By Jim Hagarty
2015
Awareness is often slow in coming and it sometimes arrives like a hammer blow rather than a feather brush.
All my life I have teased older people about their advanced years believing they were fine with it. They chuckled and others within earshot did too. A man I know wears a ball cap with “100” printed on the front. I think he got it at the centennial of local town. So I have told him on numerous occasions in front of our mutual friends that I wish I had a cap with my age printed on it. A crowd-pleaser of a comment, it seemed. My cleverness confirmed with every such quip.
Today I was dealing with a couple of men from the gas company. One of them was in his 30s. Somehow the topic turned to hockey and I reflected on how the game was played in the 1800s when it first became organized.
“Were you at some of those games?” the young man asked me in front of his partner. My jaw dropped and I smiled, or grimaced perhaps. It hurt big time.
And I was struck by two things. One, that the young man who was a total stranger to me thought I would be OK with being called old. Plus he had judged me based solely on my appearance. And having been so identified as old. I felt old all day. Aches and pains, shuffling, limping, wistful.
The young man did me a favour. I owe my centennial friend an apology. My hope is he never hurt like I did all day long.
