One Year Older and . . .

As you may have read recently, another birthday came my way. I feel honored to be an octogenarian. Believe it or not, that is one reason I keep on writing these Senior Moments. To be able to write Post Senior Moments will not be my privilege.

Moments ago I was lured by my computer into checking into my High School past. I looked to see if there were any schoolmates I knew or wanted to contact. Up came a page of an old yearbook with tiny, hardly legible pictures and names. Then I checked to see if any reunions were scheduled. None.

In the mail arrived a welcome periodical: a regular journal from one of my previous schools. Ah, such sweet memories were awakened. I went through all 34 pages and when I finished, I recognized two, a former professor, the other a former student. Everyone else were strangers. What else after 60 years. It was a pleasure to see what was happening, what the professors were writing, celebrity alums making the news, and the prowess of some athletes. I was also offered a chance to stay connected, to become a Partner and to receive information on Planned Gifts via four different credit cards.

Getting older is not something we can either guarantee or calculate. What we can do is accept it, face it honestly and yes, assist others in their fading moments, months or years which will enrich us all. One thing about a new year is that we enter with a clean page. Nothing there to either relish or or abolish. But soon it will be full of eraser marks, misspelled words, inaccurate math as we try to balance our check books, drawings only a few could recognize and all kinds of other stuff.

Then out comes the eraser which can make the pages blurred, torn, illegible. Strange as it seems, we are all (or mostly all) tempted to make year-end resolutions. Some will be forgotten, others mysteriously disappear, and some we wish we hadn't made in the first place. Even so, we can be thankful for the new beginning, the clean slate, the erasers and the challenge of the new year. Happy New Year and many more to come. Just don't forget an ample supply of erasers. And sharpened pencils. And a hiding place for those resolutions you don't want made public.