Some Common Denominators

How was your day?  Mine was pretty good, but busy.  We live in a retirement community in the Rio Grande Valley in Texas.  Most of us who live here have purchased our homes from the same mobile home retailer.  Each year this man holds a customer appreciation dinner at a local hall.  There’s food, beer and soda, door prizes and a great band.  While we were visiting with friends, enjoying the music and dancing around a crowded floor I couldn’t stop thinking of how happy everyone looked.  We were whooping it up.  By, “we” I mean a room of over 500 old, gray, paunchy, wrinkled, and remarkably spry retirees.  We are people you never see pictured in ads or on television drama.  We are not sculpted, nipped, tucked or liposucked.   We are ordinary people, having a good time and loving life.   And that doesn’t even include the great band.  The saxophonist used to play back up for Elvis Presley.  The singers were top rate.  The female vocalist played the bass guitar and sang like a slightly less smoky Keely Smith.  They were all in their 60’s, 70’s or 80’s and they, too, were whooping it up. 

            I am sure that our children would think we were all a little crazy.  The hard work of earning a living and raising responsible child behind us, we are now busy proving that you are never too old to have a happy childhood.  The realities of old age are not eluding us.  There were a lot of artificial hips and knees on that dance floor.  But between all of the rigors of advancing age, we are squeezing in as much fun as we can.  And it comes easy.  We are active, involved and aware.  We also have many things in common.  I think these commonalities are important.

First of all, let’s look at the businessman who held the dinner dance.  He clearly is a good salesman and part of that is encouraging new business.  All of the former customers he invites are asked to bring four friends.  We are willing to do that, which means he is someone with whom we are happy to maintain a relationship.  He is a successful businessman because he has an eye for a marketable product, is reliable and honest.  He employs less than one hundred people, but they are good people. 

What about the band?  They pursue their passions.  Not being in the lime light doesn’t keep them from doing what they love.  Slowing down doesn’t mean stopping. 

Next, let’s look at the retirees.  There were nine of us at our table.  The common denominators were hard work, frugal living and attention to detail.  Most of the people at that table did not have a college education, but all of us had worked hard from childhood on.  There were no, “trust fund” babies at our table.  We started punching some one’s clock while still in high school and had kept it up all our lives.  Many of us had worked two jobs at a time.  None of us had lived high, wide and handsome.  We lived within our means, not within our imagination.  None of us smoke.  We all take some exercise.   The result seems to be a happy retirement. 

There is a lesson here, but I’m not sure it is the easy answer that some people want.  It is a lifetime of hard work, purposeful, intelligent and disciplined living.  It is personal responsibility, not government intervention.  It is, “us” deciding to be happy, not, “them” looking after us. 

Don’t look for easy answers and keep the faith.