B E B E R E

Wednesday, May 11, 2005

A bit of advice: Don't Get Old.

After two days of sunshine, it seems as though everything is bursting out in the garden. I don't need to buy any plants, but I've got a lot of rearranging to do. Anyone need any hostas?

Yesterday evening, I planted my morning glories and my sweet pea plants over by the chain link fence (the moonflowers will have to wait a few more days; not big enough yet). While I was out there, a couple of the Tufts Students who live next door came out to have dinner. Was only half-listening to the conversation, but what I was left with was pretty entertaining - bragging about the older people they'd dated. I think the guy who made the statement "Oh yeah? Well I almost MOVED IN with a THIRTY YEAR OLD." won. I moved into the lilac trees so they couldn't the fit this caused me. Thirty years old? Get me to the Geriatric Ward!

Mentioned this to Raphaella, who was taking down her laundry, and she just shook her head and clucked. At about that time, the new students behind her house came out to cook out. They apparently like High-Powered Dance Club Hits and put forth a valiant effort at turning the block into a High-Powered Dance Club. We took advantage and grooved-out a bit on her new patio. Boy, does my neighbor have moves! Raphaella told me that she always loved to dance, but married a man who hated it. That's tough, but I can understand. It was the same for my mom, has always been the case for me.

It's going to be an interesting summer.

19 comments:

miriam sawyer said...: Age is a matter of perspective. I once asked my daughter, who was in second or third grade, about her new teacher: What was she like, how old was she? She answered, "Oh, she's old. About 27." At the time I was about 28.; 5/12/05, 9:39 AM
Be said...: Oh, I realize that...it just made me laugh, because I remember being like that when I was their age.; 5/12/05, 9:58 AM
Simon Kenton said...: Well, injudiciousness is not age-related, and on occasion, there is no fool like an old fool. I was dating a young woman.

She said to her colleague, "You don't suppose? I mean, really. You don't think ... it's just a Father Fixation?"

"No," says her friend, with comely indignation. "Certainly NOT. ALL the 18-year-old girls are WILD for bald middle-aged guys."; 5/12/05, 3:05 PM
Be said...: Hey, there's a lot to be said for bald, middle-aged men. I used to tease an ex-boyfriend that he was dating me because he feared death. His maintenance was that he always wanted a trophy blonde to go with his fancy car.; 5/12/05, 3:33 PM
Richard Lawrence Cohen said...: Simon, you sly dog! One never knows what one'll find on a third party's blog.

My younger brother, after his divorce, progressively dated younger and younger woman. Eventually I suggested he just date an egg.; 5/12/05, 6:25 PM
Yogo said...: When I was in my 20s, anything more than ten years older than me was considered old. Now that I'm 40 (don't say it) the old line has moved up to 20 years older than me.; 5/12/05, 10:51 PM
Simon Kenton said...: RLC, concealment and discretion indirection are hopeless if you've tracked me here. Like the ghost in that (Sir Walter Scott?) poem, that goes around calling, "Found Out! Found Out!"

All right. Dammit. I've developed a crush on Bebere. I could withstand the flowerblogging. Actually, I could withstand it very easily. And I look on the recipes as one of those bizarreries that our friends affect, to be passed over in slightly embarassed silence. Take for instance my oldest friend, the fundamentalist Christian. So fundamental, he is autodidacting in Hebrew and Greek, but a fundamentalist Christian nonetheless. Or your ex-wife, tube-blogging. In the face of the personified peculiar, we forbear, even as we hope for forbearance. These deviances are things which are not discussed.

I could even resist Bebere's eminent good sense and humorous detachment. But that she is a polyglot - that, THAT, has ravished me. Ah, God! what a governess she would make.; 5/12/05, 11:09 PM
Be said...: Nappy: Too funny! Back when I was a kid, I used to think about the year 2000 and how old I'd be (29). At that time, the only reference I had for that age was my mom - single with two kids and two jobs. Tired, unhappy, older than her years.

When I actually hit 29, I was like - Oh - I'm young still. I find it interesting, too, at how much the life experience brings me closer to my 'elders' than those who are younger than me.; 5/13/05, 8:02 AM
Richard Lawrence Cohen said...: Simon: She'd be perhaps as a governess in a Bronte novel, wouldn't she?

But I leave these things to you. I'm glad to be hors de combat...; 5/13/05, 3:06 PM
Be said...: Being a governess would be my ideal job. However, I'd be very wary of the Mr Rochesters out there. Always good to watch out when a fellow says, "yes, we're still married, but we're separated."; 5/14/05, 12:00 PM
Richard Lawrence Cohen said...: I meant "She'd be perfect as a governess..."; 5/15/05, 2:45 PM
Simon Kenton said...: Well, there is at least one sturdy sensible independent and comely governess in Sherlock Holmes.

.....................

I never used the "married but separated line." That admitted, many young women are undeterred by the married state; perhaps they are the equivalent of trophy hunters. Against such the best defense is a bland and affable stupidity; if I do say so myself, knowing how near irresistible is this opening, I did this well.; 5/15/05, 3:50 PM
Be said...: Well, Simon - monogamy in the traditional sense is so outré. I don't how it is by you, but I know of several poly colonies here. Don't think I'd do well in one of those Brave New Lifestyle Choices. Heaven knows when I have dated more than one person simultaneously, it was always a problem to keep the names straight.

***

Trophy hunters? That would be marrying the rich, old guy (with the heart condition). The big advantage of dating a married man (knowingly) is that you can have your fun with him and when he gets on your nerves, you can send him home to the person who's contractually obliged to deal with him.; 5/15/05, 4:59 PM
Simon Kenton said...: I was relying on a different definition of trophy hunting - it's rare and difficult to get one. Your basic 220-point whitetail or 400-point bull elk comprise about 0.1% of their respective populations. I'm a meat hunter only, but I have complete respect for the people who not only go for the meat, but have the skill to locate and stalk one of these grand (biological) sports.

Old rich guys with ectopic beats and obstructed arteries and incipient re-infarctions? A callipygian young beauty such as yourself can club them like so many baby seals.; 5/15/05, 6:34 PM
Be said...: Misinterpretation on my part. It's only recently that women started going after the Big Blondes. I was thinking of bagging a big purse.

Clubbing old men with faulty tickers isn't really my sort of sport, either. Might be a consideration if I needed a better upper body workout. Don't know what, if any effect, it would have on the glutes, however.; 5/15/05, 11:49 PM
Simon Kenton said...: Was talking to KL, a folk singer, author and enviro activist, and mentioned the 'clubbing-baby-seals' concept. She's in her mid-80s, with the bone structure of a classic beauty, though 75 years of desert sun have blotched and toughened her skin. For a moment, her face softened and revealed the girl. "Ah, that's what I did to BR," she said, smiling. "He never had a chance once I fell for him. Clubbed him like a baby seal. How I loved that man. Of course, that's what you're supposed to do, fall in love with your boatman." Fifty years gone in an instant, she was back in the Grand Canyon back when the great red river was still sculpting it.; 5/16/05, 11:47 AM
Be said...: That's lovely, it really is. It's good that she knew who she wanted and knew how to get him. I have no doubt that there are women out there whose playbooks read like the Art of War. I'm not one of them. I think you have to be trained in that sort of thing, as well as want someone badly enough to strategize like that.; 5/16/05, 3:40 PM
Simon Kenton said...: Training? Strategy? You are probably not familiar with the breed. Of boatman it was said with perfect truth by Dr. Gibbs, "Man is Weak, and Boatman is Weaker than Most." I suspect that BR was not as resistant as some might have been to her charm. Plus it has to be said: several of us, who are no spring roosters ourselves, have quarreled over which of us will (try to) get KL in the next life. It's an acknowledgement of her impact that when she met my wife and flirted with me, she quickly assured my new wife that nothing had happened between us; and that my wife was pleased by the assurance. In her mid-80s, she has still that impact. Of how many 85-yr-olds can it be said that they have to reassure ladies decades younger?

Wish I'd been BR, and she'd clubbed ME like a baby seal.; 5/16/05, 5:01 PM
Be said...: Well, the woman I work for is in her mid sixties and I have a couple of my guy friends (my age) vie for her attentions. She, like me, doesn't care for the young ones.

I hope to be half as awesome as she when I'm even twenty years younger.; 5/16/05, 10:51 PM

Wednesday, May 11, 2005

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