Lose

When I get through with showering and dressing, I often look in the mirror and remark with some surprise that "I've got an all right look". I'm pleasantly surprised, of course. That's not to say that I look as young as I did a few years ago. I look a bit rougher, I think. In ten years and twenty years, that will only be more pronounced. For the moment it's endearing, but eventually it will not be so much so. I just hope that I handle it all right.

I think that the best way to deal with getting older is to be graceful about it. Going down with a desperate struggle doesn't make things any better. When I get old, I hope to be a man about it. I hope to continue on all my days doing the best I can that day to make myself presentable, but to never try looking young when it is obviously no longer possible. As I said, for the moment it remains a feasible enterprise.

When my looks are gone someday, I hope that I am able to say that I got out of the process what I wanted. If I'm going to end up looking old no matter what I do, I hope to have it happen from a lot of fast living. Who wants to say that they lost their looks in front of the television? Give me late nights, drinking and travel. That's how you get unpleasant to look at. You've got to come out of it with some heart-stopping stories or there's no point.

I appreciate that at my age all this must not have the quality that I want in it. Certainly I hope to think this when I am older. Perhaps I will have different views after I have really been through it. It's like that song, isn't it? I may very well see things differently, but I'm glad to have this recorded so that I can look back and ruefully chuckle at how I imagined things would be before I really got going- back when I thought there'd be a day that I would really get going.