We will win Halloween in our neighborhood forever if I can figure out a mutually beneficial arrangement with the father of my son’s classmate. His grandmother is 107 years old. I was in shock comprehending this number. His wife showed me a picture. Social norms dictate you say the person looks great, that you’re surprised by the age. But I couldn’t get the words out because holy mother, homie looks 107 to the minute. I didn’t know humans could exist in such a state. If she told me she prefers to sleep in a casket, I would say I get it. If she told me she’s met God, I would ask if she spends most weekends up there.
I need to get you that picture so you understand. Can I just ask for it? I don’t know them that well. Would that be unkind? Picture “Tales from the Crypt” if you had H.B.O. in the 90s or google it. Now picture her on our porch next to a cauldron of candy. Who among our Indian neighbors would risk cardiac arrest to grab a Twix? More likely they would abandon this inconvenient American tradition that won’t fall on a Saturday again for 11 years. For my kids, this will be their one time trick-or-treating without school that day or the next.
My offer to 107-year-old Grandma would be a base rate of $20 an hour to sit in a comfortable chair by our front door Halloween night, plus a dollar for every audible noise she managed to make. The weather is perfect right now, and the job couldn’t be much different than what she would be doing anyway. I also want to pitch a more lucrative business if she’s open to hanging out in a morgue for an extended time to see if some corpses come back to life because they figure if this chick’s alive, they might have something left in the tank after all. Grieving loved ones have no budget constraints for bonus time with their departed.
This is not to be disrespectful. I revere those who can squeeze this much life out of life, who put up an ever-more-wrinkled index finger every time Father Time comes calling, or maybe it’s the middle finger. I want to be like them. I have questions.
There is a booming industry around longevity science/snake oil because capitalism is like the water that will always find the gaps and create some too. The extent to which I’ve explored it is reading the book “Outlive” passed along from my brother, but I know there is a whole podcast-bro-product-sponsorship ecosystem.
I cannot be the only one wondering why all the talking and writing and YouTubing is by men. Meanwhile women live longer. This must be what “mansplaining” is. I want to hear from the champs. If America and Germany are running seminars on how to win a world war, only one registration should be full.
My guess however — based on a snippet from the Netflix docuseries “Live to 100: Secrets of the Blue Zones” which I am saving to watch with my 79-year-old mother-in-law over Thanksgiving — is there are no magical tips no matter who’s talking. A female Okinawan centenarian’s advice was to try not to let things bother you too much, sensible but probably not enough to score a book deal.
There is not much on earth that does not bother my mom. She runs hot on negative energy. Pettiness gives her turbo boosts like a video game. She’s not big on vegetables and has a sweet tooth. Exercise is on her radar but easily derailed by the most vague of ailments. Yet my brother and I would be zero surprised if she lived 20 percent longer than my dad who eats well, works out religiously and does not engage in melodrama.
The disparity carried over to our next generation. My wife still buys gummy bears at age 41, whereas I wanted to shoot myself when I accidentally took a swig of Sprite this month. She aspired to launch a running habit one summer evening, and the shoes wait sadly in the same spot after their maiden trip like the forgotten toy in every “Toy Story” movie. I run to the gym Monday through Friday before dawn. As proof the motivation is intrinsic and not for a chance to hit on Catwoman, I don’t bother to take out my retainer.
Yet I am the one who has to gulp statins on cardiologist orders and at some point will start a bidding war for those abs during my organ donation while she makes it rain at Chippendales with the life insurance payment. Just prop up my corpse on the Halloween porch next to Grandma 147 if she’s still kickin’.
The greatest thing about being 107 is she has a daughter in her eighties. We all want to be around for our kids as they grow up, but that is extreme and hilarious. For some reason I picture the batter catching up to the runner on an inside-the-park home run. What a woman, what a life. God bless her and God bless Nana, my buddy’s grandma who passed this year at a solid age 99. If your scrapbook includes hiding with the other kids in the English countryside when the Nazis were bombing the cities and the launch of ChatGPT… you had a good run. That’s the podcast I want to listen to.