When I Grow Up I Wanna Be An Old Person!

Lovely Loves,

America (scratch that. pretty much all of mankind) is obsessed with not aging. There's anti-aging creams, anti-aging foods, anti-aging surgery, even anti-aging exercises (pray, check for wrinkles, pray again). Growing old has been labelled tasteless, unfashionable, ugly. Well I don't buy it. While people go inject themselves with toxic paralyzing substances and search for the wrinkle cream of everlasting youth, I embrace old age.

Old age is the age ofexcuses, the backstage pass to life, the skeleton key to the playground over the hill. Once you hit a certain age you can get away with just about anything. Riding the motorized cart through grocery stores? Cutting lines? "Accidentally" tripping rude passerby with your cane? Asking that cute senior citizen to help you cross the road? You're old! Go for it!

The Grandma from "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" is an special inspiration to me. "You want to go

insane?" some might ask, but I see it as getting to climb on to my neighbor's roofs (or into their

basements), wearing a cowl, and accusing people of being evil Turks. Sounds like fun to me!

Some other inspiring old people:

-My Grandmas!

-Betty White and the Golden Girls

-Maxine

-The Grandma from "Runaway Bride"

-Mrs.Marple

-The bald,

dancing Six Flags guy who is really a woman (no, seriously. thats a bald

cap.)

-God (so old he's ageless)

-Several other cool oldish people who i can't think of at the moment. They're out there, though.

Somewhere...

Plus, who says being old means not being beautiful? Wrinkles are a sign of a life well laughed and a million smiles. They add character and warmth to a perhaps otherwise mundane face. Plus, if I get age spots i can play connect-the-dot whenever I want!There are definite downsides to aging: the dentures, the arthritis, the need to pee at all hours of the night. But hey,occupational hazards, right?

Plus, just imagine the stories I'll tell my Grandchildren. "Back in the days when I had natural teeth we didn't (insert high-tech invention here). No, no. We used a black box called a VHS player and instead of (insert here) we took a smaller black box and inserted it into a slot in the bigger black box. Really!" Just wait till I tell them about washing dishes by hand, or reading paper books, or riding in mammoth gas-guzzling tanks. Hee hee hee.

Night You Young Whippersnappers,

Hannah Hoo