Ask for the Senior Discount When Robbing Banks
Watching the news recently, I heard one of the newscasters refer to a bank robber as an elderly gentleman. Later in the broadcast he said the bank was robbed by a 68 year old man wearing a mask. Whoa, I thought, wait a minute, 68 is considered elderly? I’m in that age group, I never think of myself as elderly. This got me going to my Merriam-Webster to see what a dictionary defines as elderly. There it was, glaring back at me – the definition according to Merriam-Webster, el-der-ly – “rather old, much past middle age.”
I do not like that definition for a 68 year old bank robber and what is “rather old” anyway. This led me to look up definitions for more words that describe this time of life. I started with old, just plain ordinary old, “having lived for many years, not young.”
Okay, I thought, I can live with that. I know I’m not young. I have lived for many years, then again how does one define “many”? My quest continued. I looked up middle aged, “the period in a person’s life from about 40-60.” Hmmm, better scratch that one. How about senior, that’s not a bad term, gets me in to the movies cheaper, gets me a discount at many places, and the definition is good, “a person older than another.” Yes I like that one. I’m older than many others I know, plus I know many people older than I. So I can accept senior. Why didn’t they refer to that bank robber as a senior, surely he’s older than someone else?
Finally, I took a breath and looked up ancient, “very old, having lived or existed for a very long time.” Here we go again, a subjective word lurked in that definition, “very.” My mother lived to 90, her sister is 92, maybe that’s what is meant by “very.” But, if we go by this dictionary “very” must be older than “rather” which helps define elderly. Now I was getting confused. So I went to the thesaurus and found some synonyms for each of these terms. It got uglier. I found dowager and grey beard. I found old timer and golden ager to name but a few. And then I stopped looking. After all aren’t all these terms subjective? My 92 year old aunt is a young as she thinks she is. She drives herself places, she wears the latest styles, and she told me during our last conversation that she thinks she still has a great body. Is that ancient?
To me, aging, if you have your health, is just a part of living. We age every day and how we choose to define ourselves is just a choice of words. I like that my grandkids call me gramma. I don’t want any of those cutesy names that exist in place of that. I want to be called gramma. It is exactly where I want to be at this stage of life. I am most certainly a grandmother. This means I can spoil the children in ways I would not have spoiled my own kids. It means I can give the little one back to her mommy when she needs a diaper change and I can pick and choose when I see them. But even more, it means I am at a great time of life when I no longer work, no longer feel compelled to do all the holiday dinners and can sit back and rest on my laurels. So I’m no longer middle aged, older than just old, younger than ancient, definitely a senior, but elderly ????, I just can’t get passed that “rather old” in the definition. Next time, Mr. newscaster, just say bank robber when you refer to a 68 year old bandit – that will do just fine.
Category: Local News
