By Jim Hagarty
2018
I took 19 pills today. I take 19 pills every day. Six of them are to keep me from getting too good looking, and another six help keep my soaring intelligence quotient in check. The other seven treat a variety of other small issues such my tendency to be over hilarious, my relentless push to be too romantic, my desire to be the most generous person on the planet and my apparently unstoppable necessity to bullshit people.
I am pretty sure you know none of the pills are for any of that. What they are designed for is for me to keep seeing through my eyeballs, to keep all my limbs attached to my body, to keep my bones from turning into sponge toffee and to deal with all the fat I insist on stuffing into my gob each day.
The reason I tell you all this is to draw a contrast between my grandfather and me. I never met the man. He left this world six months before I arrived. But he lived to be 84 years old and I know for a fact that he did not swallow 19 pills every day. In fact, in his later years, when he was feeling a bit punky, he would go to the doctor and Dr. Pridham would check him out thoroughly then go to his cupboard and fetch him a bottle of pills.
“Now John, I want you to take one of these pills every day and make sure you don’t miss any days,” the doctor would say.
My grandfather did as he was told and immediately started feeling better. One pill a day was all it took. And the funny thing is, it wasn’t even a real chemical. It was candy. A placebo, I guess they call it. I don’t know if a doctor would get away with that today. Mind over matter.
So I am 67, choking down 19 pills a day, and hoping some day to see 84 but not at all sure I will. My Grandpa popped a piece of candy into his mouth every day and was on his way to 90 when Father Time intervened.
Of course, in his lifetime, 1866-1950, John Hagarty did a lot of hard work as a farmer. Most of it outside in the fresh air. The rest in his barn or shed. There was not much automation to ease the chores and the chores were hard and plenty. Cutting wood for the winter’s heating supply, for example.
And farmers of his generation knew a few other tricks a lot of us have forgotten. They went to bed early, took noon-time naps, ate well and hearty and protected themselves from the sun, by wearing straw hats and white shirts with the long sleeves rolled down and the collar buttoned.
Most importantly, they ate their candy as prescribed.
