Inside looking out: Crock of ages

The aging mind can be a terrible thing.

Our bodies grow old. Our minds stay young. I think like a 30-year-old, but after I look in the mirror, I hear my 60s-plus body laughing and saying, “Don’t kid yourself. Remember the year you were born.”

My mind tells me to take a 3-mile hike along the scenic Lehigh River. Play a game of basketball. Hit 50 ground balls to my son. Work in the yard all day long until sunset. Unload five pallets from the food pantry truck at the church.

My body says, “Do it, wise guy, but you’d better get those ibuprofen pills ready because I’m gonna be hurtin’!

My mind doesn’t fear falling down the stairs. I’m going downhill and gravity makes moving my body easier. I’m more likely to fall up the stairs. My legs don’t pick my feet high enough to lift me over the edge of each step. The last time I tripped and nearly fell on my face, my body yelled, “Whew! That was close. You’d be screaming, ‘Help! I’ve fallen and I can’t get up!’ ”

Sometimes the aging mind can be a beautiful thing. When I go to concerts at Penn’s Peak to see tribute bands for Bob Seger, AC/DC, The Rolling Stones, and Creedence Clearwater Revival, we senior rock fans are time machined back to the late ’60s and early ’70s, when electric guitar riffs and long drum solos blasted through sound arenas with mind-blowing escapes from reality. Our collective minds of white hairs and smooth baldies become young once again, rocking to songs that bring back memories of muscle cars, back-seat kisses, and late-night cheeseburgers eaten inside neighborhood ma and pa diners.

At the end of our lives, our bodies have the final say. I go to funerals now instead of weddings, and conversations with my Woodstock hippie friends have transitioned from bragging about the girls we loved and lost to whining about our Medicare Part B coverage and our monthly Social Security benefits.

Much of my time is spent with 40-somethings because I have young children who play youth sports. These are prime timers whipping up complaints about their jobs, their hectic schedules, and the umpire behind the plate who just called their kid out on strikes. I love to hear their banter of insults.

“Hey, Nick, when you look down, can you see your feet? What did you eat for breakfast today, a dozen eggs with a side of a horse?”

“You forgot to ask me about the loaf of toasted bread covered with a pound of butter. And I needed a snow shovel to scoop up my home fries.”

The higher side of 60 brings incessant hypochondria.

“I can’t bend down to tie my shoes, anymore,” said Lou.

“When I get up in the morning, I feel like the Tin Man from the Wizard of Oz,” joked Will. “Once I lube my joints with a can of WD-40, I’m good to go.”

“The best cure for the body is a quiet mind,” said Napoleon Bonaparte. I wonder if anyone can ever really empty his or her mind while not sleeping. In fact, I’d like to tell my mind to shut up so I can fall asleep

At any age, especially when you lie down at night, the body begs the mind to rid itself of stress.

“You’re killing me,” says the body. “I’m getting chest pains and I feel tension everywhere, You gotta help me out here!

The mind has a debate with itself.

“You have to take control and change what you do and how you think,” is one thought. “Be proactive and the stress in your body will go away.”

“You need to give up trying to control your life. What if your expectations cannot be realized,” says another thought. “That will only cause more stress. Focus on good moments that come your way. Enjoy them and your stress will depart naturally.”

Life is too short to be sitting my body down in a rocking chair or plopping it onto a couch next to a bag of potato chips.

“Get up and go out and live!” says my stubborn mind to my tired body. “Go at it hard and fast. Walk those 3 miles along the Lehigh. Don’t think about how much you will ache at the end of the day.”

I just have to make sure my mind remembers where I put that bottle of ibuprofen, and then once I’ve slammed down the pills after my hike, I’m going to reward my body for bearing the pain of exercise

“Sit down on the couch now and eat that bag of potato chips,” I’ll tell my body. “I’ll flip the cap off a cold one for you, too.”

Ah, finally, my mind and my body are happy together!

Rich Strack can be reached at katehep11@gmail.com.