by Red Green
Phase Five: The Revelation
You find yourself leafing through a Disney World brochure.
BUCKING TRENDS
I have a friend in the real estate business, and he was telling me how popular condos are with retirees. He then proceeded to list all the things that people no longer want in a home, which ended up being a pretty accurate description of the house I currently own.
Now, I know the logical decision would be for me to sell my house immediately at a huge loss and go and live in a condo with other people who have done the same thing, and then we could all get together on Saturday nights and reminisce about the good old days when we had backyards and garages. But I’m not going to do that.
There are two things I don’t like about trends. First, trends are like breezes—they have to keep moving to exist. So once you start following trends, you’re pretty much committing to a life on the road. Second, trends are for the sole purpose of making money. I’d rather eke out a living doing something I enjoy than make a fortune doing something I hate.
Maybe one day I’ll be able to make a fortune doing something I enjoy. But that won’t be a trend—it’ll be a miracle.
WHEN NOT TO SAY WHAT YOU’RE THINKING
• While the policeman is writing out the ticket.
• When your minister asks if you know any good jokes.
• While you’re at your in-laws’ house, sitting at the dining room table staring at the contents of your dinner plate.
• When the boss asks how you like his haircut.
• When your wife says, “What’s your problem?”
IN CASE OF AN ACCIDENT
(Cut this out and carry it in your car)
• Remove your seat belt. If you weren’t wearing your seat belt, remove the shards of windshield.
• Check all your passengers and make sure everyone agrees on the same story to tell the cops.
• Check for injuries. If none, immediately decide who will fake what for the insurance.
• If there’s any part of your car that is not damaged but you would like to have repaired free, damage it.
• Extinguish all smoking materials, including cigarettes, cigars, pipes, and passengers.
• Retrieve all passengers who were not wearing seat belts from nearby trees, ravines, rockslides, and under other vehicles.
• If there are flammable fluids spilled on the ground, mark out the perimeter of the spill with lit flares.
• If the other driver is behaving in an upset or aggressive manner, hit first and ask questions later. One bruise more won’t matter.
• Make sure you have your licence, ownership, and bribe money for witnesses.
HOW TO TELL WHEN YOU NEED A VACATION
A lot of people are working too hard these days. Here are some danger signs to watch for:
• You always look like you’ve had seven coffees.
• You come home from work and your entire family has their bathing suits on.
• You only ride elevators that feature reggae music.
• You put a tiny umbrella into your glass of Maalox.
• You look for a tie that goes with your Hawaiian shirt.
• You have money in the bank.
• When you smile, your wife doesn’t recognize you.
YOU’VE DONE A LOT BY COMPARISON
It’s human nature to compare ourselves with others, but sometimes as we get older, we need to look outside our own circle—or even species—in order to feel that we haven’t done badly. Take, for example, the sea turtle. It can live for a hundred years and yet its only accomplishment of any significance is laying eggs in the sand. You do that every month in the boardroom and you probably won’t make it past seventy-five. Or look at those giant redwood sequoia trees, or whatever they’re called. Some are more than two thousand years old, and they’re famous because people drive through them. Well, you let people walk all over you and you’re only forty-seven. So I say you’re doing just fine. Maybe if you lived to be two hundred we could expect more, but let’s not wish for too much of a good thing.
BODY CHECK
I was in a golf tournament recently and I couldn’t help noticing that the young lady in the refreshment cart was significantly underdressed. I’m not complaining. I’m just saying I didn’t know where to look. Well, actually I did know where to look—I just didn’t think I could get away with it.
I understand that people dress that way to attract the attention of members of the opposite sex, especially in their own age group. But this was a golf tournament made up mostly of old guys like me, so I figure her outfit was mainly a marketing ploy. And it was working. She was doing a brisk business and her tip jar was just one more thing about her that was full to overflowing. There were no victims here, so I decided to feel good about it. I elected to treat it as a medical checkup. If I could look at a beautiful young woman and have an emotional response, that would mean my body is still working. And if I could do that without in any way thinking she might find me attractive, that would mean my brain must be okay too.
THE BALANCE OF NATURE
I’m a great believer in maintaining a balance in the types of friends you cultivate. If you’re a middle-aged married guy, it’s important to hang out with an old married guy and a young engaged guy. That way, you’re ready to deal with every personal scenario. When you’re feeling confused and troubled, you can talk to the old guy and find out that he’s just as confused and troubled as you are, which means it obviously won’t kill you. And when you’re feeling successful and omnipotent, you can go and play squash with the young guy.
A GUIDE TO STREAMLINING
Nowadays, cars have really fancy streamlined bodies. Although anything you can afford will have a big, boxy, and ugly body. (I’ll resist the temptation to point out the similarities to you personally.)
Of course, streamlining isn’t new. We had streamlining back when I was a teenager. In fact, racing cars were really streamlined, with lightweight aluminum bodies that looked like this …
Unfortunately, your car doesn’t look like that. It’s not made of aluminum—it’s made of rust. And it looks like this …
But now you too can have a streamlined, racy-looking car. All you need to do is take that fourteen-foot aluminum boat you accidentally drove over the rocks last summer …
Then remove all the metal body parts from your car. (Don’t discard these, because I’m sure you’ll think of some great project you can use them for, like a walk-in closet or a spare bedroom.)
Next, take the boat and remove the outboard motor, again saving it because you might be able to use it someday for something, or maybe the guy who owns the boat may figure out that you took it and want it back.
Now turn the boat over and mount it on the car frame like this:
Add paddles at the back for fins, and there you go. Your very own Puntiac. Or an Oldsmoboat.
Now I actually took this a bit further, because when I removed some of the body panels, the engine fell out. So I took the outboard motor and mounted it on the back like this:
Then I duct-taped it in place, removed the prop and turned it into a hood ornament, and attached paddles to the propeller shaft of the motor. This car is now my biggest fan.
I started her up and what do you know …
I got a hundred dollars for it from the scrap metal dealer.
HOW TO BE REGRETFUL
I know that people tend to have regrets in their lives, and as they get older, these regrets can become debilitating. But you can’t go back and change any of them, and they can actually stop you from doing things now, out of fear that you’ll regret those things later. They tell me you must have regrets to be normal, though, so to keep the real bad ones out of my mind, I’ve made a list of reasonable regrets that are bad enough to make me feel a slight twinge of guilt, but not so terrible that I end up hating myself. Here are my regrets:
• Buying a car made in a Baltic country.
• Eating that second
pizza.
• Not going to the bathroom before riding the Scrambler.
• Not kissing my second girlfriend.
• Kissing my first girlfriend.
• Pulling Grandpa’s finger.
NO PEAKING
A lot of guys I know have a photograph of themselves in great physical shape. Maybe they were on the rowing team or running every day, or maybe they just had the time and motivation to work out on a regular basis. So they have this picture of themselves with a small waist and rippling muscles. It might be on a guy’s desk or somewhere in his home, or even worse, it’s buried deep in his mind. Every time he sees or even thinks about that picture, he is reminded of how the aging process has destroyed him. It’s been a constant deterioration from that earlier peak of physical prowess to the pitiful, flabby, lethargic, bald specimen he has now become.
I, on the other hand, have a picture of myself on the beach at the age of thirteen. My weight was within ten pounds of what it is now, and there is no physical evidence of any type of muscle. I can stand beside that picture at any time and comfort myself that I have not “started to sag” or “let myself go” or “lost a step.” I was out of shape at thirteen, and I’ve maintained it all these years. Nobody looks at my picture and says, “Wow, is that you?”
Instead of looking good for a year or two and then feeling bad my whole life, I opted for looking bad all the time and feeling good my whole life.
ARE YOU UP FOR IT?
There is a peculiar disease that has plagued the men in my family. In fact, it seems to apply to almost all men in all families. I think it’s called Riser’s Syndrome. There’s only one easy-to-spot symptom: as you get into middle age and beyond, you find yourself getting up earlier and earlier. A man who used to sleep till lunch at twenty-seven will leap out of bed at the crack of dawn at forty-eight.
And the disease seems to progress as you get older. Generally, you get up an hour earlier for every ten years of your age. If you were getting up at seven when you were thirty, you’ll get up at six at forty, you’ll get up at five at fifty, and so on. If you live long enough, you actually run the risk of getting up before you go to bed. That’s why older men start back-timing their bedtime. We yawn through dinner, nap on the couch, and generally try to hit the sack by 9:30 p.m. This can be very inconvenient for our wives and family, not to mention our dinner guests.
So I’ve come up with a solution. If you’re going to bed at 9 p.m. and getting up at 5 a.m., you’re getting eight hours’ sleep—they’re just not the right eight hours. You need to move east—two time zones east, to be precise, where 9 p.m. becomes 11 p.m. and 5 a.m. becomes 7 a.m. That’s acceptable for anybody. And in another ten years, you’ll have to move farther east. Keep doing this and you will always be keeping proper hours, no matter how old you get. Besides, I hear China is a great place to live.
HOW TO USE YOUR CAR TO GET WOMEN
Nothing turns women on faster than a great car, and nothing turns them off faster than the guy who’s driving it. The trick is to accessorize your car so that it screams “hunk,” and then keep your mouth shut or the relationship will go “thunk.”
The Colour
Women like flash. The kind of flash you do with a paint job, that is, rather than a raincoat. Paint your car a flashy colour: red, silver, deep blue. Avoid yellow, brown, and plaid. Be careful when choosing murals for your van. Horses and rock groups and spaceships are okay, but paintings of nude babes tend to attract gay women or, worse still, straight men.
Bumper Stickers
Decals are a reflection of your personality. “I Brake for Stray Dogs” suggests sensitivity, but “I Brake for Stray Dogs When I’m Hungry” sends a whole other message, and “I Brake for Stray Dogs When I’m Lonely” is just disturbing. You can send out the message that you’re a worldly, well-travelled guy with bumper stickers that say “Talladega Speedway Is for Lovers,” “We Saw the World’s Largest Road Apple,” or “I’d Rather Be in Go-Kart Universe, Wisconsin.” People generally believe that all signs lie, so having a decal that reads “I’m a Swell Guy” or “I’m Way Cool” or “Tested Negative” sends the exact opposite message. Try one that says “I’m Willing to Give Women One Final Chance—Apply Within.” It’s just the kind of challenge that women can’t resist.
Fur
If you really want to impress the ladies, you’ve got to get fun-fur seat covers in Day-Glo pink or tiger stripes. Trust me. And don’t just use old shag carpeting from your deck or try stretching out a velour sweater you got at a Star Trek convention. Spend the money and get the proper seat covers. They cost a bit, but they’ll save you a lot in flowers and candy.
Wheel Disks
It’s been my experience that most women don’t know the difference between, say, a ‘Cuda and a HemiCuda. It’s true. But they do recognize a great set of wheel disks. If you’re going out at nights, you can probably get away with a set of garbage can lids sprayed silver.
Add-ons
Mud flaps on the rear tires and a big leather cover to prevent the hood from stone chips also send a message that you are a sensitive, caring guy. At least when it comes to your car. And a woman is naturally curious to find out if you will have the same respect and concern for her. Even though no other guy she’s met with a car like yours did. The design on the mud flaps can make or break your chances. A top hat or a die looks very classy. A silhouette of a naked woman can be scary. Especially if you traced it.
Lights
The more lights you have adorning your vehicle the better. Cover the grill, the side mirrors, the rear window, and all the window trim with lights, then add fluorescent ground effects and even a laser beam coming out of your tailpipe. The appearance that the sun shines out of your exhaust pipe gets respect. If you have enough disposable income to completely cover your car with lights, do it. (Right after Christmas, hardware stores sell off strings of lights dirt cheap.) If you have enough bulbs, you can make your car look like something out of Close Encounters of the Third Kind, or that electric light parade at Disney World, or maybe even a galaxy. Stars give off light. If you give off light, you must be a star. (Don’t assume that hanging a moon will enhance this image.)
Sound
LOUD! Jack up the car and look along the exhaust pipe until you see a section that’s bigger than the rest. That’s the muffler. Hack the muffler off with a pickaxe. Now you’ve got some serious engine noise happening. Next, find a punk rock band that’s bankrupt. That shouldn’t be hard. If all you find is a punk rock band that’s doing well, wait a week. Buy all their equipment cheap or trade them for razor blades. Pile all the speakers and amps into your back seat and hook them up to your radio. Turn the bass up to where the car is hopping off the pavement and doing the Macarena. This not only lets the women know you can dance, but also tells the Catholic girls that you understand rhythm. (Do not turn the radio to an alltalk station. Women don’t like guys who are all talk.)
Make and Model
Don’t waste your money here. Only other guys care that it’s a 1968 Boss Chevy Nova in mint with Harley carbs, and you don’t want to attract guys, remember? Women couldn’t care less what kind of car it is. Once women see the lights and hear the racket, they’ll have made up their minds.
The Last Word
The key is to find a way not to be ignored. If you deck your car out the way I’ve described, the women will definitely notice. If they’re pointing and laughing, you can sneak around on foot and join them with comments like “Look at that piece of crap. What a loser.” Have a few laughs with them about it. They’ll like you. You’ll probably get to take them home. Call a cab. If you’re lucky, you won’t have to come and get your car till the morning.
HOW TO TELL WHEN YOUR COMPANY IS ABOUT TO DOWNSIZE
• During the lunch break, nobody can find the want ads because your boss has them.
• Your company just had a bad year. Or a good year. Or an average year.
• The company president traded in his BMW for
a Hyundai.
• Extra boxes of Kleenex are brought in for the directors’ meeting.
• The company replaces the nurse with someone named Kevorkian.
• Your office is being used to store Star Wars merchandise.
• Your boss tells the courier about your excellent work habits and asks if his company is hiring.
• Your request for a pay increase is met with stunned silence, then laughter.
• Everyone in senior management is spending most of the day in the restroom.
• You have shareholders.
YOU’RE NOT GETTING OLDER, YOU’RE GETTING MORE FOCUSED
Some people see the aging process as the law of diminishing returns. I prefer to look at it as nature’s way of coordinating knowledge, experience, and focus. As you lose your hair and vision and hearing and libido and general degree of attractiveness to members of the opposite sex—or any sex, of any species—you’re left to concentrate on your true purpose in life. I’m still not completely sure what that is, but for me it’s trending toward some combination of eating junk food, watching television, and complaining. I’m sure I’ll have a clearer picture any day now. I’ll keep you posted.
