It's A Great Time To Be An Old(er) Guy!

You lived in, or close to, a big city. I lived in a little country town. Maybe location was the difference, and yes things are "safer" to a point. Back then, many crimes went unreported.

 

Yeah, it's a pretty good era to be a geezer in. Gonna get even better for geezers, man, just you wait.

 

Loved the 70's. Great music, great local bands, the cars were still good looking. Then came the 80's; new wave music, synth, one man band, with everything pre recorded, ugly cars...

Seatbelts, what seatbelts???...

 

LOL, some good stuff guys. Yes I lived in a small town and yes we left the keys in the car and never locked the house. There was also problems, such as the draft selecting and sending the disenfranchised to Vietnam and institutionalized racism.

Being in the boomer generation it has been interesting growing up in this country. I recognize that so much of the economy and culture has been focused on us that it is almost disturbing ( Have you noticed how much of the major TV ads are still aimed at us, only it is now the drug and healthcare companies! ).

I can almost empathize with the generations coming up behind us. They will not have the shear numbers needed to influence world affairs the way we did. Few of them will know the joy of exploration we did, both geographically and socially. And the freedom from fear seems to continue to shrink.

Hey I am getting older and feel I have earned the right to observe and report my opinions, lol !

-H

 

Yeah - not a bad time to be a geezer! I get to play guitars now that I never imagined owning as a kid (I do not wax nostalgic for that crusty Fender Duo-Sonic I played in garage bands)!

 

You bring up some interesting points Coach56. I was just languishing on memories in Boy Scouts watching salmon spawning in such great numbers the creek looked red, but that creek hasn't seen a salmon in 35 years now. Being a boomer, I know generations after me will never witness that and I feel somewhat responsible just being part of that greedy generation. At the same time though, we had the draft in the '60's, racial prejudice, the Cold War for most of our life where they were tenuous at best of times. However, this "shrinking of the freedom from fear" seems to be absolutely devastating to younger generations and this is when my heart goes out to them the most.

 

I'm not going to get into details about some of the things others have mentioned, but I will say I'm very thankful for having grown up in the 60's & 70's. Without quality music in my life, I don't need to be on this planet, (or any other).

 

Well, I HAD a working cd player in the Montana. Think I finally killed it with my collection of Springsteen, classic rock, and Black Sabbath. It gave up the ghost a few months ago. So the radio is set to a local classic rock and oldies station.

 

I'm 66 and retired. I wish I knew what I know now at 16 but it doesn't work that way. I also wish I was 16 but that ain't happening either. Oh well, sigh, slaps self upside of head, lol. "Snap out of it, Jim!"

Back to reality, I'm in good health (my colonoscopy last month went well and I don't have to have another one for three years) and have a pension check coming in. Children are in their thirties and forties and doing okay. I have a good woman. I go to bed when I please and get up when I please (translate as going to bed before midnight and getting up around eight or so - old habits die hard). No more working at oil refineries in the middle of winter in northern Alberta. Could be a lot worse so I'm thankful that I made it to retirement.

 

Wish I could feel as optimistic as you folks! 66 and waiting for the day.

 

30 replies in and no mention of Viagra?

 

What I like about being older is this: the things I care about now are more important than the things I don't care about. When I was younger, the opposite was true. That's a discovery that can only happen with time - there's no flash-of-light revelation involved.
Nostalgia - sure, I suffer from it sometimes, but I'm not offended if people don't get it. I can't expect someone who is 30 years younger than me to feel the same way about stuff they didn't live through.

 

I hear the older you get, the less you give a damn what others think. Must be nice!

 

But if you're a true codger, you don't give a damn about not giving a damn.

 

I wonder if the old timers (from when I was a youngster) were still as capable on guitar as many of us old timers are now. I don't know about that. Some for sure, but maybe nowhere near as many.

I am guessing that it's become much more acceptable (thanks aging rock stars!) to have kept on rockin', so it's a great time to be an old rock and roller.

 

I know it's a cliche', but "Better late than never" is a positive thing. We only live once and not only do you now have the joy of playing, but hopefully you, and all of us, will be playing for many many years to come. Hope!

 

Face it, if us geezers had had the inter-webs back when we was first learning to play, we never would have got beyond cowboy chords because we'd of fapped ourselves to death.

 

It's A Great Time To Be An Old(er) Guy!

Yeah I hear those colonoscopies are nearly pain free these days

 

50 to me is the start of the back nine

good things about turning 50?

- you're pretty good at certain things
- you have two decades of experience on any 30 year old
- you've aged out of most marketing bs
- you feel freer to speak your mind

pop tells me "don't get old" but it feels like a privilege

so far