Ken's Second

Marking a new decade at age 70, otherwise just another day

I reached a milestone, Sunday, June 29: I turned 70. I didn’t expect to still be alive, but I’ve beaten Mr. Death so far.

On the day before, friends and acquaintances asked me about my plans for Sunday. “To wake up,” I quipped. I’ve joked in recent years that at my age birthdays come and go; mostly, they go. One of my friends, Melissa, said she stopped having birthdays.

When I was younger, birthdays marked smaller milestones: turning 18, gaining the right to vote; and at 21, the right to buy alcohol and order drinks in a bar. I marked my 21^st birthday with a tour group of college-age adults in Amsterdam. However, I had the best of my memorable drunken nights at age 20 at dorm parties when I attended a state university in Central California.

Later birthdays mark other rites of passage. For instance, I considered age 35 – half a lifetime ago – the arrival of middle age. I had a strange experience that Friday. I worked two shifts on the desk of a daily newspaper in the northern Sacramento Valley to produce the Friday and Sunday editions. I received a call at home at 10 p.m. “Do you know who this is?” a female voice asked. I initially mentioned my niece’s name, then she asked for my age. “You’re told old,” she said before politely hanging up.

Then, we mark milestones with each following decade. AARP The Magazine features photos of celebrities reaching new decades starting at age 50; the magazine named Dana Carvey, Jimmy Smits and William Dafoe to the 70 club in the June/July issue. An odd-numbered year, age 65, is significant because Medicare kicks in.

Many of my birthdays have been mundane or otherwise forgettable. At the office, co-workers signed cards with occasional clever or stupid messages. I recall in the early 1990s employees at the aforementioned newspaper circulated a birthday card for a carrot-haired graphic artist in her early twenties named Gretta. Harold, a reporter, signed it with an irreverent greeting, “Who are you?”

I’ve tried to do something memorable for others on their birthdays. I send birthday cards (I’m old-fashioned) and gifts such as books to friends. I post messages on Facebook such as “Get your kicks at age 66.” When a friend turns 64, I send a link to the video of the Beatles song When I’m 64.

Sometimes acts of kindness can backfire. I treated Andrew, a tenant in my apartment complex in St. George, Utah, to dinner to celebrate his 34^th or 35^th birthday 10 years ago. Perhaps thinking I was gay, he questioned my intentions and consulted the apartment complex’s maintenance worker before accepting my friendly gesture. Then, after arriving at the restaurant, Andrew threatened to walk home if the server brought him a slice of a birthday cake, a tradition that goes back years. However, the worst thing that happened is Andrew spent what should have been an enjoyable dinner going on a paranoid rage, fearing the government would take away his guns. His outburst scared me and soured our friendship.

For the most part, birthdays are happy occasions. Bar patrons mark birthdays by bringing cupcakes or cake, with plenty to share. I occasionally buy someone a drink on that person’s birthday. I recall a woman brought her daughter, apparently on her 21^st birthday, to a Whiskey Row bar. “Buy baby doll a drink,” she implored. I obliged.

A real estate salesman named Jim received an unusual gift for his birthday a decade ago. He unwrapped the blowup doll for others to see at the Raven Café. I haven’t seen him in more than 10 years, so I don’t know whether he, his gift or both are still with us.

Musician Llory McDonald sings Happy Birthday whenever someone marking a birthday is attending the club where she performs with her band, Combo Deluxe. She has a bawdy sense of humor and closes by adding the line, “I hope you get ----.”

Sundays arrive after the Friday and Saturday night barhopping, and Sundays are my most solitary days. This past Sunday started no different, apart from my sister and my ex-girlfriend calling and my friend Sarah leaving me the birthday song in a voicemail while I was on the phone. After making my typical Sunday visit to the library, I sauntered over to the Bird Cage Saloon on Whiskey Row. Sarah bought me a pineapple/cranberry juice (we both avoid alcohol) and I danced with her and her sister,

Rebecca, to Scandalous Hands, a Prescott band. Trained as a ballerina, Sarah showed she still has the moves.

Word spread that I was marking my birthday, and some patrons expressed surprise when I disclosed my age. I showed one woman my driver’s license. “Seventy is the new 50,” another bar patron said. I also received more than 30 posts on my timeline on Facebook.

As we mark another year, I’m well aware that aging takes its toll. “What a drag it is getting old,” Mick Jagger of the Rolling Stones crooned on Mother’s Little Helper, released in 1966. The late cartoonist B Kliban drew a bent-over old man (shown in this comic panel). I have diabetes, arthritis, sleep apnea, hearing loss, a thinning hairline and dermatitis, and can’t keep up with others on hiking trails, even some who are older. I generally like to go home from clubs by 11 p.m.

I woke up today, and underwent my annual wellness exam at my nurse practitioner’s office. But like yesterday, today is just another day, to use the title of a Paul McCartney song.