The Swamp

Happy Friday!!

First off, not mine, just in general. I'm 52 and it just hadn't really dawned on me 4 or 5 years ago the window that many of us are about to enter/in the middle of/deeply mired in with regards to friends, relatives and parental type units passing on.

Attended the memorial service for best man's mother last night. Week prior it was another groomsmen's dad. All told in the last year, over a dozen friends have put parents to eternal rest. It's starting to really sock me in the gut, frankly.

I guess I'd never really fully understood what a midlife crisis was all about until the last year or so. I'm not in one, thankfully, but holy shit do I understand it. Talk about a sobering, gut-wrenching, slap in the face dose of reality.

Last few weeks I've been making a concerted effort to reconnect with friends and family. Today, I pulled the trigger on reaching out to my dad, who I haven't spoken to in over 10 years (very long story, this is the second time we've gone this route.)

Not sure I have much of a point, other than the obvious: Don't let petty, or even non-petty shit preclude you from... At a minimum... Making an effort and being at peace with whatever that effort yields.

Carry on.

nods. nods again.

I'm 50, and I co-sign on many of the things you wrote, nonlinear. One of the main reasons I've made a (somewhat) concerted effort to lose weight is because I don't want to drop dead of a heart attack at this point in my life. I'm about to celebrate my 25th wedding anniversary next Tuesday, and frankly, I want to make it to our 50th anniversary. I owe it to her (and myself) to at least have a fighting chance to reach that milestone.

I too haven't spoken to my dad in a while (since January 2021), but I'm not even close to wanting to reach out to him. There's a lot of non-petty stuff that he needs to work through before I'd consider that. Knowing him, he won't. Instead he'll just drink and blame everyone else for his problems, much like he has during his adult life.

As my late mother-in-law said, getting old isn't for sissies. I learned a lot from her, but that phrase has stood out for a long time now.

Yup. Over the past three years, all the males in my family tree in the generation above me have died. (Except for one uncle, who is expected to die any day now.) Plus my wife's dad. My wife's dad died at 70, which was really sad, but everyone on my side of the family lived a long life. And given what my dad and his brothers all went through (born in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia in the 1920s and 30s), it's a miracle they made it as long as they did.

Just saw Syb's post. Last week my wife and I celebrated our 25th anniversary with a great trip to Victoria BC.

Rough timing here. The sister/cousin of some friends of mine died (41) this week and at the end of April I lost a friend (44) back home to a sudden heart attack. Either one would have qualified as the closest person I knew in my age bracket to die prior to 2022, so the luck has officially ran out.

mister d wrote: ↑Fri Sep 30, 2022 6:03 pm Rough timing here. The sister/cousin of some friends of mine died (41) this week and at the end of April I lost a friend (44) back home to a sudden heart attack. Either one would have qualified as the closest person I knew in my age bracket to die prior to 2022, so the luck has officially ran out.

Ugh. That's an extra level of scary (and sad).

Steve of phpBB wrote: ↑Fri Sep 30, 2022 6:02 pmJust saw Syb's post. Last week my wife and I celebrated our 25th anniversary with a great trip to Victoria BC.

Congrats! We're going to Chicago and Milwaukee next weekend to visit some friends and go to a couple of favorite watering holes (mostly the Foundation tiki bar in Milwaukee).

Also, I'm not a sex toy.

Sabo wrote: ↑Fri Sep 30, 2022 6:08 pm
Also, I'm not a sex toy.

The Hell you're not!

Sunday I am at a fundraising golf tournament in honour of the wife of a college roommate of mine who died 18 months ago from breast cancer. Buried a really good friend last year. Had a heart attack last year...

It's like your whole life you know these things are going to happen, but it's kind of theoretical until something happens (a health scare, a death, or even just catching yourself in the mirror and seeing your grandfather) and it becomes reality.

Well done swampers. We need some brown liquor and dark wood to discuss the issues of 1975 babies. Here, here. Really doh

I’m right with all of you. Friends losing parents really hits me hard and I can’t even fathom losing my mom.

Wife and I also celebrated our 25th anniversary this month. Didn’t do anything big to celebrate since we are buying a house.

HaulCitgo wrote: ↑Fri Sep 30, 2022 6:48 pmWe need some brown liquor and dark wood to discuss the issues of 1975 babies.

I can only bring the brown liquor

Sabo wrote: ↑Fri Sep 30, 2022 6:08 pm

Steve of phpBB wrote: ↑Fri Sep 30, 2022 6:02 pmJust saw Syb's post. Last week my wife and I celebrated our 25th anniversary with a great trip to Victoria BC.

Congrats! We're going to Chicago and Milwaukee next weekend to visit some friends and go to a couple of favorite watering holes (mostly the Foundation tiki bar in Milwaukee).

Also, I'm not a sex toy.

Not a toy, a sex MACHINE!

Been having similar thoughts.FiL isn’t in great shape, can barely walk, but then I realize he is in his mid 80s. I don’t think of him as being that old! My mother is getting difficult to talk to on the phone, just doesn’t get the gist sometimes. No senility or anything, just takes a lot of patience to get through a call.

And this week my mother forwarded me an obituary for a kid I went to Hebrew school with from age 5 - 14. “Long illness,” no idea what. Not someone I ever kept in touch with or heard about in 30 years, but seeing this far too often. Someone made a Facebook page memorial wall for my high school. Way too many names I knew have been added.

I remember asking both sets of my grandparents what the worst part about getting old was. Both told me the same thing independently of each other:
1) people can be condescending to you
2) all your friends start dying

That second point always stuck with me…even at 25 years old when I asked the question. It helped give me perspective and be able to face the reality that life ends for everyone.

FiL says the worst part of getting old is having to find new fishing buddies. He is 82.

So as you guys perhaps remember, my brother-in-law passed away last April. That got me thinking about things like my own mortality, life for my wife should I pass first, or for me if she goes before my time. Shit that wakes you up at night. It's better than waking up to regrets, I guess, because we all have those questions.

GoodKarma wrote: ↑Fri Sep 30, 2022 9:49 pm I remember asking both sets of my grandparents what the worst part about getting old was. Both told me the same thing independently of each other:
1) people can be condescending to you
2) all your friends start dying

That second point always stuck with me…even at 25 years old when I asked the question. It helped give me perspective and be able to face the reality that life ends for everyone.

OK boomer. Seriously I got a similar answer from a friend of mine (he was a retired professor from Harvard (was previously a Vietnam war correspondent for the LA Times who also survived the Holocaust). Not so much the condescension, but the complacency of youth. Of course, he might've been taking a swipe at me by saying that.

I've already lost four very close friends. It's a motherfucker. I think I'm all perspectived out at this point.

Sorry, dude.

I’m 63 and I’m seeing friends dying or getting really bad physical issues. The weird thing is how common physical issues become. I see my friends and we compare aches and pains.

We went to a Billy Strings concert tonight at Stanford (great!), but when it was time to go, one of my buddies couldn’t stand up straight and had great difficulty walking. He wasn’t drunk or high, and he was completely lucid. Took us half an hour to get to the car which should have been a ten minute walk. (This is a guy who swims almost every day). I drove his car home - I was going to take him to ER but he started feeling better so I took him to his home instead.

sancarlos wrote: ↑Sat Oct 01, 2022 1:37 am I’m 63 and I’m seeing friends dying or getting really bad physical issues. The weird thing is how common physical issues become. I see my friends and we compare aches and pains.

We went to a Billy Strings concert tonight at Stanford (great!), but when it was time to go, one of my buddies couldn’t stand up straight and had great difficulty walking. He wasn’t drunk or high, and he was completely lucid. Took us half an hour to get to the car which should have been a ten minute walk. (This is a guy who swims almost every day). I drove his car home - I was going to take him to ER but he started feeling better so I took him to his home instead.

You sound like the Miami Dolphins.

Sabo wrote: ↑Fri Sep 30, 2022 6:08 pm Also, I'm not a sex toy.

“Leave the goggles on”

If I’m going to be honest with myself and all of you I’m very much in denial about all this (shit than makes me feel old thread notwithstanding), I think because the alternative would be to just drown in worry. I’m going to get slapped hard in the face by reality at some point.

The pandemic has been a minor such slap because seeing people (or their kids!) for the first time in two plus years can be pretty disruptive to the illusion.