[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 113 (Monday, July 29, 1996)]
[Senate]
[Pages S9078-S9079]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         ADDITIONAL STATEMENTS

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                         ADMIT A GENERATION GAP

 Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, recently the Nashville News, of 
Nashville, IL, carried a column by Grover Brinkman, a former newspaper 
editor who is now 93 years old and lives in Monroe County, IL.
  What he wrote for the Nashville News is a great combination of wisdom 
and humor. Those of us who have acquired the status of senior citizen--
I am now 67--can appreciate the wisdom handed down by a 93 year old.
  I ask that the Nashville News article by Grover Brinkman, be printed 
in the Record.
  The column follows:

                         Admit A Generation Gap

                          (By Grover Brinkman)

       How does one accept senior status with grace? Good 
     question, isn't it! Perhaps some sage will have the right 
     answer some day, but it's debatable.
       One can turn hermit and play checkers in a nursing home. Or 
     perhaps a better way . . . face the ticking clock in a 
     humorous vein that has no negatives.
       Or if deep thinking is part of your waking hours, check out 
     some of the following questions:
       Do you remember the time when you dimmed the lights for 
     romantic reasons? Now you replace the 100 watt bulbs with 40s 
     as an economy measure to stretch your Social Security 
     dollars.
       There are many memories of voluptuous gals in a halter and 
     bikini; now a bit of this memorbilia triggers your pacemaker 
     and raises the garage door.
       Your house is much too large at the moment. When the kids 
     were growing up, it was just the opposite.
       A rocking chair was once used by grandma, now you're in it.
       You bite down on one of those luscious red apples from the 
     Pacific Northwest, and your newly-acquired dentures stay 
     there.
       You satisfy a whim to have your palm read, but the seer 
     instead concentrates on your forehead, for the lines there 
     are more distinctive.
       You always insisted that burning the midnight oil was the 
     routine that made life livable; now end of day seems to be 
     nine o'clock.
       You read only the headlines in the morning paper, for your 
     tired eyes can't decipher the seven-point body text.
       You get winded playing a game of dominoes with your 
     grandson.
       Most of the seniors at the center carry little black books, 
     but now they contain only names with an added M.D.
       If you get an occasional gleam in your eyes, it's probably 
     the sun bouncing off your tri-focals.
       Your realize that your entire body aches, and what doesn't, 
     won't work. Even your toes at times have toothaches. (Or 
     would the word toe-aches be better?)
       Your children have a middle aged look, and your grand-kids 
     are six feet-plus basketball giants.

[[Page S9079]]

       You walk holding your head high, necessary to see the 
     potholes high, necessary to see the potholes in the walk 
     through your tri-focals.
       You're still 15 around the collar, 54 around the waist, and 
     90 on the golf course.
       When you go for a haircut, the barber trims more hair out 
     of your nose and eyebrows than on your balding head.
       Presumably you're well-versed, know most of the answers to 
     today's problems, but no one asks for your opinion.
       All your peers talk about the golden years, but you doubt 
     if they have as much shiny metal as a new penny.
       You used to take a pill or two at bedtime to keep a 
     vigorous health, now they advise one to help you sleep.
       Even a sip of your favorite wine seems to aggravate your 
     ulcer, so you drink skim milk instead, remembering when you 
     were a boy growing up on a boon-docks farm, they used skim 
     milk only for hogs. Today it costs about as much as the real 
     article. 'Taint fair!''
       You awake at seven, at least with a bit of ginger in your 
     time-tossed frame; by the noon hour you've degenerated well 
     past 60, and by bedtime you're a centurion, too tired to put 
     proper emphasis in a prayer.
       You try to be entertaining, reciting pleasant memorabilia, 
     but the young crowd think only of athletics, so you realize 
     that you're trying to bridge a generation gap, and it simply 
     doesn't work.
       You despise nursing homes, but deep down you realize that 
     they are the only bus stations, offering bed and board, 
     between here and a tombstone.
       One of your role models, the late Dr. Norman Vincent Peale, 
     insisted that the only way to solve life's problems was in 
     daily positive thinking, but you admit that on many things 
     you're as negative as the minus-post on your car battery.
       In your youth, you couldn't wait to tie the knot with your 
     best gal and start a family; now you fumble in tying the 
     knots in your shoe laces.
       Health authorities insist that you include plenty of fiber 
     in your daily diet, but a bowl of chicken soup is far easier 
     to masticate.
       You love chocolate in all of its forms but your arthritis 
     does not.
       When more and more people, some of them strangers, keep 
     calling you Pops, you know definitely that a generation gap 
     exists.
       Leg cramps are now a nightly experience. But as a 
     youngster, the only cramps you knew were deep stomach 
     wretching called cholera morbus, after you'd eaten too many 
     green apples.
       But it's still a good life despite negative viewpoints. In 
     fact it's the only thing left, come to think of it. You're 
     old, stubborn as the proverbial Missouri mule, but still 
     confident that you'll be around for a few more moons, 
     awaiting the day when the good Lord throws in the final 
     towel.
       There is one consoling thought in this treatise on 
     longevity--scores of old friends are up there, holding open 
     the gate. Some of them, with genes shorter lived than mine, 
     have been holding open that gate for a long time.
       I don't have the genes of a Methuselah, but I'm running 
     neck and neck with Bob Hope, and that would tickle anyone's 
     hormones. Grow old, but don't let senility be a part of 
     it!

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