Wednesday, December 20, 2017

Senior Economics

I just finished reading an article in the January/February ATLANTIC ("Choke-Proof Food" - Rene Chun) Which talks about the problems an aging population is posing for Japan.  A fourth of the country is now over 65.  By 2060 that percentage is projected to rise to 40.

This, according to Chun, does not bode well for Japan's economy.  Elderly drivers are causing more accidents.  Old folks are falling off too-fast escalators.  Chun doesn't mention it, but I can imagine what the lines in grocery stores are like with shaky codgers digging through fanny packs for valuable coupons.  And what about the rash of coughing fits at huge all-you-can-eat buffets?  It gives one pause.

But the Japanese, ever resourceful, are figuring out a way for this onslaught of seniors to turn into a cash bonanza.  Escalator companies are enjoying the rising (so to speak) need for slow speed escalators.  Self driving buses for seniors are going into mass production.  Shopping carts are being equipped with magnifying glasses.  Video arcades are installing benches and games designed to ward off dementia.  Arcade Staffers are getting certified as "service attendants."  But the biggest economic coup has to be Softia G, a nutritional therapy product from Nutri Co.  Sofia G provides the means to turn "hard" foods into pureed blobs.  With Softia G a senior can, for example, take a salmon steak, puree it in a special blender, then reshape it into a salmon steak complete with grill marks, and then wolf it down without needing someone to stand by who is expert in the Heimlich Maneuver.  This is an idea whose time has come.  Just think how much quieter it will be at The Golden Corral.

There are other products whose time has come.  I'm thinking of starting a new business (the new tax overhaul will certainly facilitate this) to fill this senior niche.  Kathie saw a special report on some Sunday morning show that highlighted a large blue plastic boot-like contraption that would enable seniors with stiff backs to put on their socks without having to bend.  Let the market do its thing and boost these blue sock thingees into an investor's dream come true.

Two way earbuds would be a godsend for a lot of the seniors I hang out with.  Set them on receive and they act as hearing aids.  Reverse them to block out unwanted noise at hipster restaurants.

Coupon organizers would be nice.  It would speed up lines at the grocery store and prevent millennials from being apoplectic as they wait in line behind some old codger.

A Geezer Alert app would be welcome.  Seniors, the ones who still remember how to work a smart phone, could simply point the camera at themselves and take a picture.  The app would supply immediate advice about that day's outfit.  Do things match?  Do you really want to wear those calf high white socks with your wingtips and shorts?  Are you making an embarrassing attempt to look younger than you are?  Such an app would go a long way toward smoothing over embarrassing social interactions.

I'm saving my best idea till last.  How about walkers that can instantly convert to shopping carts with the push of a button?  A wobbly old person might be using his walker to cruise the mall.  If he sees someone walking toward him looking sympathetically toward his sad device, he can simply press the button and Voila, he's pushing a shopping cart. "Hey, I'm not old," the old guy might say. "I'm homeless."  Think of all the humiliation that will save.


Sunday, December 17, 2017

Waiting By The Stage Door

I have a recurring dream where I am in the basement holding Willa tightly while waves of radiation from an inevitable nuclear cataclysm slowly eat away at us.  In another fun dream, I am with all four of my grandgirls in the wilderness that used to be the C-470 corridor.  I am helping them, Cormac McCarthy style, find food and drink while fending off attacks of marauders transformed by nuclear devastation.  Those are my dreams lately.  I don't dream about stupid tax bills, or presidential faux pas, or frustrating Bronco games, or even about verbal fights with all the black Republicans at the Y.  I dream about protecting my grandchildren.

I don't worry about my health as much as I used to.  My children and their spouses are pretty much who they are and I couldn't be happier with them.  No bad dreams there.  And as much as I still worry about Kathie's health, I don't dream about dread cancer scenarios any more.  My grandchildren have become my primary focus, number one on my agenda.

Before Boss Tweet's election, I mentioned to a conservative friend at the Y that the environment was my main issue.  I didn't want my grandchildren growing up in a world where they would have to tread water.  Bob, my friend, said he didn't want his grandchildren growing up in a country that had an unsustainable debt.  That's why he was going to vote for Trump.  I wonder what his rationale is to the $1.5 trillion Trump and his minions are going to add to that deficit and eventually to the national debt?

Oh well, if my dream scenario comes true we won't have to worry about debts or treading water or anything anymore.  I take a perverse comfort in that.

In the meantime, I will bask in the glow emanating from my grandkids.

We saw Chris' production of "Home for the Holidays" at Lone Tree yesterday afternoon.  My twenty-three year old grandson Sage was up on stage singing bluesy versions of Christmas carols and engaging the audience with his huge voice and even huger smile.  Sammi, who had recently tripped on the stairs at her home and could barely walk, was there in the kids chorus being a trooper just like she always is.  And there was Brooklyn, who is always the only person on stage I can look at, moving and singing like only she can.  I cried through the entire production because it was so damn good.

A lot of my life has been spent waiting outside stage doors to congratulate my kids after great shows.  When they were in high school, I never missed a performance and even made it to the majority of their rehearsals.  I was so proud of them, but mostly I loved living vicariously through their achievements.  The same thing with the grand kids.  Sammi came out first and was assaulted by hugs all around.  Sage came out a few moments later and I hugged him and assured him that he was the best one in his row.

Brooklyn always seems to be the last one out of the dressing room and yesterday was no exception.  The thing is that every emotion she is feeling is immediately written on her face.  God, how I love that face.  I remember after a show at PACE a few years ago, Brooklyn just stood right outside the stage door waiting to be loved.  I'll never forget the little smile and the anticipation written all over her.

Yesterday was a little different.  In the second act, she missed her entrance and had to stay off stage for the "Twelve Days of Christmas" number.  It was her one solo in the show and she blew it.  One of the other kids saved the day by singing Brooklyn's lines.  Brooklyn was devastated and her barely dry tears were clear for all of us to see.  I think she might have been a little afraid to face her father.  I don't blame her.  Future super stars aren't supposed to miss entrances.

On the other hand, what's one missed cue when there was that glorious, tear stained face to contend with?  I'll bet she has recovered nicely.  All I know is that I can't wait for her next performance.

Friday, December 1, 2017

The end of White Male Privilege: What has the world come to?

There is an episode during the first year of "The Andy Griffith Show" where Ellie, Fred the druggist's niece, is new in town, just come back from pharmacy school in Mount Pilot I suppose.  Andy ends up asking her to the town picnic and dance that weekend and she agrees.  Of course, Andy, more Barney-like in the early seasons, somehow tells himself that he was tricked into asking her out as part of Ellie's devious scheme to get a husband.  He is convinced when Opie comes home with a free ice cream cone given to him by the desperate female.

He tries to throw her off the track by getting eligible bachelors around town to go into the drugstore and flirt with the new female druggist, but Ellie gets wind of Andy's behavior when Opie--it is always Opie--enters and repeats some of Andy's lunatic ravings.  Ellie quickly informs Andy that she wouldn't go to the picnic and dance with him if he were the last person on earth and to prove it she throws herself at the next person to walk through the door--wouldn't you know it--Barney.

It all ends happily.  Ellie and Opie, with Andy acting as chaperone, go to the picnic.  The episode ends there.  One can only wonder what happens after the dance.

I think it was my son Nate who once commented--if it wasn't him, it should have been--that the answers to all the questions in life can be found in "The Andy Griffith Show."  I just saw the above episode for the umpteenth time this morning on Sundance and it has crystallized my thinking on sexual politics.

Andy's attitude, while exaggerated, is kind of a cultural norm.  Men are full of themselves.  They can be shy and bumbling, the little dears, but eventually they'll act like assholes.  Women, at least the ones we are bombarded with on situation comedies, usually end up in control of the relationship and make their male halves look like bumbling morons.  But the thing is that this woman-in-control thing is always portrayed ironically.  As if to say, we all know that it is the man who is in charge, but wouldn't it be funny if it were the other way around?  Some joke.

Look at the difference in how we talk about acting out sexually.  Before the recent storm of sexual allegations--every "famous" man in America must be looking over his shoulder--male sexual predators were called leches, ladies' men, wolves, cocksmen, sugar daddies, babe magnets, studs, etc. Besides the term rapist, I can't think of a single term for a male sexual athlete that has a negative connotation  What do we call women who act out sexually, either for real or in our male imagination?  Slut.  Whore.  Hot for It.  Gagging for It.  Hot to trot.  Ho.  Easy.  Nympho.  I cannot think of a single word to describe this behavior with a positive connotation.

Definitions belong to the conquerers and it is pretty obvious who is doing the defining in this situation.

But it looks like things are changing.  "Me too" is starting to do a little defining of its own and that has only added to the rash of bad years old white males, the ones in my demographic, are having.  It appears at first glance that white males have regained their precious supremacy, at least for a little while.  But that doesn't change the fact that for a long time now, white males have been noticing the steady erosion of their power.  Long time neighborhoods have been changing their complexion.  It won't be long before whites are in the minority.  They already are in some areas.  (You can tell which because those are the areas that have been the most heavily gerrymandered.)  There are gay people on television!  There are lesbians getting married!  A black family occupied The White House!  A woman had the temerity to run for president!  Worse than that, women have the vote!  And as a final insult, it looks like women want to be equal sexually as well.  It is one more entitlement being stripped away from white male privilege and it is scaring the shit out of them.

Those poor white guys, embodied by our President, are discovering (well some are) that they can't talk the same way they used to.  They can't act the same way.  And if they want to get along, they can't even think the same way.  Trump's crotch grabbing braggadocio secured him a lot of votes.  Old white guys who tend to vote for all things Trump think that's the way you're supposed to talk.  To see a beautiful woman in front of you on the golf course and to comment that there is nothing better than great pussy is what a man's man is supposed to do.  I'll bet John Wayne said stuff like that all the time.  And if Rock Hudson hadn't been gay he would have probably said the same thing.  But now, if you are a member of the fake news media, you get fired for saying, thinking, or doing such things.  Of course, if you are a Republican running for office, you get elected.

What has the world come to?