, Tyler, MN 56178)